Where to start?
Guns? Swiss gun ownership is through the roof compared to almost any other country (they really *do* have a well armed militia.)
Tax rates? Monaco's income tax is 0%.
Even ignoring the smaller european countires, the overall level of taxation is *broadly* similar between the US and Western European countries http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_rates_around_the_world).
Yet all of Europe provides free, high quality health care. Highly subsidised (or free) access to leading universities as part of the taxation system.
Why is it, do you think, the european nations with 'high' taxes (Nordic countries, Switzerland as prime examples) regularly top the standard of living tables?
As for free speech / free press - the European convention on human rights provides for free speech and this has been upheld time after time. Certain countries have a specific ban on Nazi symbology, but given the circumstances who can blame them?
Consider the position of the US (34th) in relation to 19 out of the top 20 *European* countries (the other being New Zealdnd) which top the World Press Freedom indicies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Worldwide_Press_Freedom_Index)
The biggest problem in your ill informed comments is that you seem (in a Sarah Palinesque fashion) to assume Europe is a country, not dozens of nations.
The basic business model of a newspaper (and a commercial TV channel) is to sell advertising space. Once you fix that firmly in your mind things make a lot more sense.
Newspapers require journalists to write stories that will make people buy papers. Sometimes they might be some public good (Watergate). Often times it will be utter drivel (almost anything about Britney Spears). As long as the stories fit the business model (serious investigative reporting, celebrity trash and anything inbetween) then it's all good.
It gives the 4th estate too much credit to think they are particulary political. Fox hammer the conservative message because their business model is to attract conservative politics lovers/haters to Fox. Their perceived politics is just part of the business plan.
Obama is popular - therefore newsworthy - so stories about him will sell.
McCain is less popular and in many respects less newsworthy (his politics and personal life are well known now, and wealthy old white male politicians aren't scarce on the ground) so stories are not going to sell as many papers.
Long story short - media don't exist to help voters make informed choices; they exist to make money. That ambitious politicians and their campaign teams use this to their advantage should also not be a surprise.
why not go the whole way? Abolish paid for, special-interest driven, corruptable politicians entirely?
Allow anyone to draft legislation, post it on some server (ArXiv style) and allow it a few months to be peer reviewed to discuss merits of new law. Legislation that looks like being worth considering is then written up by professionals into a version worth voting on, then put to a public online vote.
Set a suitable quorom so single interest groups can't force things through. Give every law a 12 month sunset clause, so if it doesn't work in practice it can be dropped unless people activley vote again to keep it on the books.
Government then restircted to basic administrative tasks and oversight into government departments provided by citizens chosen through further popular votes.
Yeah, i can see flaws in this system (especially with budget allocations) - and I'm sure/. will pick them to pieces, but is it any more flawed than the current systems in place in western democracies?
As long as you'd accept spending *six weeks* being interrogated by special branch (who, by all accounts, don't f*** about), protesting your innocence, before being chucked back out on the street to rebuild your life (reckon *your* boss would keep you on if you were 'helping police with their investigations for six whole weeks).
Think back to May 1st this year. Now imagine you'd spent every single day between then and now in the cells at Paddington Green station being questioned about a crime you didn't commit / plan to commit.
Reckon you'd come out after six weeks the same person?
Except, of course, the bill has to get through the Lords. Which it almost certainly won't. Even Lord Goldsmith (ex attorney general, promoted to Lords) is against it.
Then it has to be voted on again by the Commons - which could be in a few months time. Only then will it become law (ignoring formality royal assent, and possible rare use of Parliament Act).
Who knows what Brown's ability to force sick MPs into the house to vote, and what deals N. Ireland MPs will insist upon then?
I honestly think a few months down the line, when it comes to the crunch, the government could loose this, and force a vote of no confidence vote on Brown.
In any case UK is still a way off from 42 day detention......
you don't like your elected representatives? Reckon your fellow citizens share your views? Why not stand for election yourself?
People get the governments they deserve, so if you think the system sucks, get up and do something. Democracy isn't getting worked up about bits of paper signed by dead politicians, or flags, or songs, or fireworks - democracy is the fact they any one person can stand for election and make changes to the system with the support of their peers.
the set of amendments to the constitution which form the bill of rights in the US closely match - and indeed were derived from the English/Scottish bills/claims of right from 1689. This is, I'm afraid, fact - phrases like "cruel and unusual punishment" come from English bill of rights.
The UK doesn't have a single written constitution (for complex historical reasons), but there are plenty of documents (for example Margna Carta) which were developed in the UK and limit state power. It's absurd to suggest that the UK does not have systems in place to limit the power of the state.
The US system of politics/government didn't develop in a vacuum.
Many of the ideas of the US constitution were based on UK law (hardly a surprise) and modified to suit the particular ideology/politics/beliefs of early US politicians. It's probably fair to say that some aspects of the US model have been a success, and some less so.
it is easy to pick holes in both US and UK systems of government, and neither represents a perfect democracy, but it is difficult to argue that they don't both share a common root.
Apart from Articles 10 and 11 of European Convention on Human Rights? Part of Human Rights Act.
Try and remember that first section of US constitution is based on English Bill or Rights (1689) and Scottish Claim of Right, which itself carries on a tradition of defining the limits of state power and citizens rights dating back to Magna Carta (which predates Columbus by 200 years).
Worth thinking about every time americans get all misty eyed about their own history.
That's not to say the UK is a perfect democracy, but neither is the US.
That's just one bank. IIRC most offer some sort of online fraud guarantee. It's in the retail banks' interest to have people banking online. Paying bills, arranging standing orders, ordering cheque books in branch all cost money to the banks. Better for them that people do it online, even if they take the occasional hit from refunding people whose accounts have been hit by fraudsers.
In addition, the FSA would almost certainly side with a sensible customer who was victim of fraud and complaied via the FSA about their banks actions.
yes. have tried it. am a chemist.
you can get 40% alcohol to burn but it takes a little heating and a good ignition flame. It's not a great candidate for a molotov cocktail.
regular drinking alcohol (i.e. 40-45% by volume) will not ignite if you put a match to it. It requires pre-heating an strong flame source to get it to burn. (Try making a molotov cocktail with room temp vodka, a rag and a match and you won't get very far).
Of course, stronger alcohols (80-90%) will ignite. And for that reason you'll have a tough job taking them on board a plane (and this goes back way before 9/11). You could possibly try and use aftershave / perfume, but the overpowering smell would probably alert people before you get a chance to make a molotov cocktail.
There simply is no way of covering every single eventuality and still ensuring an economically viable transport system. The whole point in airline security is to prevent some of the obvious risks.
The/. analogy of cars is required here - you *cannot* prevent a car being stolen (or aeroplane being blown up), the more you secure you make it , the more tempting a target it becomes to high-end thieves(committed, organised terrorists). But that doesn't mean that locking the doors and setting the alarm (x-rays and searches) is a bad idea......
yes, "up" to around 90p, from a year high of £11.65...........
price only up this morning as it looks like a deal has been reached which would avoid nationalising NR, which would make the shares essentially worthless.
The 'owners' of the bank are the shareholders, and they've gone and lost a whole shed-load of money. Although I believe the directors took a nice bonus this year.
"Past performance is not necessarily a guide to future performance and the value of an investment may fall as well as rise." As they say in the small print.
hmmm. You can prove the root of two is irrational. You can't however, *prove* that evolution is true. It just happens the be the only/best theory that explains all of the observations we make about the world around us and it's predictions have been shown to be remarkably strong for the last couple of hundred years or so.
It is possible that another, better, theory could be developed to replace evolution - that's the very nature of science and scientific theory. But, that's not looking likely, as all the evidence stack repeatedly in favour of evolution.
'All' that is wrong with creationism (esp young earth creationism) is that it doesn't fit so neatly with all of the things we know about the universe.
sorry to bother the conspiracy theorists out there - but the US government wasn't "caught." The "US government" openly (i.e IP address was visible) chose to edit wikipedia.
Now, there is a 'simple English' version of wikipedia (presumably to help people learn English) but for the benefit of/. here is the what's in big, bold type on the front page of that sire
"Welcome to Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia that anyone can change." (http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)
rubbish. The decriminalisation of parking offences (i.e. the town council not police issue the fine) shows that english towns are extremely effective at raising money from the local population. I double dare you to park your car in Westminster on a double yellow line and see how long it is before you get a £100 ticket (reduced to £50 if you pay in 2 weeks.)
I pay > £120 for my TV licence - and live in a major city. If I lived in the middle of nowhere I would receive the same TV shows for the same price. Yet the "cost per person" of delivering TV to remote ares is far higher.
For that reason the "cost per person" argument doesn't wash. As a public service broadcaster with a good history of technological innovation the BBC *should* be providing the same services to people who don't want/can't afford to use windows.
It should be possible to design a completely idiot proof reactor that would automatically disable itself in the event of coolant loss.
In principle, yes, but the msjor problem is how do you *know* it is idiot proof? You need to let an infinite number of idiots loose on your reactor design for an infinite timespan to prove it is idiot proof.
It's probably fairer to say that we can make very good, safe reactors now that are very (but never 100%) safe. The real decision is whether X deaths / 100 years from possible radioactive leaks is more unpalatable than Y deaths / 100 years from Katrina v2.0 (assuming that global warming will contribute to more deadly weather).
FWIW i think nuclear is *a* solution, but not the unique solution.
Slashdot Mirror
Where to start? Guns? Swiss gun ownership is through the roof compared to almost any other country (they really *do* have a well armed militia.) Tax rates? Monaco's income tax is 0%. Even ignoring the smaller european countires, the overall level of taxation is *broadly* similar between the US and Western European countries http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_rates_around_the_world). Yet all of Europe provides free, high quality health care. Highly subsidised (or free) access to leading universities as part of the taxation system. Why is it, do you think, the european nations with 'high' taxes (Nordic countries, Switzerland as prime examples) regularly top the standard of living tables? As for free speech / free press - the European convention on human rights provides for free speech and this has been upheld time after time. Certain countries have a specific ban on Nazi symbology, but given the circumstances who can blame them? Consider the position of the US (34th) in relation to 19 out of the top 20 *European* countries (the other being New Zealdnd) which top the World Press Freedom indicies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Worldwide_Press_Freedom_Index) The biggest problem in your ill informed comments is that you seem (in a Sarah Palinesque fashion) to assume Europe is a country, not dozens of nations.
The basic business model of a newspaper (and a commercial TV channel) is to sell advertising space. Once you fix that firmly in your mind things make a lot more sense.
Newspapers require journalists to write stories that will make people buy papers. Sometimes they might be some public good (Watergate). Often times it will be utter drivel (almost anything about Britney Spears). As long as the stories fit the business model (serious investigative reporting, celebrity trash and anything inbetween) then it's all good.
It gives the 4th estate too much credit to think they are particulary political. Fox hammer the conservative message because their business model is to attract conservative politics lovers/haters to Fox. Their perceived politics is just part of the business plan.
Obama is popular - therefore newsworthy - so stories about him will sell.
McCain is less popular and in many respects less newsworthy (his politics and personal life are well known now, and wealthy old white male politicians aren't scarce on the ground) so stories are not going to sell as many papers.
Long story short - media don't exist to help voters make informed choices; they exist to make money. That ambitious politicians and their campaign teams use this to their advantage should also not be a surprise.
because once your biometric details are stolen it's easy to replace/reset them.......
why not go the whole way? Abolish paid for, special-interest driven, corruptable politicians entirely?
Allow anyone to draft legislation, post it on some server (ArXiv style) and allow it a few months to be peer reviewed to discuss merits of new law. Legislation that looks like being worth considering is then written up by professionals into a version worth voting on, then put to a public online vote.
Set a suitable quorom so single interest groups can't force things through. Give every law a 12 month sunset clause, so if it doesn't work in practice it can be dropped unless people activley vote again to keep it on the books.
Government then restircted to basic administrative tasks and oversight into government departments provided by citizens chosen through further popular votes.
Yeah, i can see flaws in this system (especially with budget allocations) - and I'm sure /. will pick them to pieces, but is it any more flawed than the current systems in place in western democracies?
and gitmo is substantially different from a concentration camp (as opposed to a death camp) because............
moderate, hey?
As long as you'd accept spending *six weeks* being interrogated by special branch (who, by all accounts, don't f*** about), protesting your innocence, before being chucked back out on the street to rebuild your life (reckon *your* boss would keep you on if you were 'helping police with their investigations for six whole weeks).
Think back to May 1st this year. Now imagine you'd spent every single day between then and now in the cells at Paddington Green station being questioned about a crime you didn't commit / plan to commit.
Reckon you'd come out after six weeks the same person?
Except, of course, the bill has to get through the Lords. Which it almost certainly won't. Even Lord Goldsmith (ex attorney general, promoted to Lords) is against it.
Then it has to be voted on again by the Commons - which could be in a few months time. Only then will it become law (ignoring formality royal assent, and possible rare use of Parliament Act).
Who knows what Brown's ability to force sick MPs into the house to vote, and what deals N. Ireland MPs will insist upon then?
I honestly think a few months down the line, when it comes to the crunch, the government could loose this, and force a vote of no confidence vote on Brown.
In any case UK is still a way off from 42 day detention......
you don't like your elected representatives? Reckon your fellow citizens share your views? Why not stand for election yourself?
People get the governments they deserve, so if you think the system sucks, get up and do something. Democracy isn't getting worked up about bits of paper signed by dead politicians, or flags, or songs, or fireworks - democracy is the fact they any one person can stand for election and make changes to the system with the support of their peers.
the set of amendments to the constitution which form the bill of rights in the US closely match - and indeed were derived from the English/Scottish bills/claims of right from 1689. This is, I'm afraid, fact - phrases like "cruel and unusual punishment" come from English bill of rights. The UK doesn't have a single written constitution (for complex historical reasons), but there are plenty of documents (for example Margna Carta) which were developed in the UK and limit state power. It's absurd to suggest that the UK does not have systems in place to limit the power of the state. The US system of politics /government didn't develop in a vacuum.
Many of the ideas of the US constitution were based on UK law (hardly a surprise) and modified to suit the particular ideology/politics/beliefs of early US politicians. It's probably fair to say that some aspects of the US model have been a success, and some less so.
it is easy to pick holes in both US and UK systems of government, and neither represents a perfect democracy, but it is difficult to argue that they don't both share a common root.
Apart from Articles 10 and 11 of European Convention on Human Rights? Part of Human Rights Act.
Try and remember that first section of US constitution is based on English Bill or Rights (1689) and Scottish Claim of Right, which itself carries on a tradition of defining the limits of state power and citizens rights dating back to Magna Carta (which predates Columbus by 200 years).
Worth thinking about every time americans get all misty eyed about their own history.
That's not to say the UK is a perfect democracy, but neither is the US.
Halifax bank will refund all money lost through online fraud.
http://www.halifax.co.uk/securityandprivacy/onlinefraudguarantee.asp
That's just one bank. IIRC most offer some sort of online fraud guarantee. It's in the retail banks' interest to have people banking online. Paying bills, arranging standing orders, ordering cheque books in branch all cost money to the banks. Better for them that people do it online, even if they take the occasional hit from refunding people whose accounts have been hit by fraudsers.
In addition, the FSA would almost certainly side with a sensible customer who was victim of fraud and complaied via the FSA about their banks actions.
there are large parts of the world where life is closer to your version of 1858 than to your version of 2008.
yes. have tried it. am a chemist. you can get 40% alcohol to burn but it takes a little heating and a good ignition flame. It's not a great candidate for a molotov cocktail.
regular drinking alcohol (i.e. 40-45% by volume) will not ignite if you put a match to it. It requires pre-heating an strong flame source to get it to burn. (Try making a molotov cocktail with room temp vodka, a rag and a match and you won't get very far).
/. analogy of cars is required here - you *cannot* prevent a car being stolen (or aeroplane being blown up), the more you secure you make it , the more tempting a target it becomes to high-end thieves(committed, organised terrorists). But that doesn't mean that locking the doors and setting the alarm (x-rays and searches) is a bad idea......
Of course, stronger alcohols (80-90%) will ignite. And for that reason you'll have a tough job taking them on board a plane (and this goes back way before 9/11). You could possibly try and use aftershave / perfume, but the overpowering smell would probably alert people before you get a chance to make a molotov cocktail.
There simply is no way of covering every single eventuality and still ensuring an economically viable transport system. The whole point in airline security is to prevent some of the obvious risks.
The
yes, "up" to around 90p, from a year high of £11.65...........
price only up this morning as it looks like a deal has been reached which would avoid nationalising NR, which would make the shares essentially worthless.
The 'owners' of the bank are the shareholders, and they've gone and lost a whole shed-load of money. Although I believe the directors took a nice bonus this year.
"Past performance is not necessarily a guide to future performance and the value of an investment may fall as well as rise." As they say in the small print.
hmmm. You can prove the root of two is irrational. You can't however, *prove* that evolution is true. It just happens the be the only/best theory that explains all of the observations we make about the world around us and it's predictions have been shown to be remarkably strong for the last couple of hundred years or so.
It is possible that another, better, theory could be developed to replace evolution - that's the very nature of science and scientific theory. But, that's not looking likely, as all the evidence stack repeatedly in favour of evolution.
'All' that is wrong with creationism (esp young earth creationism) is that it doesn't fit so neatly with all of the things we know about the universe.
Here endeth the lesson.
sorry to bother the conspiracy theorists out there - but the US government wasn't "caught." The "US government" openly (i.e IP address was visible) chose to edit wikipedia.
/. here is the what's in big, bold type on the front page of that sire
Now, there is a 'simple English' version of wikipedia (presumably to help people learn English) but for the benefit of
"Welcome to Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia that anyone can change." (http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)
10 print "my code rocks, thanks for asking" 20 goto 10
rubbish. The decriminalisation of parking offences (i.e. the town council not police issue the fine) shows that english towns are extremely effective at raising money from the local population. I double dare you to park your car in Westminster on a double yellow line and see how long it is before you get a £100 ticket (reduced to £50 if you pay in 2 weeks.)
er it is still very much legal to serve beer and milk by the pint in the UK. (1 UK pt = 568 ml).
on Wikipedia all are equal but some are more equal than others.
but does it run, oh, i see.
I pay > £120 for my TV licence - and live in a major city. If I lived in the middle of nowhere I would receive the same TV shows for the same price. Yet the "cost per person" of delivering TV to remote ares is far higher.
For that reason the "cost per person" argument doesn't wash. As a public service broadcaster with a good history of technological innovation the BBC *should* be providing the same services to people who don't want/can't afford to use windows.
I'm not worried: I'm more of an olde english drinker.
It should be possible to design a completely idiot proof reactor that would automatically disable itself in the event of coolant loss.
In principle, yes, but the msjor problem is how do you *know* it is idiot proof? You need to let an infinite number of idiots loose on your reactor design for an infinite timespan to prove it is idiot proof.
It's probably fairer to say that we can make very good, safe reactors now that are very (but never 100%) safe. The real decision is whether X deaths / 100 years from possible radioactive leaks is more unpalatable than Y deaths / 100 years from Katrina v2.0 (assuming that global warming will contribute to more deadly weather).
FWIW i think nuclear is *a* solution, but not the unique solution.