The quote from my post is from the US CONSTITUTION! (HINT: It doesn't apply in this case.)
M$'s troubles with that big fine is in the EUROPEAN UNION! So like I mentioned, I don't know EU law, so I don't know what they would do. But I doubt that M$ would actually refuse to pay a fine - they might use legal tactics to draw out the day when they actually have to write the check, but no publicly owned company would actually refuse to pay....and I don't think they'd "auction" M$ property - assuming EU law allows for such, it would simply be confiscated. Results the same, but gitcher terms straight - it makes a difference legally...
I didn't say impossible - your post only underlines what I said - which is that if the gov't tried what you propose, lawsuits would ensue, whereupon the courts would have the final say. At which time, the laws would apply, whether the loser is the gov't or not.
Ok, argue semantics between the term democratic or republic, but in either case, I hardly think that the law would fail to apply. Besides, both the EU and the US are republican in nature, since both use a representative form of government, so your semantic argument hardly changes the nature of my point. I was using the term democratic as opposed to totalitarian, since obviously the latter would have no trouble at all in taking the actions you seem to think appropriate.
There is plenty of court precedent to the existance of intellectual property, and I hardly think your position would be any kind of a slam dunk in the courts. US law (based upon that Fifth amendment) is traditionally slanted against allowing the government to take property, and I hardly think the courts would take lightly the idea of removing a copyright from a product like Windows just on the basis of anti-trust law, given that there is no basis in law at present for such action. If you think there is, please cite either case law or a specific law that allows such a drastic measure.
Besides, your cite in US law would hardly solve the issue, since we're talking about the EU here, and I can not claim any knowledge of EU law. For all I know, there may be specific provisions to do just that. After all, EU has no specific bill of rights like we do.
So maybe someone with a knowledge of what EU law allows could step in here and enlighen us?
In a DEMOCRATIC country, laws apply to the government as well. In the US, the constitution only allows the taking of property (real, personal, or intellectual) in cases of public need, and requires the gov't to reimburse the private party for that property. That takes care of the idea of them being able to cancel a copyright or such arbitrarily, without payment (certainly not on a single company - as a class, removing copyright protection from a whole class of products, may be a different case, but would still spark a hell of a lot of lawsuits.) And such actions would entail some consequences, both economically, and legally. I'd be surprised if there weren't some such protections built into the EU structure, as well, tho certainly not in the same class with our constitutional bill of rights.
No, I agree with you, M$ will probably end up paying these fines, and they should. M$ is a publicly held corporation, and as such, is beholden to its shareholders for its conduct. They may pay these fines, but I seriously don't think they'll challenge the EU by threatening to withdraw from the market. M$ shareholders would have a fit.
A law is not an agreement. Yes, the EU can force M$ to share the information they are contending about because M$ is breaking the law by engaging in illegal monopolistic activities. That is not forcing an agreement, it is enforcing the law. A democratic government still has to obey all the laws that apply to its citizens, and most democratic countries have independant court systems to force that compliance.
Of course, a totalitarian country can pretty much do as it pleases, and they often do, so yes, there, they can force agreements, which is really just forcing compliance with a specially crafted law, not an agreement per ce. But if they do so to an internationally based company, they'd better be prepared for the consequences, which is the pullout of most internationally based companies from that country to protect themselves. Sovereign countries may be able to do things companies cannot, but they are not always powerful enough to take the consequences. International mega corporations are not powerless, even tho they don't have armies. Most totalitarian countries are not big enough with strong enough economies to withstand the withdrawal of companies that bring in hard cash. So yes, they can, but not without paying for it.
Uh, I don't know what universe YOU live in, but in THIS one, democratic govements like the EU can't just "write their own contracts"...
A contract, in every legal jusrisdiction that uses a legal system similar to that is the US or the EU, is an agreement between two or more parties, where a valuable consideration is exchanged, and mutually agreeable terms are negotiated. A democratic government cannot force an agreement on an independant party.
They would definitely look into third party alternative, tho, and many EU governments are doing just that. Several German cities have gone OSS in recent years.
Sorry, I wasn't aware that we were talking about putting Macs in an enterprise environment. But, just because you have never SEEN macs deployed there, doesn't mean that they aren't. I know that there are numerous companies that have Mac environments; I've seen news reports of companies moving to Macs en mass - as well as school districts, too - indeed, whole states (albeit, SMALL states...). Since I hear you asking such questions as "Is there a centralized management capability? " tells me that you don't know enough about them to be able to knowledgeably question their capabilitites - you don't know what they are. (Yes, they do it's called 'remote desktop', and it does allow scripting.)
Don't get me wrong - I've never supported Macs in a large enterprise - mine doesn't allow Macs. So I don't have more than a theoretical knowledge myself of that environment regarding Macs. I do know, from what I read of others' experiences, and technical publications, that Macs can exist very well in the enterprise - they are actually more compliant with standard protocols such as tcp/ip than Microsoft is.
I won't try to say that Macs can scale to the level that PC can. I know that Apple hasn't tried to make them do that, and that's well known among techies, even those of us that support Apple. But they ARE good network citizens, and are capable of existing on an AD network.
Again, I can't speak for your experiences - although, I'll never own another Epson printer as long as I live!
Sorry I lost you - but look up some history of the Muslim conquest the early years - it is well documented that Muslim armies forced conversion. I didn't make that up. I don't doubt your quotes - I've read them! But just because they're in the book doesn't mean that they'll get followed every time by everybody. Same with Chrisitanity. And I didn't claim that all Muslim expansion was forced, either. The history of the expansion of Islam into India is markedly different from the armed expansion across Northern Africa into Spain.
The caliphate establishment I speak of is not the same thing you are talking about. Most moderate muslims do not espouse the establishment of sharia as a dominant form of a system of justice, that is mostly a goal of more fundamentalist groups. Muslim countries that allow alcohol or pork do not use sharia as a system of justice, it is often used, tho as a guide to secular law making. Fundamentalists, tho, wish to establish it as a dominant or sole system of justice - see how the Taliban ruled Afganistan.
As I said, do NOT try to drink alcohol in Saudi Arabia, it is strictly banned there - certainly in public institutions. But then, Islam is certainly no different than Christianity, in that different people and cultures practice it and adhere to it in different ways and to differing degrees.
But none of this changes what I said about the goals of the "fundamentalist" terrorist groups.
In reality, they are using Islam as a sham front to disguise their true goals. They really do not adhere to a strict form of Islam, if they did, they would consider the destruction of the twin towers as part of Holy War to have been heretical, since the Koran forbids the destruction of infrastructure in a Holy War. It does NOT allow any exception to the killing of Muslims, either, and forbids the killing of innocent civilians in a Holy War, too. But these are all hallmarks of Al Qieda and their operations, as well as stated principals, and were all accomplished in the 9/11 attacks.
Holy War as practiced and supported by moderate versions of Islam, is supposed to be a defensive war, and not one of expansionism or terror. It forbids the taking of the life of an enemy combatant if he has put down his weapon in surrender, and forbids the killing of prisoners. These, too, are halmarks of the terrorists.
Yes, I've been trained - by Apple products that DO "just work"! It's called experience, and I've used Macs since 1987, and most of mine have worked for years, without problems. All of the old Macs I passed on to others after buying new Macs have been working up to 10 years after they were first purchased!
Sorry I have to decline your kind offer of help - but as a support professional that has been trained to support Windows, I help folks like yourself every day at work, when their Windows based products DON'T!
Have a nice day the next time you have to reformat your HD and reload Windows to rid yourself of spyware or viruses that my Mac won't run!
When was that? 1999? I don't wonder - with the older OS, OS 9 or older, that was often the case, because of manufcturers failing to provide drivers, and also due to apple not always adhering to standards.
I've owned Macs since 1987, and I can state with no qualms at all that since 2000, and the advent of Mac OS X 10.2 (and to an extent, 10.3), I have had NO trouble at all using peripherals, or even standard upgrade parts such as memory, HDs, printers, scanners, PCI cards, etc. in any Mac I've owned since then.
I work as a support professional with the Feds, supporting PCs and Micro$oft windows based software, since my agency is M$ centric, and refuses to use anything not branded M$, unless they just don't make it. I also support friends and family that have Macs, and can state without reservation that Macs are infinitely easier to support than PCs. Adding peripherals to a Mac is just as easy as plugging it in, 99% of the time. At the office, when a user wants to get a peripheral added, it usually takes a support professional to do it, and watching the support tickets, as well as doing these things myself as well, I KNOW that it is often not nearly as simple to add such peripherals to PCs. Seeing the hoops we often have to go through, and the tricks we need to know to force things to work in Windows, its no mystery to me how Apple can claim, with real honesty, that things in OS X "just work" - because they mostly do!
I don't doubt that you may have had problems - Apple is staffed with human beings, and human systems produce products that have mostly predictable failure rates. Some people just have bad luck to get those lemons - I often read posts in this and other forums by Mac users that do have such bad luck - they take their products back to Apple under warranty, and Apple fixes or replaces those products, as such warranty allows, from what I've read. Many times, I have called Apple, sometimes months past my telephone support warranty expiration, and Apple support people have helpfully assisted me anyway. Often, I have found, that if you have recently bought a piece of software from them, even if the hardware phone support (90 days) has passed, and your question has nothing to do with that software - they'll help you with that unrelated issue anyway, if it's just a software issue and does not require hardware return or replacement.
Your milage may vary, and if you had bad experiences with Apple, I'm sorry for it, but your experience does not necessarily extend to the experiences of all users, nor the actual operability of the Mac OS over all. By and large, Apple's systems DO just work, and they have a valid claim to market their products using that slogan.
I'm going to reply to your post - late as it is, because I think it rates a reply.
As to your first paragraph, they leave Norway and Sweden alone because neither country is a threat to their plans. Although you'll note the trouble a certain newspaper got into a while back over some cartoons...
As to the second point... I want to stress that my comments apply to the terrorists in general, that are allied loosely to Bin Laden and his ilk, NOT the Palestinian groups fighting Isreal, and NOT to Muslims in general. so, having stipulated that... as to Muslims in general, no, you're right, they mostly don't care what we do. We can sit here and wallow in sin (by their standards) and they really don't care - as long as we do it here, at home. In a LOT of Muslim countries, you'd better refrain from doing those things, they are illegal in most Muslim countries, at least the most strict of them. And, no you won't get pork in a muslim country, animals with split hooves are unclean - no muslim will touch one, even to serve to a christian. The meat cannot be handled in the same kitchen with their own food!
I did not say Muslims have anything in common with Hitler or Nazis - read my f***in' post! I said the terrorist groups are using the same TACTICS Hitler did to gain power in Germany in the 1930's. So did many communist groups in different places and times. Tactics are non-denominational - anybody can use them, regardless of their religious beliefs or lack of same...
"If the US reversed policy..." GET REAL! Not gonna happen, in this world or the next, regardless of whether the Dems or Repubs are in power. Bin Laden and every terrorist leader knows it too. So do all of the leaders of most Muslim countries. That's why they have chosen to use that particular set of foreign policies of the US - because they know most muslims will back them on their stance against us, and they know its something we will never change - so their cause is assured of a public reason to oppose us, thus distracting their real targets - the totalitarian leaders of Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, etc., AND attracting support from the ignorant masses of common muslims. (who will fuel their suicide bombing campaigns with willing victims.)
Your statement about moderate Muslim countries is a bit off base, too. Countries like Turkey might not like what Bin Laden is doing, but they've never supported our efforts whole-heartedly, either. Their support of the invasion of Irag was limited, and there were restrictions on what they allowed us to do, mainly having to do with their reservations about the Kurds. Not that that matters. Like I said, the flak about US foreign policy is just that, flak to disguise what the terrorists' real goals are - an internationally based caliphate, publicly based upon Islamic law - mostly because it allows a sufficiently harsh governing structure to disguise the totalitarian nature of the caliphate for their own purposes.
Don't forget - whatever modern, moderate Muslims may say - the Koran is the same book that was used in ancient times to justify a "holy war" that allowed the early muslims to conquer the Middle East, much of what was Alexander the Great's empire, all of Turkey, much of the Balkins, all the way around Northern Africa, including across the Pillars of Hercules into Spain up to the Pyranees. The only reason that they didn't kill every non-muslim they came across is because many of them converted to Islam at the point of a sword. And there are sufficient numbers of fundamentalist muslims being trained right now in countries like Pakistan that would like to continue that holy war all the way around the world.
Read a bit about Islam, it might open your eyes a bit... not that Christianity was any better, but that's a different topic...
I didn't redefine the argument, you did. You have added unrelated items to what I originally posted to, and have used those to support points that I showed you were wrong about.
"that somehow supports your point that spending large amounts of money in another areas would be a good thing."
I never stated any such thing. This series of posts are about the Northrup program to sell this system to protect airports. We were arguing positions regarding the effectiveness of the system, NOT arguing about methods to defeat terrorism. Your introcuding three areas of argument tangencial to the issue simply serve as a straw man you could use to counter my points you had no counter point to in the first place. They did nothing but widen the argument to points you wanted to rant about, and I did not dispute in the first place.
I repeat my statement that you only want to argue, and your opening the argument to my methods instead of finding counter-points to where I disputed your posts, only goes to prove it. You have no counter-points to argue, since you only make bald faced statements as to your opinion that this system is ineffectual, where the article, and other people's posts, have shown you to be wrong.
I do not dispute your contentions about the additional steps that may be necessary to defeat the terrorists, I will not argue your partisan opinion about Bush and his 'cronies' - that is for another topic, not this one.
I also do not, and HAVE NOT noted any such argument that this system is an effective tool to defeat terrorism - it is simply a way to protect our airports against a single type of threat. I never went beyond that, nor have any other posters supporting the viability of this system that I have seen. That is your own straw man you have tried to put in my mouth so you could shoot it down.
I contend that it is your inability to read content and context that is at fault here, as your misreading of my post shows. My last statement, saying that you prove my sig, you chose to misread as my calling you a pig. It does not - it is an analogy stating that trying to prove something to someone unable or unwilling to learn is a waste of time.
As evidenced by your using the opportunity to call me a pig, my attempts to engage you in polite discourse have merely irritated you and wasted my time.
I will not post another answer to you on this topic - you have gone past polite discourse into the realm of insult, and have refused to acknowledge any of the validity of what I have posted, where I have noted in at least two postings that I do not disagree with some of your statements.
"How does buying a high-tech boondoggle improve intelligence work, police work, or in-flight security?"
Didn't say it did, now did I? Why are you still arguing with my statements - especially when my statements don't contradict yours?
"The only feasible solution to terrorism is politicial; force and high-tech gadgets will not work."
Didn't say this system would be a solution to terrorism, just that it'd make our airports safer. I happen to agree with your statement on the solution, tho. Again, why are you still arguing?
"The decision will be made by all of us at the ballot box, and if you're smart, you join me in voting people like Bush out of office, people who waste our hard-earned money on boondoggles and pork for their buddies in industry."
You can rail against Bush all you want - this system, or one like it to do the same thing, will likely get installed in at least the more vulnerable airports in the US, and likely in other countries as well. That is what this topic is about anyway.
Again, you are arguing now just for the sake of being contrary. I have logically answered all your points, and you have not bothered to find a logical counter-point to anything I said. Do us all a favor and find another topic to rant about.
You illustrate the point made in my sig very well...
"Get real! There has never been a missile-based attack against a US airliner on US soil."
Nope, but that doesn't mean there couldn't be. Again, goes back to what I said: For once people are looking towards a future threat, not reacting - and who are you to recognize what terrorist groups are looking at for the future?
"because even if it isn't 100% effective, it is still useful, and that argument is just nonsense."
BS, that argument is NOT nonsense! If we wanted every defense system to work perfectly, we'd never mount any defenses at all! There isn't an anti-aircraft defense system that is 100% effective, yet air forces the world over deploy billions of dollars worth of anti-aircraft defense system every year.
"...if current commercial air travel is inherently too prone to terrorist attacks, we need to stop flying and let the market find other solutions. Big economies can function quite well without air travel."
I'd ask businesses that depend on air freight to get products around the world overnight just how well their businesses could function. I think your head is in left field somewhere. The US economy had serious problems from just a week's worth of no air travel after 9/11.
"The government "got pilloried" on 9/11 for the specific and avoidable ways in which they screwed up: lousy intelligence work, lousy police work, lousy in-flight security, lousy border security."
I think that is just what I said - for not doing enough to protect us ahead of time. The details you mention just illustrate my point.
"To my knowledge, nobody criticized them for failing to waste billions of dollars on high-tech boondoggles."
Wrong again, they get criticized for that all the time. Remember the Osprey?...and a few others?
I'd rather the US government spend those billions setting up defense systems to protect airports here in the US, rather than sending them to ungrateful dictators that hate us anyway. At least the money stays here and employs US citizens.
This system is NOT a high tech boondoggle - it is based upon proven technology, and smarter heads than yours or mine have access to better info than we do to determine whether this is needed for US deployment.
THAT decision hasn't been made yet - according to the article, it is being developed by the manufacturer in hopes that the US, Israel, or other governments may find it useful.
And the decision will be made at a pay grade higher than yours or mine - unless your name is George W. Bush! (or whomever his successor may be)
It seems to me that you are just arguing for the sake of arguing. You have now successfully used your opponent's argument against you as your own argument!
"Demanding perfect safety is irrational" is just the argument used against you just a couple of posts back.
Nobody said that this defense is perfect. But the point is that, if, as you argue, we "just stop flying", our economy would tank in a week! "We could lose a commercial airliner to a missile every month and flying would still be safer than driving a car." Yeah, because nobody would be flying! So we need something that will make the masses of air travelers feel that there is a system in place that will safeguard them, so they will keep flying.
This system is based upon technology that works. We have had the technology to track fast moving objects like artillery shells for over forty years. Where do you think counter-battery artillery fire came from? From the ability to use radar to find out where the shells were fired from. This takes the counter-artillery defense one step further, from "find the bastards shooting at our guys and kill 'em" to "Let's stop the artillery fire from killing our guys, first, BEFORE we kill the bastards!"
On slash dot, just a few weeks ago, there was a story that linked to some cool footage of what was described as a defense shield against anti-tank fire. It was a short range radar that could detect incoming fire, real time, and direct laser fire or anti-missle missles at the incoming round to detonate the warhead before it struck the tank. It was not described as ready for prime-time, but it is apparantly pretty advanced in development.
This argument is ironic - most of the time, the government gets pilloried because, like with 9/11, it didn't do enough to protect us ahead of time. Now, when they really have an opportunity to buy a system being developed by a commercial outfit to protect us BEFORE an airliner gets shot down, you say they're wasting taxpayer money!
Actually, the US' response to the terrorists will not affect whether they quit attacking us or not. The real reason that they attack us is that we are not Muslim, and are the most powerful non-muslim country, and thus can thwart their aims to establish an international "caliphate" based upon Islamic Law (Sharia).
Their claims that our foreign policy is the reason for their attacks is a straw man they establish to attract followers that would not otherwise support their aims. If they were to allow this real intention to be widely known (and believed) throughout the Muslim world, their support would dry up overnight. But because US foreign policy, especially regarding Israel, is so hated by many in their world, it is easy to use that as a way to attract the ignorant, poor, downtrodden masses that fuel their suicide bombing campaigns.
If you doubt the effectiveness of this tactic, re-read your European history circa 1920-1945, and refamiliarize yourself with the very similar tactics used by Hitler to gain power in Germany. I assure you that very few Germans realized his intentions, even after he published "Mein Kampf", which was a road map of his plans! Oddly, even fewer Jews believed it either, though there were a few that did, and left Germany in time.
Point is, we could reverse our foreign policy completely, dump Israel, remove ourselves from the Middle Eastern international scene, and very little would change. They would still find reasons for continuing their war, until they acheived their goal.
It's time we wised up, and began fighting them on their own terms, psychologically. Certainly, some adjustments in foreign policy would help, and might even help our own goals in the process, but the main thing is to attempt to undermine them in their own game.
Fighting them on the ground as we are is only half the battle.
You're comparing apples with oranges. Capitalism isn't our problem; materialism is.
Capitalism is the economic system that drives our economy, Materialism is the philosophy of accumulating more and more stuff with no regard for whether it's good for us or our ecology.
Unfortunately, materialism is a byproduct of living in a successful capitalistic society that has met no limits through the period of its development, so fails to recognize that such limits really do exist. Thus, marketing has convinced many consumers that they really need new products when, as you mention, the current product they have would serve them for years to come. Another name for it is Consumerism.
Originally, (as in Middle Ages or earlier) in England, as with most of the western world, there were few educated people. Most of them, in the beginning, were priests. How they learned to read and write, including spelling, depended on who taught them. There were no dictionaries, so there were no standardized ways to spell anything. The only standard was the Bible, but since it had a myriad of different translations, THAT wasn't really much of a standard, either!
As the nobility began to realize that without knowing how to write, the church had much more control over them than they were comfortable with, they gradually learned to read and write. Of course, there were always the educated merchants, who often travelled, and helped transfer information, and the written word, from place to place. Most writers spelled things pretty much the way they were taught, or just felt how it should done. No standards at all, really.
The first dictionaries didn't get written until the early 17th century, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictionary#History) 1604, as a matter of fact. but I'm sure it took a while before they became widely known about and consulted (Englishmen being what they are about any central authority).
Even England has a wide variety of dialects, so again, as has been noted, WHICH dialect will we standardize on?...and which original dictionary will we use?
But in Texas, where I grew up, we use "thuh" almost all the time. Unless it is in a different context... or sometimes it depends on the word... or the speaker... or what part of the state yer from... oh, hell, we usually just say it the way we want to!
"Only in the USA is a person's religion significant."
I beg to differ - look at Northern Ireland, the Balkan States, etc. One's religion in those States makes a great deal of difference! It can even get you killed! My wife is German, and even though there are just two religions that most Germans belong to (Catholic or Evangalish {sp}), there are still hard feelings between the two sides - even tho the Hundred Years war was fought centuries ago. Memories in Europe are long, and hard feelings over religious disagreements run deep! Look at England just two hundred years ago, Catholics and others that were not Anglican were terribly set upon. You cannot tell me that those feelings have dissapated in that short period of time.
Yeah, the guy that stole it may have been just a punk looking for drug money (I live in the Aspen Hill area, and most burglers they catch here are...)...but they DON'T know who HE sold it to, do they?
Friend, if you have a problem with an Apple product, and it's within warranty, all you need to do is call tech support. They won't charge you for the time, cause it's within the warranty period. If she's talking about $49 an hour or applecare, that means your warranty is past, and you won't get it fixed under warranty.
Her more subtle message is, buy the applecare, and THEN make the tech support call, then maybe they'll fix it under warranty!
With every Mac, you get free 90 days telephone support. If you have a warranty issue, make an appointment at the genius bar, and take it in for them to look at. If it really is broken, and there isn't a question, like with the squishy button, they'll either issue a replacement, or fix it with no questions asked. I've been using Macs since 1987, and my warranty experience with them has always been sterling. The one time I walked away from a Genius bar unsatisfied, I got home, looked at my iPod again, and saw that the whole issue had been my fault for using the wrong cable from the beginning! (was using USB in a USB 2 port instead of a firewire cable in a firewire port - no wonder it wouldn't work! Brainfart... too many cables on one machine.) Of course, when the tech at Apple plugged it in, HE used the correct cable and port, so it worked for him...typical user error. That's why they often seem skeptical, it's their job - people DO try to get new stuff for free sometimes, and people often don't use the equipment correctly - I know, my own job is tech support for Uncle Sam. I see that all the time.
Next time, know the tech support terms for your equipment, and listen when the operator is telling you something - just maybe she knows what she's talking about!
Simple. The VA is NOT a part of the military, and does not adhere to military rules regarding security. Nor is my agency; we're civilian, and civilian rules apply, even if they are insufficient. Civilian agencies operate under different conditions, and many allow such information to be moved about, although anybody with any sense would requuire complete HD encryption for that level of sensitivity.
But you are right, the problem lay with the VA's operating procedures, or lack of adherance to same. And the employee paid for it with his job. He is now a FORMER employee, thanks I am sure to his boss's lack of oversight, and the lack of IT secuity in VA procedures. Not all his fault, but in such cases where upper management is shown to be idiots, somebody has to pay the piper, and it's usually the little guy that's caught with his pants firmly around his ankles!
Slashdot Mirror
Boy, talk about mixups!
...and I don't think they'd "auction" M$ property - assuming EU law allows for such, it would simply be confiscated. Results the same, but gitcher terms straight - it makes a difference legally...
The quote from my post is from the US CONSTITUTION! (HINT: It doesn't apply in this case.)
M$'s troubles with that big fine is in the EUROPEAN UNION! So like I mentioned, I don't know EU law, so I don't know what they would do. But I doubt that M$ would actually refuse to pay a fine - they might use legal tactics to draw out the day when they actually have to write the check, but no publicly owned company would actually refuse to pay.
I didn't say impossible - your post only underlines what I said - which is that if the gov't tried what you propose, lawsuits would ensue, whereupon the courts would have the final say. At which time, the laws would apply, whether the loser is the gov't or not.
Ok, argue semantics between the term democratic or republic, but in either case, I hardly think that the law would fail to apply. Besides, both the EU and the US are republican in nature, since both use a representative form of government, so your semantic argument hardly changes the nature of my point. I was using the term democratic as opposed to totalitarian, since obviously the latter would have no trouble at all in taking the actions you seem to think appropriate.
There is plenty of court precedent to the existance of intellectual property, and I hardly think your position would be any kind of a slam dunk in the courts. US law (based upon that Fifth amendment) is traditionally slanted against allowing the government to take property, and I hardly think the courts would take lightly the idea of removing a copyright from a product like Windows just on the basis of anti-trust law, given that there is no basis in law at present for such action. If you think there is, please cite either case law or a specific law that allows such a drastic measure.
Besides, your cite in US law would hardly solve the issue, since we're talking about the EU here, and I can not claim any knowledge of EU law. For all I know, there may be specific provisions to do just that. After all, EU has no specific bill of rights like we do.
So maybe someone with a knowledge of what EU law allows could step in here and enlighen us?
In a DEMOCRATIC country, laws apply to the government as well. In the US, the constitution only allows the taking of property (real, personal, or intellectual) in cases of public need, and requires the gov't to reimburse the private party for that property. That takes care of the idea of them being able to cancel a copyright or such arbitrarily, without payment (certainly not on a single company - as a class, removing copyright protection from a whole class of products, may be a different case, but would still spark a hell of a lot of lawsuits.) And such actions would entail some consequences, both economically, and legally. I'd be surprised if there weren't some such protections built into the EU structure, as well, tho certainly not in the same class with our constitutional bill of rights.
No, I agree with you, M$ will probably end up paying these fines, and they should. M$ is a publicly held corporation, and as such, is beholden to its shareholders for its conduct. They may pay these fines, but I seriously don't think they'll challenge the EU by threatening to withdraw from the market. M$ shareholders would have a fit.
A law is not an agreement. Yes, the EU can force M$ to share the information they are contending about because M$ is breaking the law by engaging in illegal monopolistic activities. That is not forcing an agreement, it is enforcing the law. A democratic government still has to obey all the laws that apply to its citizens, and most democratic countries have independant court systems to force that compliance.
Of course, a totalitarian country can pretty much do as it pleases, and they often do, so yes, there, they can force agreements, which is really just forcing compliance with a specially crafted law, not an agreement per ce. But if they do so to an internationally based company, they'd better be prepared for the consequences, which is the pullout of most internationally based companies from that country to protect themselves. Sovereign countries may be able to do things companies cannot, but they are not always powerful enough to take the consequences. International mega corporations are not powerless, even tho they don't have armies. Most totalitarian countries are not big enough with strong enough economies to withstand the withdrawal of companies that bring in hard cash. So yes, they can, but not without paying for it.
Uh, I don't know what universe YOU live in, but in THIS one, democratic govements like the EU can't just "write their own contracts"...
A contract, in every legal jusrisdiction that uses a legal system similar to that is the US or the EU, is an agreement between two or more parties, where a valuable consideration is exchanged, and mutually agreeable terms are negotiated. A democratic government cannot force an agreement on an independant party.
They would definitely look into third party alternative, tho, and many EU governments are doing just that. Several German cities have gone OSS in recent years.
Uh, dude, the US COURT of Appeals is part of the COURT system, which is NOT part of the Executive Branch! You know, the THIRD branch of government?
Duh, go back to high school civics class...
Ah! Now we're talking enterprise?!
Why didn't you say so?
Sorry, I wasn't aware that we were talking about putting Macs in an enterprise environment. But, just because you have never SEEN macs deployed there, doesn't mean that they aren't. I know that there are numerous companies that have Mac environments; I've seen news reports of companies moving to Macs en mass - as well as school districts, too - indeed, whole states (albeit, SMALL states...). Since I hear you asking such questions as "Is there a centralized management capability? " tells me that you don't know enough about them to be able to knowledgeably question their capabilitites - you don't know what they are. (Yes, they do it's called 'remote desktop', and it does allow scripting.)
Don't get me wrong - I've never supported Macs in a large enterprise - mine doesn't allow Macs. So I don't have more than a theoretical knowledge myself of that environment regarding Macs. I do know, from what I read of others' experiences, and technical publications, that Macs can exist very well in the enterprise - they are actually more compliant with standard protocols such as tcp/ip than Microsoft is.
I won't try to say that Macs can scale to the level that PC can. I know that Apple hasn't tried to make them do that, and that's well known among techies, even those of us that support Apple. But they ARE good network citizens, and are capable of existing on an AD network.
Again, I can't speak for your experiences - although, I'll never own another Epson printer as long as I live!
Sorry I lost you - but look up some history of the Muslim conquest the early years - it is well documented that Muslim armies forced conversion. I didn't make that up. I don't doubt your quotes - I've read them! But just because they're in the book doesn't mean that they'll get followed every time by everybody. Same with Chrisitanity. And I didn't claim that all Muslim expansion was forced, either. The history of the expansion of Islam into India is markedly different from the armed expansion across Northern Africa into Spain.
The caliphate establishment I speak of is not the same thing you are talking about. Most moderate muslims do not espouse the establishment of sharia as a dominant form of a system of justice, that is mostly a goal of more fundamentalist groups. Muslim countries that allow alcohol or pork do not use sharia as a system of justice, it is often used, tho as a guide to secular law making. Fundamentalists, tho, wish to establish it as a dominant or sole system of justice - see how the Taliban ruled Afganistan.
As I said, do NOT try to drink alcohol in Saudi Arabia, it is strictly banned there - certainly in public institutions. But then, Islam is certainly no different than Christianity, in that different people and cultures practice it and adhere to it in different ways and to differing degrees.
But none of this changes what I said about the goals of the "fundamentalist" terrorist groups.
In reality, they are using Islam as a sham front to disguise their true goals. They really do not adhere to a strict form of Islam, if they did, they would consider the destruction of the twin towers as part of Holy War to have been heretical, since the Koran forbids the destruction of infrastructure in a Holy War. It does NOT allow any exception to the killing of Muslims, either, and forbids the killing of innocent civilians in a Holy War, too. But these are all hallmarks of Al Qieda and their operations, as well as stated principals, and were all accomplished in the 9/11 attacks.
Holy War as practiced and supported by moderate versions of Islam, is supposed to be a defensive war, and not one of expansionism or terror. It forbids the taking of the life of an enemy combatant if he has put down his weapon in surrender, and forbids the killing of prisoners. These, too, are halmarks of the terrorists.
In short, the terrosists are thugs!
Yes, I've been trained - by Apple products that DO "just work"! It's called experience, and I've used Macs since 1987, and most of mine have worked for years, without problems. All of the old Macs I passed on to others after buying new Macs have been working up to 10 years after they were first purchased!
Sorry I have to decline your kind offer of help - but as a support professional that has been trained to support Windows, I help folks like yourself every day at work, when their Windows based products DON'T!
Have a nice day the next time you have to reformat your HD and reload Windows to rid yourself of spyware or viruses that my Mac won't run!
"Back when I had Macs..."
When was that? 1999? I don't wonder - with the older OS, OS 9 or older, that was often the case, because of manufcturers failing to provide drivers, and also due to apple not always adhering to standards.
I've owned Macs since 1987, and I can state with no qualms at all that since 2000, and the advent of Mac OS X 10.2 (and to an extent, 10.3), I have had NO trouble at all using peripherals, or even standard upgrade parts such as memory, HDs, printers, scanners, PCI cards, etc. in any Mac I've owned since then.
I work as a support professional with the Feds, supporting PCs and Micro$oft windows based software, since my agency is M$ centric, and refuses to use anything not branded M$, unless they just don't make it. I also support friends and family that have Macs, and can state without reservation that Macs are infinitely easier to support than PCs. Adding peripherals to a Mac is just as easy as plugging it in, 99% of the time. At the office, when a user wants to get a peripheral added, it usually takes a support professional to do it, and watching the support tickets, as well as doing these things myself as well, I KNOW that it is often not nearly as simple to add such peripherals to PCs. Seeing the hoops we often have to go through, and the tricks we need to know to force things to work in Windows, its no mystery to me how Apple can claim, with real honesty, that things in OS X "just work" - because they mostly do!
I don't doubt that you may have had problems - Apple is staffed with human beings, and human systems produce products that have mostly predictable failure rates. Some people just have bad luck to get those lemons - I often read posts in this and other forums by Mac users that do have such bad luck - they take their products back to Apple under warranty, and Apple fixes or replaces those products, as such warranty allows, from what I've read. Many times, I have called Apple, sometimes months past my telephone support warranty expiration, and Apple support people have helpfully assisted me anyway. Often, I have found, that if you have recently bought a piece of software from them, even if the hardware phone support (90 days) has passed, and your question has nothing to do with that software - they'll help you with that unrelated issue anyway, if it's just a software issue and does not require hardware return or replacement.
Your milage may vary, and if you had bad experiences with Apple, I'm sorry for it, but your experience does not necessarily extend to the experiences of all users, nor the actual operability of the Mac OS over all. By and large, Apple's systems DO just work, and they have a valid claim to market their products using that slogan.
I'm going to reply to your post - late as it is, because I think it rates a reply.
As to your first paragraph, they leave Norway and Sweden alone because neither country is a threat to their plans. Although you'll note the trouble a certain newspaper got into a while back over some cartoons...
As to the second point... I want to stress that my comments apply to the terrorists in general, that are allied loosely to Bin Laden and his ilk, NOT the Palestinian groups fighting Isreal, and NOT to Muslims in general. so, having stipulated that... as to Muslims in general, no, you're right, they mostly don't care what we do. We can sit here and wallow in sin (by their standards) and they really don't care - as long as we do it here, at home. In a LOT of Muslim countries, you'd better refrain from doing those things, they are illegal in most Muslim countries, at least the most strict of them. And, no you won't get pork in a muslim country, animals with split hooves are unclean - no muslim will touch one, even to serve to a christian. The meat cannot be handled in the same kitchen with their own food!
I did not say Muslims have anything in common with Hitler or Nazis - read my f***in' post! I said the terrorist groups are using the same TACTICS Hitler did to gain power in Germany in the 1930's. So did many communist groups in different places and times. Tactics are non-denominational - anybody can use them, regardless of their religious beliefs or lack of same...
"If the US reversed policy..." GET REAL! Not gonna happen, in this world or the next, regardless of whether the Dems or Repubs are in power. Bin Laden and every terrorist leader knows it too. So do all of the leaders of most Muslim countries. That's why they have chosen to use that particular set of foreign policies of the US - because they know most muslims will back them on their stance against us, and they know its something we will never change - so their cause is assured of a public reason to oppose us, thus distracting their real targets - the totalitarian leaders of Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, etc., AND attracting support from the ignorant masses of common muslims. (who will fuel their suicide bombing campaigns with willing victims.)
Your statement about moderate Muslim countries is a bit off base, too. Countries like Turkey might not like what Bin Laden is doing, but they've never supported our efforts whole-heartedly, either. Their support of the invasion of Irag was limited, and there were restrictions on what they allowed us to do, mainly having to do with their reservations about the Kurds. Not that that matters. Like I said, the flak about US foreign policy is just that, flak to disguise what the terrorists' real goals are - an internationally based caliphate, publicly based upon Islamic law - mostly because it allows a sufficiently harsh governing structure to disguise the totalitarian nature of the caliphate for their own purposes.
Don't forget - whatever modern, moderate Muslims may say - the Koran is the same book that was used in ancient times to justify a "holy war" that allowed the early muslims to conquer the Middle East, much of what was Alexander the Great's empire, all of Turkey, much of the Balkins, all the way around Northern Africa, including across the Pillars of Hercules into Spain up to the Pyranees. The only reason that they didn't kill every non-muslim they came across is because many of them converted to Islam at the point of a sword. And there are sufficient numbers of fundamentalist muslims being trained right now in countries like Pakistan that would like to continue that holy war all the way around the world.
Read a bit about Islam, it might open your eyes a bit... not that Christianity was any better, but that's a different topic...
I didn't redefine the argument, you did. You have added unrelated items to what I originally posted to, and have used those to support points that I showed you were wrong about.
"that somehow supports your point that spending large amounts of money in another areas would be a good thing."
I never stated any such thing. This series of posts are about the Northrup program to sell this system to protect airports. We were arguing positions regarding the effectiveness of the system, NOT arguing about methods to defeat terrorism. Your introcuding three areas of argument tangencial to the issue simply serve as a straw man you could use to counter my points you had no counter point to in the first place. They did nothing but widen the argument to points you wanted to rant about, and I did not dispute in the first place.
I repeat my statement that you only want to argue, and your opening the argument to my methods instead of finding counter-points to where I disputed your posts, only goes to prove it. You have no counter-points to argue, since you only make bald faced statements as to your opinion that this system is ineffectual, where the article, and other people's posts, have shown you to be wrong.
I do not dispute your contentions about the additional steps that may be necessary to defeat the terrorists, I will not argue your partisan opinion about Bush and his 'cronies' - that is for another topic, not this one.
I also do not, and HAVE NOT noted any such argument that this system is an effective tool to defeat terrorism - it is simply a way to protect our airports against a single type of threat. I never went beyond that, nor have any other posters supporting the viability of this system that I have seen. That is your own straw man you have tried to put in my mouth so you could shoot it down.
I contend that it is your inability to read content and context that is at fault here, as your misreading of my post shows. My last statement, saying that you prove my sig, you chose to misread as my calling you a pig. It does not - it is an analogy stating that trying to prove something to someone unable or unwilling to learn is a waste of time.
As evidenced by your using the opportunity to call me a pig, my attempts to engage you in polite discourse have merely irritated you and wasted my time.
I will not post another answer to you on this topic - you have gone past polite discourse into the realm of insult, and have refused to acknowledge any of the validity of what I have posted, where I have noted in at least two postings that I do not disagree with some of your statements.
Have a nice day...
"How does buying a high-tech boondoggle improve intelligence work, police work, or in-flight security?"
Didn't say it did, now did I? Why are you still arguing with my statements - especially when my statements don't contradict yours?
"The only feasible solution to terrorism is politicial; force and high-tech gadgets will not work."
Didn't say this system would be a solution to terrorism, just that it'd make our airports safer. I happen to agree with your statement on the solution, tho. Again, why are you still arguing?
"The decision will be made by all of us at the ballot box, and if you're smart, you join me in voting people like Bush out of office, people who waste our hard-earned money on boondoggles and pork for their buddies in industry."
You can rail against Bush all you want - this system, or one like it to do the same thing, will likely get installed in at least the more vulnerable airports in the US, and likely in other countries as well. That is what this topic is about anyway.
Again, you are arguing now just for the sake of being contrary. I have logically answered all your points, and you have not bothered to find a logical counter-point to anything I said. Do us all a favor and find another topic to rant about.
You illustrate the point made in my sig very well...
"Get real! There has never been a missile-based attack against a US airliner on US soil."
...and a few others?
Nope, but that doesn't mean there couldn't be. Again, goes back to what I said: For once people are looking towards a future threat, not reacting - and who are you to recognize what terrorist groups are looking at for the future?
"because even if it isn't 100% effective, it is still useful, and that argument is just nonsense."
BS, that argument is NOT nonsense! If we wanted every defense system to work perfectly, we'd never mount any defenses at all! There isn't an anti-aircraft defense system that is 100% effective, yet air forces the world over deploy billions of dollars worth of anti-aircraft defense system every year.
"...if current commercial air travel is inherently too prone to terrorist attacks, we need to stop flying and let the market find other solutions. Big economies can function quite well without air travel."
I'd ask businesses that depend on air freight to get products around the world overnight just how well their businesses could function. I think your head is in left field somewhere. The US economy had serious problems from just a week's worth of no air travel after 9/11.
"The government "got pilloried" on 9/11 for the specific and avoidable ways in which they screwed up: lousy intelligence work, lousy police work, lousy in-flight security, lousy border security."
I think that is just what I said - for not doing enough to protect us ahead of time. The details you mention just illustrate my point.
"To my knowledge, nobody criticized them for failing to waste billions of dollars on high-tech boondoggles."
Wrong again, they get criticized for that all the time. Remember the Osprey?
I'd rather the US government spend those billions setting up defense systems to protect airports here in the US, rather than sending them to ungrateful dictators that hate us anyway. At least the money stays here and employs US citizens.
This system is NOT a high tech boondoggle - it is based upon proven technology, and smarter heads than yours or mine have access to better info than we do to determine whether this is needed for US deployment.
THAT decision hasn't been made yet - according to the article, it is being developed by the manufacturer in hopes that the US, Israel, or other governments may find it useful.
And the decision will be made at a pay grade higher than yours or mine - unless your name is George W. Bush! (or whomever his successor may be)
It seems to me that you are just arguing for the sake of arguing. You have now successfully used your opponent's argument against you as your own argument!
"Demanding perfect safety is irrational" is just the argument used against you just a couple of posts back.
Nobody said that this defense is perfect. But the point is that, if, as you argue, we "just stop flying", our economy would tank in a week! "We could lose a commercial airliner to a missile every month and flying would still be safer than driving a car." Yeah, because nobody would be flying! So we need something that will make the masses of air travelers feel that there is a system in place that will safeguard them, so they will keep flying.
This system is based upon technology that works. We have had the technology to track fast moving objects like artillery shells for over forty years. Where do you think counter-battery artillery fire came from? From the ability to use radar to find out where the shells were fired from. This takes the counter-artillery defense one step further, from "find the bastards shooting at our guys and kill 'em" to "Let's stop the artillery fire from killing our guys, first, BEFORE we kill the bastards!"
On slash dot, just a few weeks ago, there was a story that linked to some cool footage of what was described as a defense shield against anti-tank fire. It was a short range radar that could detect incoming fire, real time, and direct laser fire or anti-missle missles at the incoming round to detonate the warhead before it struck the tank. It was not described as ready for prime-time, but it is apparantly pretty advanced in development.
This argument is ironic - most of the time, the government gets pilloried because, like with 9/11, it didn't do enough to protect us ahead of time. Now, when they really have an opportunity to buy a system being developed by a commercial outfit to protect us BEFORE an airliner gets shot down, you say they're wasting taxpayer money!
Talk about headless chickens!
Actually, the US' response to the terrorists will not affect whether they quit attacking us or not. The real reason that they attack us is that we are not Muslim, and are the most powerful non-muslim country, and thus can thwart their aims to establish an international "caliphate" based upon Islamic Law (Sharia).
Their claims that our foreign policy is the reason for their attacks is a straw man they establish to attract followers that would not otherwise support their aims. If they were to allow this real intention to be widely known (and believed) throughout the Muslim world, their support would dry up overnight. But because US foreign policy, especially regarding Israel, is so hated by many in their world, it is easy to use that as a way to attract the ignorant, poor, downtrodden masses that fuel their suicide bombing campaigns.
If you doubt the effectiveness of this tactic, re-read your European history circa 1920-1945, and refamiliarize yourself with the very similar tactics used by Hitler to gain power in Germany. I assure you that very few Germans realized his intentions, even after he published "Mein Kampf", which was a road map of his plans! Oddly, even fewer Jews believed it either, though there were a few that did, and left Germany in time.
Point is, we could reverse our foreign policy completely, dump Israel, remove ourselves from the Middle Eastern international scene, and very little would change. They would still find reasons for continuing their war, until they acheived their goal.
It's time we wised up, and began fighting them on their own terms, psychologically. Certainly, some adjustments in foreign policy would help, and might even help our own goals in the process, but the main thing is to attempt to undermine them in their own game.
Fighting them on the ground as we are is only half the battle.
You're comparing apples with oranges. Capitalism isn't our problem; materialism is.
Capitalism is the economic system that drives our economy, Materialism is the philosophy of accumulating more and more stuff with no regard for whether it's good for us or our ecology.
Unfortunately, materialism is a byproduct of living in a successful capitalistic society that has met no limits through the period of its development, so fails to recognize that such limits really do exist. Thus, marketing has convinced many consumers that they really need new products when, as you mention, the current product they have would serve them for years to come. Another name for it is Consumerism.
At any rate, Capitalism isn't the problem.
Actually, that's not quit true.
...and which original dictionary will we use?
Originally, (as in Middle Ages or earlier) in England, as with most of the western world, there were few educated people. Most of them, in the beginning, were priests. How they learned to read and write, including spelling, depended on who taught them. There were no dictionaries, so there were no standardized ways to spell anything. The only standard was the Bible, but since it had a myriad of different translations, THAT wasn't really much of a standard, either!
As the nobility began to realize that without knowing how to write, the church had much more control over them than they were comfortable with, they gradually learned to read and write. Of course, there were always the educated merchants, who often travelled, and helped transfer information, and the written word, from place to place. Most writers spelled things pretty much the way they were taught, or just felt how it should done. No standards at all, really.
The first dictionaries didn't get written until the early 17th century, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictionary#History) 1604, as a matter of fact. but I'm sure it took a while before they became widely known about and consulted (Englishmen being what they are about any central authority).
Even England has a wide variety of dialects, so again, as has been noted, WHICH dialect will we standardize on?
But in Texas, where I grew up, we use "thuh" almost all the time. Unless it is in a different context... or sometimes it depends on the word... or the speaker... or what part of the state yer from... oh, hell, we usually just say it the way we want to!
Didn't you RTFA? It siad that these mosquitos evolved IN ATHENS. Last time I checked, with four million people, Athens is a major city.
duh...
"Only in the USA is a person's religion significant."
I beg to differ - look at Northern Ireland, the Balkan States, etc. One's religion in those States makes a great deal of difference! It can even get you killed! My wife is German, and even though there are just two religions that most Germans belong to (Catholic or Evangalish {sp}), there are still hard feelings between the two sides - even tho the Hundred Years war was fought centuries ago. Memories in Europe are long, and hard feelings over religious disagreements run deep! Look at England just two hundred years ago, Catholics and others that were not Anglican were terribly set upon. You cannot tell me that those feelings have dissapated in that short period of time.
Yeah, the guy that stole it may have been just a punk looking for drug money (I live in the Aspen Hill area, and most burglers they catch here are...) ...but they DON'T know who HE sold it to, do they?
It would if it applied to ALL lawyers!
Friend, if you have a problem with an Apple product, and it's within warranty, all you need to do is call tech support. They won't charge you for the time, cause it's within the warranty period. If she's talking about $49 an hour or applecare, that means your warranty is past, and you won't get it fixed under warranty.
Her more subtle message is, buy the applecare, and THEN make the tech support call, then maybe they'll fix it under warranty!
With every Mac, you get free 90 days telephone support. If you have a warranty issue, make an appointment at the genius bar, and take it in for them to look at. If it really is broken, and there isn't a question, like with the squishy button, they'll either issue a replacement, or fix it with no questions asked. I've been using Macs since 1987, and my warranty experience with them has always been sterling. The one time I walked away from a Genius bar unsatisfied, I got home, looked at my iPod again, and saw that the whole issue had been my fault for using the wrong cable from the beginning! (was using USB in a USB 2 port instead of a firewire cable in a firewire port - no wonder it wouldn't work! Brainfart... too many cables on one machine.) Of course, when the tech at Apple plugged it in, HE used the correct cable and port, so it worked for him...typical user error. That's why they often seem skeptical, it's their job - people DO try to get new stuff for free sometimes, and people often don't use the equipment correctly - I know, my own job is tech support for Uncle Sam. I see that all the time.
Next time, know the tech support terms for your equipment, and listen when the operator is telling you something - just maybe she knows what she's talking about!
Simple. The VA is NOT a part of the military, and does not adhere to military rules regarding security. Nor is my agency; we're civilian, and civilian rules apply, even if they are insufficient. Civilian agencies operate under different conditions, and many allow such information to be moved about, although anybody with any sense would requuire complete HD encryption for that level of sensitivity.
But you are right, the problem lay with the VA's operating procedures, or lack of adherance to same. And the employee paid for it with his job. He is now a FORMER employee, thanks I am sure to his boss's lack of oversight, and the lack of IT secuity in VA procedures. Not all his fault, but in such cases where upper management is shown to be idiots, somebody has to pay the piper, and it's usually the little guy that's caught with his pants firmly around his ankles!