Bringing up Rwanda, Somalia, N.Korea, and China has nothing to do with Iraq, as LegendLength already pointed out. Prior decisions are no reason or excuse for future ones unless you have first proven that those prior decision(s) were validated and correct. Even then, you must consider the future decision in its own context.
That being said, consider Rwanda, Somalia, and North Korea. I exclude China because we could hardly consider invading them. Aside from the nuclear situation (the 3 others initially didn't possess a ballistic or nuclear threat), there are economic ones that would make war with them not feasible except in dire, world-war, kinds of situations. Furthermore, China has a stable, Communist party leadership, compared to the volatile despotism or revolution in the other 3.
Rwanda, Somalia, and North Korea all rose to prominence under a different President's watch, in a time when America had not been attacked. Consider how President G.W. Bush would have acted in a similar situation had he been in office in the mid-90s, especially if we had just suffered a terrorist attack. Furthermore, if you recall, we actually _did_ send troops to Rwanda and Somalia--a token force to the former, I believe, as part of multinational UN peacekeeper deployment. These three situations, as well as Rev. Jesse Jackon's infamous Sierra Leone settlement, represent situations where negotiation and appeasement resulted in varying combinations of: failure of their objective, massive loss of human life, and general weakening of respect for U.S. power.
Now, back to gold farmers. Whatever impact they have on the game, IMO ultimately it is up to the game creators--in the case of World of Warcraft, Blizzard--to manage this. This is an open economy--MMPORPGs are hardly a monopoly. If gamers dislike playing with people who are not playing for fun, but rather to make real money off gamers, then it is in the competitive interest of creators like Blizzard to manage this, through legal or technical means. Whether dislike comes from uninformed bigots, or geniunely frustrated gamers, this is yet another situation where--as the farmers have already proven--the dollar rules. And in this instance, the farmers are peasants, game creators are royalty, and US law is king.
Regarding your second point that "It's their own damn fault":
Equating this to a person selling you a bridge on street corner is not a fair comparison. A person selling a bridge is something highly unusual and operating as an independent group, whereas a phisher is attempting to break in on a very common transaction, by impersonating a trusted agent with a prior relationship. For your street corner comparison, a more accurate comparison would be a group coming in and setting up a fake Bank of America location and executing transactions.
As the other respondent says, your attitude is defeatist--too many people say things cannot be done. Just because something is difficult to defeat, or apparently impossible to stop, that is absolutely no reason to tolerate it. Murder is going to happen no matter what. Should we remove our laws against that?
Instead of being so negative, try seeing the positive side of this: the ground-breaking it sets for other states and countries that, through continued improvement, will hopefully greatly reduce the amount of phishing by giving courts a strong set of tools with which to punish violators.
I have a 1680x1050 LCD and 6600GT and it runs quite nicely for Source and WoW @ native. Overheating is my only concern in the summertime. But if you need to upgrade, the 7xxx should bring the 6800GT down some.
It was because the university didn't want to become de facto censors of information, in any form it may come.
I've seen this idea in more than one post: that blocking equates to censorship.
I may be missing something, but how does blocking Napster or BitTorrent make one a censor? Napster and BitTorrent are propagators of information, not creators. Censorship is to prevent "objectionable" materials. The nature of the materials is not the heart of the issue, the legality of their conveyance is.
I doubt the university has an issue with the ideas or materials you can get from Napster or BitTorrent. They don't care if you listen to Metallica or use Photoshop, and certainly will not stop you if you go out to purchase either of those and use them within your dorm room. They care about having their service used to transmit content illegally. And that is the debate, not censorship or freedom of speech.
Before you flame me, I'm not condoning the blocking of these services by the university. I'm merely questioning the use of the "censorship" argument. Too often people jump to wrap their argument in the mantle of the First Amendment. It then becomes easy to destroy that argument by showing the issue is not censorship. Focusing the debate on mechanism is much more productive.
If I chose to pirate a satellite signal to get ESPN, and my apartment complex made me take down my neat little dish rig on their roof, would you listen to me when I argued the property management company was censoring ESPN?
If I downloaded a couple of ditties by Beethoven, was I cutting into the bandwidth of students browsing the Web, no doubt purely for academic purposes?
Making sweeping statements like this without thought leads to poor policies.
And making arguments based on the vast exception rather than rule leads to lost debates.
Can you believe how totally whipped the industry has made us as gamers?...(paid good @#^#$ing money for a hard drive!) and we're still bending over and accepting [playing with the CD in the drive] these days
We can't have te cake and eat it, too.
The industry wouldn't be requiring the original CD to play if such a large portion of their so-called "whipped" consumer base found it perfectly acceptable to steal their product instead of pay for it. It's a fiscal requirement, not a technical one.
Corporations usually get away with screwing their customers, as Valve did here.
LOL!
First consider, what is your objective measure of most corporations screwing their customers? Blanket statements like that are dangerous.
Second, consider how such an incredibly non-staple product as a video game could "screw" its customers. (Well, prostitution aside, but who's screwing whom there can be debated.)
Back to the point, nothing is forcing you buy the product beside your own desire to play the game. If you don't feel $50 is a fair price for HL2, or you feel you are deceived, then don't participate. But I'm betting, in terms of utility-per-unit-time obtained, you're getting more for $50 on HL2 than half the stuff in your house.
Come back and talk about "screwing" the customer when we're talking about a monopoly on a staple product or a medical item. Until then, you're just devaluing the statement.
The "I'm just pirating it to express my indignation" excuse is either intentionally disingenuous or unintentionally pathetic. If stealing it was to make a point, and not to enjoy the game, then they wouldn't be playing it. If someone is going to steal it, at least come clean that it is for pleasure.
It is interesting to see a population who, while very intelligent or knowledgeable in technical dimensions, can be so ignorant or immature to tolerate this kind of behavior under the guise of "sticking it to The Man."
...Firefox is not a threat is because People Are Dumb
More accurately, People Are Ignorant. Or even more accurately, Information is Imperfect. Just as a lawyer may be ignorant to the benefits of Firefox, you may be ignorant to a dozen legal opportunities to safeguard or benefit yourself. Doesn't make either of you dumb.
Microsoft has the incredible advantage of a much higher ability to control information available to people, like their Firefox FUD tactic here. So it is good to see everyone here working from the bottom up to counter that.
Ironically...posting from IE at work...IT is moving us all to Firefox soon!:)
War of 1812: 1812 is recognized as a stalemate. We failed to capture Canada. But we prevented the British from capturing American land, and we won a number of key naval battles against the British. It ended in a stalemate but established America as a true independent power. I stated Vietnam is the only true military LOSS. I didn't say we WON every other war (e.g., Korea).
Civil War: I can't believe you used this as an argument. The America we live in, and the *Constitution, Congress, President, and Federal Government of the US* won the war. The people who lost were people who wanted to SECEDE from the United States. America won the Civil War, the Confederacy lost.
I am absolutely certain by Ground Zero (note that he capitalizes it, indicating a specific location, not a generic ground zero) he means Ground Zero in New York. Google "Ground Zero" and see what you get: http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Ground+Zero%22 Or just go out on a street corner and stop the first 10 adults you see and ask them what comes to mind when you say, "Ground Zero."
Given this, it is highly unlikely that the "village idiot" is Kim Jong Il (that is "il", not "ii" as you write). No matter whether he's wearing a jumpsuit or his fancy golfing duds, you're unlikely to find him at Ground Zero. The most likely conclusion is he is talking about Bush and his Cabinet.
And THAT is unwarranted hostility & aggression. Suggesting the death of millions, including the elected leadership is. Calling him out on his cowardly and hateful suggestions is not.
OK, for those who have read down this far, I'm amazed by the response this one post has generated. I felt it necessary to clarify something for all the people who are taking issue with the "right" and "left" usages.
Note that I was not the person who started this thread or using those terms, nor do I agree with wholesale application of "right" and "left" to oversimplify anyone. My comment about monolithic blocks should make that apparent.
I was responding to someone else who was using global left/right terminology to criticize America. I in turn asked him to consider what he was criticizing in light of that object's performance. I was not trying to defend the validity of his positioning, or define what distinguishes Republicans from Democrats, Conservatives from Liberals, or chimps from baboons. Nor was I trying to establish that a religious belief results in economic success. But apparently a number of people have read this and more into what I wrote, and not entirely by their own fault.
I believe that the foundation of America is driven by liberty, economic freedom and tolerance. And that, at their core, both Democrats and Republicans value these exact same principles to varying extents (e.g., divides occur where they conflict, such as morals with liberty, or taxation with freedom). Yes, the concepts of personal liberty was a "left" view of the world 200 years ago. On the same note, a free market was a "right" view 200 years ago.
I was not claiming Republicans or Bush are responsible for America's power & success (which I stand by, but recognize there are many measures, not all of which America excels in), nor am I claiming Democrats are, or Federalists, or any other single party. We got to where we are today by valuing liberty and freedom, engaging in debate and reform, and I think that is great. In contrast, people who hate blindly or assume America is bad because we're not a "middle ground" is neither a debate, nor productive. Which is amusingly ironic as this "hate America" bit often comes from the same people who preach tolerance and diversity.
Bottom line: America as a whole is "right" of the world in the original post's terminology--however he sees that--and I ask, by posing an evaluation, is that really a bad thing?
PS: And yes, I love America. I love it with Bush as President, I loved it with Clinton as President, and I would have loved it with Kerry as President. Among the many things I love is that it gives me the opportunity and ability to move to nearly any other country in the world, if I loved that country more.
Nazi Germany was also incredibly successful. They almost took over the world.
I'm not endorsing the Nazi regime's morals--they were evil.
No difference between national socialism and national republicanism? LOL! Well, one asks for the extensive government support and involvement in day-to-day life, the other support the smallest government possible (in theory).
The same way the post I responded to got "Insightful" for being "mindlessly unpatriotic, and severely incorrect drivel" as you would put it. I would say he had an idea that was worth writing back to.
Right wing parties are defined by their conservatism, not their choice of political system...Conservatives usually tend to be all for stripping away personal freedoms to support their religious beliefs/ideology also Are you serious? So do you think when the US opposed the USSR and won the Cold War, it was just a matter of the pot and kettle, both black? You are making some incredibly incorrect leaps.
Texas might have ranked #8 but liberal California ranked #7. Are you seriously trying to make an argument that California is a socialist state, and since it is #7 vs. Texas at #8, somehow that means something? LMAO! Last I checked, both Texas and California have Republican governors. Both are elements of the United States, which was already postulated by the original Parent thread to which I responded to be the most "right" country in the world. As all states operate under the same Constitution and Federal Government, the idea that one state is somehow running a far-left government is absurd. I live in CA's extremely liberal Bay Area, so, short of MA and NY, this is about as liberal as America gets. While we routinely elect Democrat senators, the 2004 ballot results show that CA isn't a liberal state. Heck, we recalled Davis after his final straw of giving out driver's licenses to people who are in the country illegally. Pointing out my omission of CA's economic status only adds to my point. Oh yeah, and a significant amount of CA's economic power comes from the incredible farmland productivity of the San Joaquin valley. Have you ever checked how the votes or money run a couple miles inland in CA? http://www.fundrace.org/citymap.php
religious nut...turn the Constitution into a discriminatory document As far as terming Bush a "religious nut" I caution against applying simple extremes like this. The same way I disagreed with people who labeled Clinton a "philandering liar." Both demonstrate a lack of understanding and a desire to villify a person to strengthen your argument. You will note that Kerry frequently referenced religion in his campaign, does that make him a "nut," too? You echo a comment about turning the Constitution into a discriminatory document. Another generalism. Does not the Constitution already discriminate? It only applies to citizens of the United States. That is discrimination against non-citizens. Does it not grant all legislative powers to the Congress, and delegate other powers similarly? That is discriminatory to everyone else. It punishes people who give aid to enemies of the US. Again, discrimination. Neither is the idea of a discriminatory amendment new. The 26th amendment stipulates you must be 18 to vote.
My opinion is still out on the matter of defining marriage, so don't assume I'm doing this because I support a Constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. My point is that jumping on the bandwagon of using this phrase to turn Bush into a discriminator is disingenuous. Remember, marriage itself is a discriminatory institution, whether or not you allow same-sex marriage. Consider this: > would you allow a man to marry his sister? > would you allow a man to marry his brother? > would you allow a 60yo man to marry an 8yo girl? > would you allow a 60yo man to marry an 8yo boy? > would you allow a person to marry a mentally retarded person? > would you allow a person to marry an animal?
The US currently has military presence in almost 130 countries, deploying approximately a quarter of a million servicemen in support roles for combat, peacekeeping or deterrence. That doesn't include roughly 100,000 non-combat personnel in Germany, Italy, Japan, and the UK.
Your sarcasm blindly simplifies our current military operations to 2 countries. It also takes the common liberal spin on Afghanistan and Iraq. While Iraq continues to be the focus of terrorist attacks, they are also enjoying refurbished schools, utilities, road systems, and a host of other benefits lacking under Hussein. Most notably, an operating democratic government with scheduled elections and a leader who is not practicing genocide. Afghanistan has already had its elections--something you don't see heavily publicized.
Korea ended as a stalemate at the 38th parallel, resulting in a negotiated settlement. I think you would define this as, "failed to win," which is difficult on it's own as the US objectives in Korea weren't clear.
Vietnam is the only true military loss America has sustained, and it did not happen because of a weak military, but because of uncertain political will from home. By choosing to withdraw, America impacted the destinies of many neighboring countries, who were left to deal with an expanding communist power.
Finally, your self-loathing is sickening. Aside from not having confidence in our men & women in uniform, you are also--even in humor--suggesting a nuclear strike in New York and wishing for the deaths of the current administration. Wow. Perhaps you should join bin Laden, "Anonymous Coward."
Doh, my original reply got lost...so here's the short short version:
My use of "left/right" stems 100% from the Parent thread to which I originally responded.
The point I was making was for the Parent author to consider his own viewpoint as well as that which he was criticizing, not to make a political thesis. I used his terminology in my response, and completely agree that "left/right" here is incredibly broad.
Furthermore, I am fiscally conservative, and socially mixed (libertarian, liberal, conservative). I do not support Bush's spending, and am concerned about my privacy, but recognize that the fanatic terrorist threat requires adjustments. I also recognize that anytime I speak out to support the Bush administration, I will be lumped into a stereotype. I try to avoid doing the same, and so I completely cede the point about the generalism of the "left/right" terminology used in this thread.
LOL. I am not "on" anything. You simply failed to understand my point. I am fully aware that China's economy is exploding, and wrote as much. The definition of "burgeoning" is "to grow and expand rapidly."
My point is that the government infrastructure of China is having to adapt to deal with the capitalist elements economy. Compare mainland to Hong Kong.
Regarding measure of success, see my response to xThinkx regarding economic measures. Also, technically, Europe is not a country, but a continent.
Regarding USSR & China, I am using the extreme opposite. If the US is the most right-wing entity in the world, I looked to them for the most left-wing entity.
Regarding Sweden, I am always amazed how this one country always comes up as the example. Yes, they do have a strong economy and some excellent performance on several fronts. However, their tax-rate is terrible for wealth development, which is why so many wealthy Swedes move out of Sweden--not a positive economic indicator for fueling explosive growth. Sweden is undergoing it's own internal toil because of the high volume on immigrants moving into the country and putting a burden on the socialist economy.
On the contrary, Sweden does beat the US on many economic indicators for poverty and child-poverty, which is very admirable. And they do have a strong economy. However, keep in mind that Sweden is a sparsely populated country, yet rich in natural resources. Consider if this economy, applied to less than 9 million, would scale linearly to a population of 290 million. If it does, I would be thrilled, as they do have many positives, as you point out.
You should also know that my mother is native born to Sweden, and I lived in Sweden. One of the factors in my mother leaving Sweden was the opportunity presented by America. That, and my family could not afford to live in Sweden, forcing us, ironically, to return to America.
What standards are you using for power? Economic, as that underlies all else. Gross National Product and Gross Domestic Product. If you're unfamiliar, GNP measures total money value of products and services produced by a nation in a year; GDP is similar but limits to production done within the country.
Most successful eh? See Conductor's response; I'm not going to point out the error of your social state panacea, but again, I submit the above. Perhaps it can be argued we're not as our GDP per capita is 2nd behind Luxembourg. But I would argue Luxembourg cannot scale to match the U.S. http://www.worldfactsandfigures.com/gdp_country_de sc.php..all of those countries... What is your measure of power & success? You mention diplomatic power. Do you have a metric by which to judge this? Are you aware that the coalition of countries that the US put together for the Iraq war was larger than that for the Korean War, and this was done without the UN's backing? After the invasion, the UN then gave its permission for the continued occupation of Iraq, after initally opposing it. For that matter, who funds the UN? Or that the US was able to hold the first democratic election in Afghanistan just recently? I think the US has far more diplomatic power than you speculate.
Please submit 1 country who you believe is more successful and powerful, and what measurements you use to determine such. Take into consideration whether that country could have accomplished even one of those items I just listed.
Finally...your knee jerk reaction of "military power" tells volumes about how you perceive both power and those on the other side of the political spectrum from you.
"I can tell you you 'whiny left wingers' are the only americans for which we keep some respect. Gosh... for the rest of the world your democrat party is right wing... so imagine our idea of who your people elected..."
What you have written above essentially translates to: "The most powerful and successful country in the world is further to the right than the rest of the world."
While it is possible that political stance is not a statistical predictor of a country's success, you should take it into consideration that it could be. After all, the U.S.S.R. was left of the rest of the world and now is no more. China is communist, but is struggling to grow with it's own burgeoning capitalist economy. Is it not possible that position from which you are delegating this respect is akin to Karl Marx paying respect to an economic system?
Also, I'm curious, how can you claim to speak for the rest of the world? Treating "everyone else" as a monolithic block with a mass opinion is the hallmark of stereotyping and short-sightedness.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow, this got way off from the OP thread.
Bringing up Rwanda, Somalia, N.Korea, and China has nothing to do with Iraq, as LegendLength already pointed out. Prior decisions are no reason or excuse for future ones unless you have first proven that those prior decision(s) were validated and correct. Even then, you must consider the future decision in its own context.
That being said, consider Rwanda, Somalia, and North Korea. I exclude China because we could hardly consider invading them. Aside from the nuclear situation (the 3 others initially didn't possess a ballistic or nuclear threat), there are economic ones that would make war with them not feasible except in dire, world-war, kinds of situations. Furthermore, China has a stable, Communist party leadership, compared to the volatile despotism or revolution in the other 3.
Rwanda, Somalia, and North Korea all rose to prominence under a different President's watch, in a time when America had not been attacked. Consider how President G.W. Bush would have acted in a similar situation had he been in office in the mid-90s, especially if we had just suffered a terrorist attack. Furthermore, if you recall, we actually _did_ send troops to Rwanda and Somalia--a token force to the former, I believe, as part of multinational UN peacekeeper deployment. These three situations, as well as Rev. Jesse Jackon's infamous Sierra Leone settlement, represent situations where negotiation and appeasement resulted in varying combinations of: failure of their objective, massive loss of human life, and general weakening of respect for U.S. power.
Now, back to gold farmers. Whatever impact they have on the game, IMO ultimately it is up to the game creators--in the case of World of Warcraft, Blizzard--to manage this. This is an open economy--MMPORPGs are hardly a monopoly. If gamers dislike playing with people who are not playing for fun, but rather to make real money off gamers, then it is in the competitive interest of creators like Blizzard to manage this, through legal or technical means. Whether dislike comes from uninformed bigots, or geniunely frustrated gamers, this is yet another situation where--as the farmers have already proven--the dollar rules. And in this instance, the farmers are peasants, game creators are royalty, and US law is king.
Regarding your second point that "It's their own damn fault":
Equating this to a person selling you a bridge on street corner is not a fair comparison. A person selling a bridge is something highly unusual and operating as an independent group, whereas a phisher is attempting to break in on a very common transaction, by impersonating a trusted agent with a prior relationship. For your street corner comparison, a more accurate comparison would be a group coming in and setting up a fake Bank of America location and executing transactions.
As the other respondent says, your attitude is defeatist--too many people say things cannot be done. Just because something is difficult to defeat, or apparently impossible to stop, that is absolutely no reason to tolerate it. Murder is going to happen no matter what. Should we remove our laws against that?
Instead of being so negative, try seeing the positive side of this: the ground-breaking it sets for other states and countries that, through continued improvement, will hopefully greatly reduce the amount of phishing by giving courts a strong set of tools with which to punish violators.
I have a 1680x1050 LCD and 6600GT and it runs quite nicely for Source and WoW @ native. Overheating is my only concern in the summertime. But if you need to upgrade, the 7xxx should bring the 6800GT down some.
It was because the university didn't want to become de facto censors of information, in any form it may come.
I've seen this idea in more than one post: that blocking equates to censorship.
I may be missing something, but how does blocking Napster or BitTorrent make one a censor? Napster and BitTorrent are propagators of information, not creators. Censorship is to prevent "objectionable" materials. The nature of the materials is not the heart of the issue, the legality of their conveyance is.
I doubt the university has an issue with the ideas or materials you can get from Napster or BitTorrent. They don't care if you listen to Metallica or use Photoshop, and certainly will not stop you if you go out to purchase either of those and use them within your dorm room. They care about having their service used to transmit content illegally. And that is the debate, not censorship or freedom of speech.
Before you flame me, I'm not condoning the blocking of these services by the university. I'm merely questioning the use of the "censorship" argument. Too often people jump to wrap their argument in the mantle of the First Amendment. It then becomes easy to destroy that argument by showing the issue is not censorship. Focusing the debate on mechanism is much more productive.
If I chose to pirate a satellite signal to get ESPN, and my apartment complex made me take down my neat little dish rig on their roof, would you listen to me when I argued the property management company was censoring ESPN?
If I downloaded a couple of ditties by Beethoven, was I cutting into the bandwidth of students browsing the Web, no doubt purely for academic purposes?
Making sweeping statements like this without thought leads to poor policies.
And making arguments based on the vast exception rather than rule leads to lost debates.
Can you believe how totally whipped the industry has made us as gamers? ...(paid good @#^#$ing money for a hard drive!) and we're still bending over and accepting [playing with the CD in the drive] these days
We can't have te cake and eat it, too.
The industry wouldn't be requiring the original CD to play if such a large portion of their so-called "whipped" consumer base found it perfectly acceptable to steal their product instead of pay for it. It's a fiscal requirement, not a technical one.
Corporations usually get away with screwing their customers, as Valve did here.
LOL!
First consider, what is your objective measure of most corporations screwing their customers? Blanket statements like that are dangerous.
Second, consider how such an incredibly non-staple product as a video game could "screw" its customers. (Well, prostitution aside, but who's screwing whom there can be debated.)
Back to the point, nothing is forcing you buy the product beside your own desire to play the game. If you don't feel $50 is a fair price for HL2, or you feel you are deceived, then don't participate. But I'm betting, in terms of utility-per-unit-time obtained, you're getting more for $50 on HL2 than half the stuff in your house.
Come back and talk about "screwing" the customer when we're talking about a monopoly on a staple product or a medical item. Until then, you're just devaluing the statement.
Sheesh.
You're a "trees" kind of guy, missing the forest and the point.
Amen.
The "I'm just pirating it to express my indignation" excuse is either intentionally disingenuous or unintentionally pathetic. If stealing it was to make a point, and not to enjoy the game, then they wouldn't be playing it. If someone is going to steal it, at least come clean that it is for pleasure.
It is interesting to see a population who, while very intelligent or knowledgeable in technical dimensions, can be so ignorant or immature to tolerate this kind of behavior under the guise of "sticking it to The Man."
Two wrongs still don't make a right.
More accurately, People Are Ignorant. Or even more accurately, Information is Imperfect. Just as a lawyer may be ignorant to the benefits of Firefox, you may be ignorant to a dozen legal opportunities to safeguard or benefit yourself. Doesn't make either of you dumb.
Microsoft has the incredible advantage of a much higher ability to control information available to people, like their Firefox FUD tactic here. So it is good to see everyone here working from the bottom up to counter that. Ironically...posting from IE at work...IT is moving us all to Firefox soon! :)
Incorrect on both counts.
War of 1812:
1812 is recognized as a stalemate. We failed to capture Canada. But we prevented the British from capturing American land, and we won a number of key naval battles against the British. It ended in a stalemate but established America as a true independent power. I stated Vietnam is the only true military LOSS. I didn't say we WON every other war (e.g., Korea).
Civil War:
I can't believe you used this as an argument. The America we live in, and the *Constitution, Congress, President, and Federal Government of the US* won the war. The people who lost were people who wanted to SECEDE from the United States. America won the Civil War, the Confederacy lost.
I am absolutely certain by Ground Zero (note that he capitalizes it, indicating a specific location, not a generic ground zero) he means Ground Zero in New York. Google "Ground Zero" and see what you get:
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Ground+Zero%22
Or just go out on a street corner and stop the first 10 adults you see and ask them what comes to mind when you say, "Ground Zero."
Given this, it is highly unlikely that the "village idiot" is Kim Jong Il (that is "il", not "ii" as you write). No matter whether he's wearing a jumpsuit or his fancy golfing duds, you're unlikely to find him at Ground Zero. The most likely conclusion is he is talking about Bush and his Cabinet.
And THAT is unwarranted hostility & aggression. Suggesting the death of millions, including the elected leadership is. Calling him out on his cowardly and hateful suggestions is not.
Get it straight.
OK, for those who have read down this far, I'm amazed by the response this one post has generated. I felt it necessary to clarify something for all the people who are taking issue with the "right" and "left" usages.
Note that I was not the person who started this thread or using those terms, nor do I agree with wholesale application of "right" and "left" to oversimplify anyone. My comment about monolithic blocks should make that apparent.
I was responding to someone else who was using global left/right terminology to criticize America. I in turn asked him to consider what he was criticizing in light of that object's performance. I was not trying to defend the validity of his positioning, or define what distinguishes Republicans from Democrats, Conservatives from Liberals, or chimps from baboons. Nor was I trying to establish that a religious belief results in economic success. But apparently a number of people have read this and more into what I wrote, and not entirely by their own fault.
I believe that the foundation of America is driven by liberty, economic freedom and tolerance. And that, at their core, both Democrats and Republicans value these exact same principles to varying extents (e.g., divides occur where they conflict, such as morals with liberty, or taxation with freedom). Yes, the concepts of personal liberty was a "left" view of the world 200 years ago. On the same note, a free market was a "right" view 200 years ago.
I was not claiming Republicans or Bush are responsible for America's power & success (which I stand by, but recognize there are many measures, not all of which America excels in), nor am I claiming Democrats are, or Federalists, or any other single party. We got to where we are today by valuing liberty and freedom, engaging in debate and reform, and I think that is great. In contrast, people who hate blindly or assume America is bad because we're not a "middle ground" is neither a debate, nor productive. Which is amusingly ironic as this "hate America" bit often comes from the same people who preach tolerance and diversity.
Bottom line: America as a whole is "right" of the world in the original post's terminology--however he sees that--and I ask, by posing an evaluation, is that really a bad thing?
PS: And yes, I love America. I love it with Bush as President, I loved it with Clinton as President, and I would have loved it with Kerry as President. Among the many things I love is that it gives me the opportunity and ability to move to nearly any other country in the world, if I loved that country more.
Nazi Germany was also incredibly successful. They almost took over the world.
I'm not endorsing the Nazi regime's morals--they were evil.
No difference between national socialism and national republicanism? LOL! Well, one asks for the extensive government support and involvement in day-to-day life, the other support the smallest government possible (in theory).
One word: Arrogance.
Hitler was also an artist and an author.
The same way the post I responded to got "Insightful" for being "mindlessly unpatriotic, and severely incorrect drivel" as you would put it. I would say he had an idea that was worth writing back to.
Right wing parties are defined by their conservatism, not their choice of political system...Conservatives usually tend to be all for stripping away personal freedoms to support their religious beliefs/ideology also
Are you serious? So do you think when the US opposed the USSR and won the Cold War, it was just a matter of the pot and kettle, both black? You are making some incredibly incorrect leaps.
Are you actually siding with hate? Do you not see what you are saying?
Texas might have ranked #8 but liberal California ranked #7.
Are you seriously trying to make an argument that California is a socialist state, and since it is #7 vs. Texas at #8, somehow that means something? LMAO! Last I checked, both Texas and California have Republican governors. Both are elements of the United States, which was already postulated by the original Parent thread to which I responded to be the most "right" country in the world. As all states operate under the same Constitution and Federal Government, the idea that one state is somehow running a far-left government is absurd. I live in CA's extremely liberal Bay Area, so, short of MA and NY, this is about as liberal as America gets. While we routinely elect Democrat senators, the 2004 ballot results show that CA isn't a liberal state. Heck, we recalled Davis after his final straw of giving out driver's licenses to people who are in the country illegally. Pointing out my omission of CA's economic status only adds to my point. Oh yeah, and a significant amount of CA's economic power comes from the incredible farmland productivity of the San Joaquin valley. Have you ever checked how the votes or money run a couple miles inland in CA?
http://www.fundrace.org/citymap.php
religious nut...turn the Constitution into a discriminatory document
As far as terming Bush a "religious nut" I caution against applying simple extremes like this. The same way I disagreed with people who labeled Clinton a "philandering liar." Both demonstrate a lack of understanding and a desire to villify a person to strengthen your argument. You will note that Kerry frequently referenced religion in his campaign, does that make him a "nut," too? You echo a comment about turning the Constitution into a discriminatory document. Another generalism. Does not the Constitution already discriminate? It only applies to citizens of the United States. That is discrimination against non-citizens. Does it not grant all legislative powers to the Congress, and delegate other powers similarly? That is discriminatory to everyone else. It punishes people who give aid to enemies of the US. Again, discrimination. Neither is the idea of a discriminatory amendment new. The 26th amendment stipulates you must be 18 to vote.
My opinion is still out on the matter of defining marriage, so don't assume I'm doing this because I support a Constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. My point is that jumping on the bandwagon of using this phrase to turn Bush into a discriminator is disingenuous. Remember, marriage itself is a discriminatory institution, whether or not you allow same-sex marriage. Consider this:
> would you allow a man to marry his sister?
> would you allow a man to marry his brother?
> would you allow a 60yo man to marry an 8yo girl?
> would you allow a 60yo man to marry an 8yo boy?
> would you allow a person to marry a mentally retarded person?
> would you allow a person to marry an animal?
The US currently has military presence in almost 130 countries, deploying approximately a quarter of a million servicemen in support roles for combat, peacekeeping or deterrence. That doesn't include roughly 100,000 non-combat personnel in Germany, Italy, Japan, and the UK.
Your sarcasm blindly simplifies our current military operations to 2 countries. It also takes the common liberal spin on Afghanistan and Iraq. While Iraq continues to be the focus of terrorist attacks, they are also enjoying refurbished schools, utilities, road systems, and a host of other benefits lacking under Hussein. Most notably, an operating democratic government with scheduled elections and a leader who is not practicing genocide. Afghanistan has already had its elections--something you don't see heavily publicized.
I presume you're talking about Vietnam & Korea?
Korea ended as a stalemate at the 38th parallel, resulting in a negotiated settlement. I think you would define this as, "failed to win," which is difficult on it's own as the US objectives in Korea weren't clear.
Vietnam is the only true military loss America has sustained, and it did not happen because of a weak military, but because of uncertain political will from home. By choosing to withdraw, America impacted the destinies of many neighboring countries, who were left to deal with an expanding communist power.
Finally, your self-loathing is sickening. Aside from not having confidence in our men & women in uniform, you are also--even in humor--suggesting a nuclear strike in New York and wishing for the deaths of the current administration. Wow. Perhaps you should join bin Laden, "Anonymous Coward."
Doh, my original reply got lost...so here's the short short version:
My use of "left/right" stems 100% from the Parent thread to which I originally responded.
The point I was making was for the Parent author to consider his own viewpoint as well as that which he was criticizing, not to make a political thesis. I used his terminology in my response, and completely agree that "left/right" here is incredibly broad.
Furthermore, I am fiscally conservative, and socially mixed (libertarian, liberal, conservative). I do not support Bush's spending, and am concerned about my privacy, but recognize that the fanatic terrorist threat requires adjustments. I also recognize that anytime I speak out to support the Bush administration, I will be lumped into a stereotype. I try to avoid doing the same, and so I completely cede the point about the generalism of the "left/right" terminology used in this thread.
LOL. I am not "on" anything. You simply failed to understand my point. I am fully aware that China's economy is exploding, and wrote as much. The definition of "burgeoning" is "to grow and expand rapidly."
My point is that the government infrastructure of China is having to adapt to deal with the capitalist elements economy. Compare mainland to Hong Kong.
Regarding measure of success, see my response to xThinkx regarding economic measures. Also, technically, Europe is not a country, but a continent.
w /EconomyE conomy
Regarding USSR & China, I am using the extreme opposite. If the US is the most right-wing entity in the world, I looked to them for the most left-wing entity.
Regarding Sweden, I am always amazed how this one country always comes up as the example. Yes, they do have a strong economy and some excellent performance on several fronts. However, their tax-rate is terrible for wealth development, which is why so many wealthy Swedes move out of Sweden--not a positive economic indicator for fueling explosive growth. Sweden is undergoing it's own internal toil because of the high volume on immigrants moving into the country and putting a burden on the socialist economy.
On the contrary, Sweden does beat the US on many economic indicators for poverty and child-poverty, which is very admirable. And they do have a strong economy. However, keep in mind that Sweden is a sparsely populated country, yet rich in natural resources. Consider if this economy, applied to less than 9 million, would scale linearly to a population of 290 million. If it does, I would be thrilled, as they do have many positives, as you point out.
You should also know that my mother is native born to Sweden, and I lived in Sweden. One of the factors in my mother leaving Sweden was the opportunity presented by America. That, and my family could not afford to live in Sweden, forcing us, ironically, to return to America.
Details:
http://www.nationmaster.com/country/s
http://www.nationmaster.com/country/us/
What standards are you using for power?
y .html
o rder/2001rank.html
e sc.php ..all of those countries...
Economic, as that underlies all else. Gross National Product and Gross Domestic Product. If you're unfamiliar, GNP measures total money value of products and services produced by a nation in a year; GDP is similar but limits to production done within the country.
As of the most recent measures (2003) not only did the United States have the largest GNP, but Texas by itself ranked #8, right behind China.
http://www.window.state.tx.us/news/303148theconom
For GDP, the United States again tops the list easily.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rank
Most successful eh?
See Conductor's response; I'm not going to point out the error of your social state panacea, but again, I submit the above. Perhaps it can be argued we're not as our GDP per capita is 2nd behind Luxembourg. But I would argue Luxembourg cannot scale to match the U.S.
http://www.worldfactsandfigures.com/gdp_country_d
What is your measure of power & success? You mention diplomatic power. Do you have a metric by which to judge this? Are you aware that the coalition of countries that the US put together for the Iraq war was larger than that for the Korean War, and this was done without the UN's backing? After the invasion, the UN then gave its permission for the continued occupation of Iraq, after initally opposing it. For that matter, who funds the UN? Or that the US was able to hold the first democratic election in Afghanistan just recently? I think the US has far more diplomatic power than you speculate.
Please submit 1 country who you believe is more successful and powerful, and what measurements you use to determine such. Take into consideration whether that country could have accomplished even one of those items I just listed.
Finally...your knee jerk reaction of "military power" tells volumes about how you perceive both power and those on the other side of the political spectrum from you.
"I can tell you you 'whiny left wingers' are the only americans for which we keep some respect. Gosh... for the rest of the world your democrat party is right wing... so imagine our idea of who your people elected..."
d ex145.shtml
What you have written above essentially translates to: "The most powerful and successful country in the world is further to the right than the rest of the world."
While it is possible that political stance is not a statistical predictor of a country's success, you should take it into consideration that it could be. After all, the U.S.S.R. was left of the rest of the world and now is no more. China is communist, but is struggling to grow with it's own burgeoning capitalist economy. Is it not possible that position from which you are delegating this respect is akin to Karl Marx paying respect to an economic system?
Also, I'm curious, how can you claim to speak for the rest of the world? Treating "everyone else" as a monolithic block with a mass opinion is the hallmark of stereotyping and short-sightedness.
An opposing foreign opinion.
http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/SunSpec/Oct04/in