Just to clarify, Windows 3.x still required DOS, so of course it ran DOS programs; it was a GUI that ran specialized applications. 95 was the first Windows that was also its own OS aside from NT.
The ACLU gets money from donations to the ACLU Foundation. At any rate, the government should have to pay legal fees if the ACLU does win against them, since they have thus proved in court that the government abridged everyone's freedom. Doesn't sound shady to me; sounds more like justice.
...and no mention of "Justin Bailey"? For those who do not know, entering "JUSTIN BAILEY" as the password in the original NES game (with all blank spaces on the second line) let you start the game as Samus wearing a bathing suit. My friends and I knew that Samus was a girl back in 1987.
Memory cards didn't open the market for longer games; with the NES, longer games had some kind of battery backup built into the cartridge, like Zelda. The PS1 was designed to feature memory cards because saves cannot be written onto game CDs.
This would make sense if we were talking about a PC version of a Sega game, which have always been awful, but it's Will Wright. The PC versions of his games have simply blown the console ports away: SimCity/SimLife on SNES, The Sims on PS2/Gamecube have all paled in comparison. Wright and Maxis are always focused on the PC experience first, so I don't think you have anything to worry about.
I was a bit flip, and I agree with you fundamentally. My wording was rather unfocused: I meant that techies look beyond advertising to see if products match their needs or interests. Ads have nothing to do with it, and Apple's don't seem deceptive to me (after all, it is much easier to do "fun stuff" on a Mac than on a PC). I don't see how monopolistic practices or GPL are advertising, though; isn't word-of-mouth (good or bad) the opposite of corporate advertising?
You proved my point that if we are to go against the spirit of an older law, we should do it with legislation, not adjudication. Should this laws permitting interracial marriage be repealed with the 13th amendment?
What? Antimiscegenation laws were ruled unconstitutional in Loving v. Virginia. They were not repealed by legislation. It took a black and white couple suing the state to get the right to marry, much like what happened in MA with gay marriage.
Actually, legislating more Federal power over the states is a hard-left political act. Think Lincoln, FDR, etc.
So, a federal law banning abortion, say, is liberal? Or one mandating prayer in schools? How does that work? You are confusing conservative philosphy on the structure of government with public policy.
The reason I say that current Democratic congressional leaders are more left-wing is because their opposition to Bush at almost every turn, even on things that would have appeased a Democrat-controlled Congress, has just pushed them further to the left (incidently or purposely). It has nothing to do with their perceived positions, it has to do with what it is they are opposing.
What kinds of liberal legislation are Dems in Congress opposing?
Just because you don't like Bush, but like FDR does not mean they were not very similar in the actions they took, although FDR undoubtedly was better at dealing with his opponents and PR.
And running the federal government and winning wars, but who's counting?
It was never imagined that blacks would marry whites, either, when marriage laws were written. And since when does anyone look to the dictionary for some kind of legal authority?
Yet Republicans (and there *many* Democrat supporters) want to change societal norms be legislating something that, by any sane and knowledgeable person, should be seen as the clearest case of interpreting the spirit of the law?
What issue are you talking about here, gay marriage? How is a constitutional amendment "interpreting the spirit of the law"? By definition, you are changing the law.
I am arguing that Bush is to the left of previous Republican leaders.
In some ways, yes; he has no qualms with expanding federal bureaucracy. However, his father and Reagan both increased taxes; Reagan also granted a limited amnesty to illegal immigrants.
Left and right are not defined by things like same-sex marriage.
No, they are defined by responses to issues; on gay marriage, using the federal government to prevent all levels of government from ever recognizing gay relationships is hard-right. Bush holds this position, at least rhetorically.
Beyond him, look at the Democratic leaders in the House and Senate. Do you think Boxer, Pelosi, Feinstein, and Reid are not to the left of their counterparts from 10 years ago?
Boxer and Feinstein are not in the Dem leadership of the Senate. Reid has virtually the same politics as Tom Daschle, Dem leader from ten years ago. Pelosi is more liberal overall than Dick Gephardt, granted. They are just perceived as more left-wing because opposing Bush has become the "liberal" position, regardless of what the opponent's actual political beliefs are.
If I were to name a President that most closely resembles Bush in terms of philosophy, I would have to say FDR.
Completely incorrect. FDR took advice from his advisors and changed course when necessary; he actually ran on a platform of balancing the budget, too, and when he tried to implement it by cutting make-work programs, the economy tanked. Bush asks God what to do and has followed the same sorry course for years, saying that history will vindicate him. The difference in philosophies could not be more stark.
Look at how hard Joseph Lieberman is having to fight to stay in power. Look at how much support Hillary Clinton has lost. Look at the traditional heavyweights of the Republican party catching flack for not being left enough.
Hillary Clinton is the frontrunner for the '08 Prez nomination. Lieberman is fighting because he constantly attacks Democrats and cozies up to Bush and Fox News (he's quite liberal on a lot of issues, anyway).
You don't think it is curious that Clinton involved this country in enough foreign combat that resulted in more American soldier's deaths than the current administration is likely going to surpass, yet we are constantly reminded about Bush's death toll, but never Clinton's?
Do you have a cite for this? According to Infoplease, 44 died in Somalia, Haiti, Kosova, and Bosnia. Over 2,500 have already died in Iraq alone!
Are you actually suggesting that the political spectrum in this country has moved leftward in the last 20 years? Well, points for counterintuitiveness, but that's just absurd.
When universal healthcare was attempted, it failed miserably and Clinton had to declare that "big government" was finished to regain any footing after Republicans took over Congress. Bush has hardly appealed to moderates, ever--the gay marriage amendment was introduced simply to inflame his fundamentalist Christian base in the 2004 election, for example. Liberal politicians have virtually zero chance on a national level in the U.S. The Democratic party is hardly "dominated" by MoveOn (and they most definitely do not appeal to Greens--Ralph Nader is a complete pariah because of the 2000 election); every Dem politician tries their best to run away from people like Michael Moore and even Howard Dean (look at Obama's recent comments about Democrats and religion). Only Russ Feingold is the closest to a national liberal politician right now.
Yes, under Bush, there is more government than ever, but this is hardly left-wing, unless you consider libertarians to be right-wing. Conservatives want to expand the reach of government as well, to get the terrorists (which is why we're talking about the NSA wiretapping right now), to stop Terry Schiavo from dying, to prevent gay marriage, etc. The budget has exploded out of corruption and Bush's constant requests for more war funding.
Clinton was impeached for committing perjury before a grand jury (Clinton testified to the Starr grand jury the day he admitted on TV that he had sex with Monica) and obstructing justice (i.e., telling Monica to get rid of the blue dress), not for lying to Congress. Two counts were dismissed by the House: perjury in the Paula Jones deposition (the trap set by Linda Tripp that actually started the entire scandal) and abuse of power.
If there was enough of an outcry and Democrats were voted in during the mid-term elections in sufficient numbers in both the House and Senate impeachment could be a real possibility.
Perhaps, but there will never be the same fire-breathing quality to Democrat denunciations of Bush that Republicans had for Clinton in 1998/99--they just don't have the heart for it: why the hell did Kerry never mention Abu Ghraib during the campaign? Plus, a number of leading Democrats (Lieberman the most prominent) criticized Clinton pretty harshly during that period, but there has been no group of Republicans to take that role now.
Bush is acting like someone who has no responsibility and nothing to lose or gain. Which is exactly what's the case - he won't be re-elected anyways, so why act responsibly?
This is a very good point. Limiting the President to two terms has caused the first term to be all about the President's re-election campaign, while the second term is filled with scandal. Nixon had Watergate, Reagan had Iran-Contra, Clinton had Ken Starr/Monica. Though he's been extremely lucky that his opponents have been too flatfooted to get much of anything out of them, Bush has had more scandals than all of these guys put together.
For an amendment designed to prevent a de facto monarchy from taking over, the two-term limit has had the intended consequence of encouraging Presidents to act arrogantly and irresponsibly with their power.
If American voters aren't happy with his decision they can always vote him out.
How can you vote out a re-elected president limited to two terms? Congress has to impeach & convict him, which has nothing to do with the voters, judging by the last impeachment.
...but how long does a game last? The old video of WW playing Spore seemed to take only a couple of minutes. He zoomed right through it all--completely unlike the other Sim games, which take forever to play (at least without cheating).
Also, a card game? WTF?
If you're a technophile, why do you only get CD or DVD consoles? Don't you have other things that can play CDs and movies? It's just a storage medium for a game machine, anyway, and they're all proprietary in one way or another regardless of whether it's a cartridge or disc. The N64 and Dreamcast were fantastic!
This would make sense if you had the time and patience to add hundreds of tags to your files, or if you had only a few tags. OS X's iPhoto already sorta tags my pictures already when I drag them into the program by putting them into dated folders.
What you describe can already be accomplished via applications today--look at the Smart Folders in iTunes, for example. Why not have a basic application like a graphics viewer sort graphics files for you? Only applications can do anything meaningful with a file aside from copy/delete.
I've lived in both a rural WalMart town of 2,000 and Manhattan, and guess which one involved close, warm, personal contact? When you can easily walk everywhere, surrounded by people from all over the world, you truly feel connected. I got out off the farm as fast as I could (and developers quickly divided farms into McMansions, anyway).
And, btw, talking about personal matters without care for those around you is one of the truly wonderful things about living in a metropolis. Who cares if the stuffy and insular don't like hearing about your sex life? Eavesdropping is fun!
Oh yes, I remember--after much research, I got a Voodoo2 for my PII/350 in 1998/99. What truly made the card worth the $180 I spent on it was UltraHLE. Playing Mario 64 with graphics even better than the Nintendo version (not to mention freezing) was a wonder to behold.
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Just to clarify, Windows 3.x still required DOS, so of course it ran DOS programs; it was a GUI that ran specialized applications. 95 was the first Windows that was also its own OS aside from NT.
Now that YouTube has Dvorak's endorsement, how long until it collapses?
The ACLU gets money from donations to the ACLU Foundation. At any rate, the government should have to pay legal fees if the ACLU does win against them, since they have thus proved in court that the government abridged everyone's freedom. Doesn't sound shady to me; sounds more like justice.
...and no mention of "Justin Bailey"? For those who do not know, entering "JUSTIN BAILEY" as the password in the original NES game (with all blank spaces on the second line) let you start the game as Samus wearing a bathing suit. My friends and I knew that Samus was a girl back in 1987.
Memory cards didn't open the market for longer games; with the NES, longer games had some kind of battery backup built into the cartridge, like Zelda. The PS1 was designed to feature memory cards because saves cannot be written onto game CDs.
This would make sense if we were talking about a PC version of a Sega game, which have always been awful, but it's Will Wright. The PC versions of his games have simply blown the console ports away: SimCity/SimLife on SNES, The Sims on PS2/Gamecube have all paled in comparison. Wright and Maxis are always focused on the PC experience first, so I don't think you have anything to worry about.
I was a bit flip, and I agree with you fundamentally. My wording was rather unfocused: I meant that techies look beyond advertising to see if products match their needs or interests. Ads have nothing to do with it, and Apple's don't seem deceptive to me (after all, it is much easier to do "fun stuff" on a Mac than on a PC). I don't see how monopolistic practices or GPL are advertising, though; isn't word-of-mouth (good or bad) the opposite of corporate advertising?
A techie who is turned off by advertising is not a techie.
What? Antimiscegenation laws were ruled unconstitutional in Loving v. Virginia. They were not repealed by legislation. It took a black and white couple suing the state to get the right to marry, much like what happened in MA with gay marriage.
So, a federal law banning abortion, say, is liberal? Or one mandating prayer in schools? How does that work? You are confusing conservative philosphy on the structure of government with public policy.
The reason I say that current Democratic congressional leaders are more left-wing is because their opposition to Bush at almost every turn, even on things that would have appeased a Democrat-controlled Congress, has just pushed them further to the left (incidently or purposely). It has nothing to do with their perceived positions, it has to do with what it is they are opposing.
What kinds of liberal legislation are Dems in Congress opposing?
Just because you don't like Bush, but like FDR does not mean they were not very similar in the actions they took, although FDR undoubtedly was better at dealing with his opponents and PR.
And running the federal government and winning wars, but who's counting?
For a death count, here you go: http://web1.whs.osd.mil/mmid/casualty/Death_Rates. pdf. Sorry the source is not as reliable as a Wikipedia article or blog posting.
The site is down. What are the numbers?
It was never imagined that blacks would marry whites, either, when marriage laws were written. And since when does anyone look to the dictionary for some kind of legal authority?
What issue are you talking about here, gay marriage? How is a constitutional amendment "interpreting the spirit of the law"? By definition, you are changing the law.
In some ways, yes; he has no qualms with expanding federal bureaucracy. However, his father and Reagan both increased taxes; Reagan also granted a limited amnesty to illegal immigrants.
Left and right are not defined by things like same-sex marriage.
No, they are defined by responses to issues; on gay marriage, using the federal government to prevent all levels of government from ever recognizing gay relationships is hard-right. Bush holds this position, at least rhetorically.
Beyond him, look at the Democratic leaders in the House and Senate. Do you think Boxer, Pelosi, Feinstein, and Reid are not to the left of their counterparts from 10 years ago?
Boxer and Feinstein are not in the Dem leadership of the Senate. Reid has virtually the same politics as Tom Daschle, Dem leader from ten years ago. Pelosi is more liberal overall than Dick Gephardt, granted. They are just perceived as more left-wing because opposing Bush has become the "liberal" position, regardless of what the opponent's actual political beliefs are.
If I were to name a President that most closely resembles Bush in terms of philosophy, I would have to say FDR.
Completely incorrect. FDR took advice from his advisors and changed course when necessary; he actually ran on a platform of balancing the budget, too, and when he tried to implement it by cutting make-work programs, the economy tanked. Bush asks God what to do and has followed the same sorry course for years, saying that history will vindicate him. The difference in philosophies could not be more stark.
Look at how hard Joseph Lieberman is having to fight to stay in power. Look at how much support Hillary Clinton has lost. Look at the traditional heavyweights of the Republican party catching flack for not being left enough.
Hillary Clinton is the frontrunner for the '08 Prez nomination. Lieberman is fighting because he constantly attacks Democrats and cozies up to Bush and Fox News (he's quite liberal on a lot of issues, anyway).
You don't think it is curious that Clinton involved this country in enough foreign combat that resulted in more American soldier's deaths than the current administration is likely going to surpass, yet we are constantly reminded about Bush's death toll, but never Clinton's?
Do you have a cite for this? According to Infoplease, 44 died in Somalia, Haiti, Kosova, and Bosnia. Over 2,500 have already died in Iraq alone!
Yes, the House begins impeachment proceedings, but the Senate holds the trial (later convicting or acquitting the Prez of the charges), thus Congress.
When universal healthcare was attempted, it failed miserably and Clinton had to declare that "big government" was finished to regain any footing after Republicans took over Congress. Bush has hardly appealed to moderates, ever--the gay marriage amendment was introduced simply to inflame his fundamentalist Christian base in the 2004 election, for example. Liberal politicians have virtually zero chance on a national level in the U.S. The Democratic party is hardly "dominated" by MoveOn (and they most definitely do not appeal to Greens--Ralph Nader is a complete pariah because of the 2000 election); every Dem politician tries their best to run away from people like Michael Moore and even Howard Dean (look at Obama's recent comments about Democrats and religion). Only Russ Feingold is the closest to a national liberal politician right now.
Yes, under Bush, there is more government than ever, but this is hardly left-wing, unless you consider libertarians to be right-wing. Conservatives want to expand the reach of government as well, to get the terrorists (which is why we're talking about the NSA wiretapping right now), to stop Terry Schiavo from dying, to prevent gay marriage, etc. The budget has exploded out of corruption and Bush's constant requests for more war funding.
Clinton was impeached for committing perjury before a grand jury (Clinton testified to the Starr grand jury the day he admitted on TV that he had sex with Monica) and obstructing justice (i.e., telling Monica to get rid of the blue dress), not for lying to Congress. Two counts were dismissed by the House: perjury in the Paula Jones deposition (the trap set by Linda Tripp that actually started the entire scandal) and abuse of power.
Perhaps, but there will never be the same fire-breathing quality to Democrat denunciations of Bush that Republicans had for Clinton in 1998/99--they just don't have the heart for it: why the hell did Kerry never mention Abu Ghraib during the campaign? Plus, a number of leading Democrats (Lieberman the most prominent) criticized Clinton pretty harshly during that period, but there has been no group of Republicans to take that role now.
This is a very good point. Limiting the President to two terms has caused the first term to be all about the President's re-election campaign, while the second term is filled with scandal. Nixon had Watergate, Reagan had Iran-Contra, Clinton had Ken Starr/Monica. Though he's been extremely lucky that his opponents have been too flatfooted to get much of anything out of them, Bush has had more scandals than all of these guys put together.
For an amendment designed to prevent a de facto monarchy from taking over, the two-term limit has had the intended consequence of encouraging Presidents to act arrogantly and irresponsibly with their power.
How can you vote out a re-elected president limited to two terms? Congress has to impeach & convict him, which has nothing to do with the voters, judging by the last impeachment.
...but how long does a game last? The old video of WW playing Spore seemed to take only a couple of minutes. He zoomed right through it all--completely unlike the other Sim games, which take forever to play (at least without cheating). Also, a card game? WTF?
Orwell didn't predict very much that actually happened, either. Brave New World looks far more likely.
If you're a technophile, why do you only get CD or DVD consoles? Don't you have other things that can play CDs and movies? It's just a storage medium for a game machine, anyway, and they're all proprietary in one way or another regardless of whether it's a cartridge or disc. The N64 and Dreamcast were fantastic!
This would make sense if you had the time and patience to add hundreds of tags to your files, or if you had only a few tags. OS X's iPhoto already sorta tags my pictures already when I drag them into the program by putting them into dated folders.
What you describe can already be accomplished via applications today--look at the Smart Folders in iTunes, for example. Why not have a basic application like a graphics viewer sort graphics files for you? Only applications can do anything meaningful with a file aside from copy/delete.
And, btw, talking about personal matters without care for those around you is one of the truly wonderful things about living in a metropolis. Who cares if the stuffy and insular don't like hearing about your sex life? Eavesdropping is fun!
Oh yes, I remember--after much research, I got a Voodoo2 for my PII/350 in 1998/99. What truly made the card worth the $180 I spent on it was UltraHLE. Playing Mario 64 with graphics even better than the Nintendo version (not to mention freezing) was a wonder to behold.