I've got my own life in my own town, why should I be killing innocents for something that happened to my granddad?
Are you kidding? Your situation has nothing in common with that of a Palestinian refugee's. You have the freedom to have your own life in your own town. You have citizenship and political rights, as well as many human rights that refugees don't have either. Imagine if you weren't allowed to be a U.S. citizen because of your grandfather's affiliations. Imagine you were not allowed to own property, vote, or have anything but the most menial of jobs (nations such as Lebanon maintain long lists of different jobs such as doctor, lawyer, etc. that Palestinians are forbidden to have). Imagine that the grandchildren of other confederate sympathizers were murdered and terrorized wherever they went.
I'm no defender of violent Palestinian attacks, only someone who actually has a clue as to why they happen. You have a lot of gall to suggest that you're in the same boat as a Palestinian and adopt the "Why can't they just get along?" cop-out. Your situations are not even remotely the same.
I don't see how your reply is in any way informative, insightful, funny, or any other adjective that a mod could use to describe it. It's just an empty, typo-ridden one-off statement that does nothing to advance any discussion about what's to become of these people. Here is my reply to someone else who made the same vapid observation, presumably hoping that it would undermine anything I have to say:
I fully expect to be modded down myself, what with my voicing a dissenting opinion and all. Plus, you're not even factually right about this, for god's sake. I checked the Wikipedia article that AC posted.
Me: "These people were unjustly displaced and sent to slums and refugee camps." You: "Earth to you! Earth to you! They didn't live in a country."
Oh come now, arguing that it was "just a territory" is to argue semantics in lieu of the point.
These people organized themselves into a loose governmental structure long before the British got involved. They had names for their towns, for their roads. They thrived--please don't try to morally justify expelling them based on their lack of flag.
You can point to how the area has been passed around like a hooker at the Republican National Convention, but that doesn't extinguish the right the Palestinians had to the land, and more importantly to their culture and way of life--both of which have been dramatically changed now that the last three generations of Palestinians have grown up in refugee camps in Israel, Lebanon, and other places. In the camps, they are afforded no political rights (can't become citizens, can't own land, etc.) and very few human rights. It's an untenable situation, and one that the U.N., the U.S., and Israel must answer for.
That's a pretty reductive way of looking at the situation. Consider this for a moment. The displaced, post-Holocaust Jews could have found safe haven in most of Europe, the United States...the Bahamas...hell, anywhere they wanted to go. Instead, they asked the U.N. to un-make an entire, separate nation and to settle there. This was done knowing full well that it would destabilize the Middle East, and that it would invite the ire of no less than 13 other nations in the region that were different from the Jews culturally, religiously, and ethnically. This was made possible only through U.S. military support. (note: To this day, the Israelis kill Palestinian refugees throwing rocks at their U.S.-made tanks by using their tanks--just because you didn't see it on CNN doesn't mean it doesn't happen).
It may seem a little cynical to claim that perpetuating violence in the Middle East was the goal of the U.N. in creating the artificial nation of Israel decades ago. No, there was a legitimate hope that the millions of displaced Palestinians would be "absorbed" by neighboring nations (the talks that took place prior to the formation of Israel provide ample evidence of this). They really did believe and hope that these people who once had a nation of their own would just take the U.N.'s emergency aid and eventually just move away to Jordan or Syria or Egypt to die--that over the years, the situation would settle down and that these people would just fold and accept their fate.
Every time another bomb goes off in Israel it's a testament to how well that plan has worked. Let me pose this hypothetical question: If somebody stole everything you had from you--your way of life, your property, even your nation--how would you respond? Personally, the very least I would do is grab an AK-47 and start making some demands. How about you?
The problem is that the Palestinians don't accept that.
Do you have sources for this? It's a rhetorical question, of course, because how could you have reliable sources for something you just made up? The fact is, Palestinians (regardless of their party) have always wanted back that which was taken from them. It's neither an unreasonable nor extreme request.
There is a saying that goes "to the victor go the spoils." And that is exactly what happened in Palestine after WWII. The Jews transformed American and British sympathy after the Holocaust into a greedy land grab. They didn't ask for part of the land that is holy to three different major religions. They didn't ask for sanctuary in a land that is holy to three different major religions. No, they took it all and displaced the native people who had been living there.
No matter how hard you try, you can't unmake history and injustice with rhetoric. In case the history of the last century escapes you, there once was a sovereign nation called Palestine. Then the U.N. passed a resolution, and Palestine was magically turned into Israel. And all the people who once lived there were herded up and sent to slums and refugee camps, where they have remained for three generations and counting--their land, their homes, and their property all stolen from them, their situation grim.
And you have the balls to label these people "extremists"?
I cheered for Israel when they went to get their kidnapped soldiers back
I hope you realize that Hezbollah operatives kidnapped those men hoping to trade them for several Lebanese citizens who had been kidnapped before them. That side of the story is ostensibly missing from most of the U.S. news coverage on the events that led up to Israel's attack against Lebanon. It was if the entire narrative of violence, attack, and counterattack in the Middle East had somehow started with the kidnapping of the Israeli soldiers--never mind anything that Israel had done to precipitate it.
You know, prisoner for prisoner exchanges are not uncommon. The Lebanese (perhaps over-optimistically) believed that since their own people had been wrongfully kidnapped, they could in turn abduct the Israelis and swap them out--no harm, no foul. It's happened before. What Israel did instead was unconscionable. They killed thousands of innocent Lebanese people and turned the infrastructure of Beirut to rubble.
Why do you think Israel agreed to a ceasefire, even though the Israeli soldiers were not returned? It's because the soldiers didn't matter worth a spit--they just served as a convenient pretext to destroy most of Lebanon. It was a disgusting and disgraceful thing to do. While the pro-Israeli American news outlets tell you half the story, the rest of the world is aware of the other half. The United Nations censored Israel for its unprovoked attack on Lebanon. Kofi Anan himself was visibly angry when two U.N. observers were killed by the Israelis under very suspicious circumstances.
Why you Americans remain so willfully ignorant of the circumstances surrounding international conflicts is beyond me.
Since WW II, the U.S. has loomed as the most militarily and economically powerful nation in the world. Now China is making a bid to become a hegemony of its own. This is a Good Thing [tm].
Superior might through superior technology has always been the mantra of developed nations. Consequently, the U.S. experienced huge gains over the last few decades due to (perceived) competition with the Russians. Like it or not, most of the best technologies we have were originally purposed for military applications, financed through the Pentagon system, and then gradually re-purposed for civilian use (the Internet being a great example of this). This has always been the silver lining.
It would be melodramatic to claim that the U.S. is on the brink of another Cold War, this time with the Chinese. However, "friendly" competition with China will help the space program, it will help Silicon Valley--it will help the United States in any area in which there is a perceived technological deficiency.
We stand to gain so much if we're not all blown to bits first.
Hey guys, it's me, Justin. I just wanted to touch base with you guys and give you a heads up! Listen, this whole x86 computing thing is just a fad. Amigas are still taking over the computer world. Just give it more time, you know? You just have to wait until like, um, 2009. Okay?
There probably is some trick like that out there, or at least a handful of Vista cracks, but I'm not too interested in finding them. If the May/June expiration date holds for this release as well, then I'll be pleased--that's a more than generous amount of time to test-drive the OS. It's free-as-in-no-purchase-necessary software, after all, and it just seems a little skeezy to want to compromise it like that. It just feels too much like stealing shareware (and a shareware-quality OS, too;)
Mod parent up, s/he's got a great point! I haven't tried Vista yet, but initial takes on the RC1/RC2 releases have been positive. From a software compatibility perspective, you might as well be running RC2 now if you know for sure you're going to just be buying Vista anyway when it hits the shelves: Whereas the old betas were fairly crash-prone and didn't run much besides Office, the RC releases are apparently much more polished and well-suited to everyday use. Windows beta testing superstar Paul Thurrott has been throwing everything he can at the 32-bit RC releases and has yet to find an application that doesn't work (we shall see if the same thing holds true for games).
That's pretty impressive for Microsoft, especially considering how poorly major Windows updates have been handled in the past. Does anybody still recall the Windows 98 --> Windows 2000 transition? It was pretty ugly stuff. Even a year after the Win2k release, drivers were still breaking, plenty of older software had weird compatibility issues, etc. It seems that Microsoft is really trying to avoid a repeat performance.
That's all true. Very few people were willing to take a chance on sci-fi in those days. She green-lit the series despite the risk and the cost (180-200k an episode was not chump change in those days). Without her, there very likely would have been no Star Trek at all, and possibly even no Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, and so on.
...and many of those 70 year olds get their disinformation from shows like the O'Reilly Factor, where the average age of the viewers is 71. That's right, a frightened, bigoted generation of "warriors" who haven't been in touch with the world since the Depression votes en masse to shape our political landscape. It makes logical sense, I suppose--wouldn't you vote for people who didn't care about long-term environmental or human rights issues and offered only short-term tax cuts if you weren't long for this world anyway? If somebody wanted to use your property tax money to help pay for public schooling, wouldn't your selfish, asshole answer be "I'm old and my kids are grown up, so why should I care about the schools..let's switch to a vouchers-based system?"
Well no, I wouldn't think and vote that way either when I'm that age. But many of these ignorant bluehairs do.
No, actually I thought "This is one of the worst movies I've seen all year. I can't believe this got good reviews" and the four other people I saw it with all agreed. Between the wooden acting, gratuitous gross-out scenes, and hamfisted symbolism that assumes the audience is retarded, it was just an overall bad time. Innocent, popcorn storytelling is one thing--shitty moviemaking is another.
It's the same problem that can befall any prequel: Inconsistent production values! Sure, the episodes from the original series represented the state of the art for the 1960's (and cost Desilu a ton to produce each episode). And sure, the original series-based movies used movie-making technology from the 1980's/1990's...but how do you make a new film that looks like it belongs in the original series star trek universe but still incorporates modern production values? Seems tricky.
It's just like in the Star Wars prequels, where due to advances in special effects and costuming, the newer Star Wars movies (episodes I-III) look far more modern even though they're meant to be prequels.
Non-nerds usually consider The Voyage Home the best one (Non-Nerd: Is that the one with the whales in it??). But I agree, The Undiscovered Country was great. Kirk rules, Picard drools!
Does this mean that we'll get to see a shirtless, drunken Rupert Murdoch dragged kicking and screaming over a mobile home lawn covered with broken Playskool toys and empty beer cans?
I've been keeping tabs on the Diebold stories coming from U.S. news sources, and it's not like the Diebold problems have been kept secret. Nevertheless, many Americans have reacted to the information with a collective yawn.
So here we have a similar set of circumstances--only the nation at risk has really changed--and the Dutch appear to be fighting mad over this. What gives?
Are the Democrats such wilting violets they need an apology over this? Everyone knows Foley is a Rep. You honestly think some cabal at FNC thought putting a "D" there would fool millions of people into thinking otherwise? I mean, come on, THINK it through.
The lack of an apology or retraction is symbolic. It demonstrates how Republicans are so unwilling to admit any fault or immoral activity such that they would rather claim that two men who are so clearly their own--Foley and (Republican House Majority Leader) Hastert--were congressional Democrats instead of Republicans. The lack of an apology or retraction is just more proof to add to the pile of evidence demonstrating that Fox News isn't interested in journalism, but in disinformation.
I suppose if it's repeated often enough, delusion becomes reality, and we can rewrite history? Repeat after me: There were WMDs in Iraq...there were WMDs in Iraq...
Why not E.T. for the Atari 2600 running on a console emulator? After falling in a pit for the 1000th time, they'll swear they thought video games were a lot cooler and give them up for good;)
In my house, do you know what works great as a reward for finishing your homework? 1-2 hours of television or computer time, their choice. In an ideal world, the kids would do their homework with or without coercion, love learning, etc. But a little extra incentive doesn't hurt;) I don't want to be presumptuous or tell anybody how to raise their own kids, I'm just saying that seems to work fine in this house.
As far as the contention that any television/computer time on school nights, I'm a little skeptical of that claim--especially because they didn't seem to use any common metric for measuring the student's performance (you know, like grades?...) and instead asked the kids. I "kid" you not:
Researchers asked the students to rate their own performance in school on a scale ranging from "below average" to "excellent," instead of looking directly at their grades or other metrics of academic performance.
Slashdot Mirror
Are you kidding? Your situation has nothing in common with that of a Palestinian refugee's. You have the freedom to have your own life in your own town. You have citizenship and political rights, as well as many human rights that refugees don't have either. Imagine if you weren't allowed to be a U.S. citizen because of your grandfather's affiliations. Imagine you were not allowed to own property, vote, or have anything but the most menial of jobs (nations such as Lebanon maintain long lists of different jobs such as doctor, lawyer, etc. that Palestinians are forbidden to have). Imagine that the grandchildren of other confederate sympathizers were murdered and terrorized wherever they went.
I'm no defender of violent Palestinian attacks, only someone who actually has a clue as to why they happen. You have a lot of gall to suggest that you're in the same boat as a Palestinian and adopt the "Why can't they just get along?" cop-out. Your situations are not even remotely the same.
I don't see how your reply is in any way informative, insightful, funny, or any other adjective that a mod could use to describe it. It's just an empty, typo-ridden one-off statement that does nothing to advance any discussion about what's to become of these people. Here is my reply to someone else who made the same vapid observation, presumably hoping that it would undermine anything I have to say:
link
I fully expect to be modded down myself, what with my voicing a dissenting opinion and all. Plus, you're not even factually right about this, for god's sake. I checked the Wikipedia article that AC posted.
Me: "These people were unjustly displaced and sent to slums and refugee camps."
You: "Earth to you! Earth to you! They didn't live in a country."
Bravo.
Oh come now, arguing that it was "just a territory" is to argue semantics in lieu of the point.
These people organized themselves into a loose governmental structure long before the British got involved. They had names for their towns, for their roads. They thrived--please don't try to morally justify expelling them based on their lack of flag.
You can point to how the area has been passed around like a hooker at the Republican National Convention, but that doesn't extinguish the right the Palestinians had to the land, and more importantly to their culture and way of life--both of which have been dramatically changed now that the last three generations of Palestinians have grown up in refugee camps in Israel, Lebanon, and other places. In the camps, they are afforded no political rights (can't become citizens, can't own land, etc.) and very few human rights. It's an untenable situation, and one that the U.N., the U.S., and Israel must answer for.
That's a pretty reductive way of looking at the situation. Consider this for a moment. The displaced, post-Holocaust Jews could have found safe haven in most of Europe, the United States...the Bahamas...hell, anywhere they wanted to go. Instead, they asked the U.N. to un-make an entire, separate nation and to settle there. This was done knowing full well that it would destabilize the Middle East, and that it would invite the ire of no less than 13 other nations in the region that were different from the Jews culturally, religiously, and ethnically. This was made possible only through U.S. military support. (note: To this day, the Israelis kill Palestinian refugees throwing rocks at their U.S.-made tanks by using their tanks--just because you didn't see it on CNN doesn't mean it doesn't happen).
It may seem a little cynical to claim that perpetuating violence in the Middle East was the goal of the U.N. in creating the artificial nation of Israel decades ago. No, there was a legitimate hope that the millions of displaced Palestinians would be "absorbed" by neighboring nations (the talks that took place prior to the formation of Israel provide ample evidence of this). They really did believe and hope that these people who once had a nation of their own would just take the U.N.'s emergency aid and eventually just move away to Jordan or Syria or Egypt to die--that over the years, the situation would settle down and that these people would just fold and accept their fate.
Every time another bomb goes off in Israel it's a testament to how well that plan has worked. Let me pose this hypothetical question: If somebody stole everything you had from you--your way of life, your property, even your nation--how would you respond? Personally, the very least I would do is grab an AK-47 and start making some demands. How about you?
The problem is that the Palestinians don't accept that.
Do you have sources for this? It's a rhetorical question, of course, because how could you have reliable sources for something you just made up? The fact is, Palestinians (regardless of their party) have always wanted back that which was taken from them. It's neither an unreasonable nor extreme request.
There is a saying that goes "to the victor go the spoils." And that is exactly what happened in Palestine after WWII. The Jews transformed American and British sympathy after the Holocaust into a greedy land grab. They didn't ask for part of the land that is holy to three different major religions. They didn't ask for sanctuary in a land that is holy to three different major religions. No, they took it all and displaced the native people who had been living there.
No matter how hard you try, you can't unmake history and injustice with rhetoric. In case the history of the last century escapes you, there once was a sovereign nation called Palestine. Then the U.N. passed a resolution, and Palestine was magically turned into Israel. And all the people who once lived there were herded up and sent to slums and refugee camps, where they have remained for three generations and counting--their land, their homes, and their property all stolen from them, their situation grim.
And you have the balls to label these people "extremists"?
I hope you realize that Hezbollah operatives kidnapped those men hoping to trade them for several Lebanese citizens who had been kidnapped before them. That side of the story is ostensibly missing from most of the U.S. news coverage on the events that led up to Israel's attack against Lebanon. It was if the entire narrative of violence, attack, and counterattack in the Middle East had somehow started with the kidnapping of the Israeli soldiers--never mind anything that Israel had done to precipitate it.
You know, prisoner for prisoner exchanges are not uncommon. The Lebanese (perhaps over-optimistically) believed that since their own people had been wrongfully kidnapped, they could in turn abduct the Israelis and swap them out--no harm, no foul. It's happened before. What Israel did instead was unconscionable. They killed thousands of innocent Lebanese people and turned the infrastructure of Beirut to rubble.
Why do you think Israel agreed to a ceasefire, even though the Israeli soldiers were not returned? It's because the soldiers didn't matter worth a spit--they just served as a convenient pretext to destroy most of Lebanon. It was a disgusting and disgraceful thing to do. While the pro-Israeli American news outlets tell you half the story, the rest of the world is aware of the other half. The United Nations censored Israel for its unprovoked attack on Lebanon. Kofi Anan himself was visibly angry when two U.N. observers were killed by the Israelis under very suspicious circumstances.
Why you Americans remain so willfully ignorant of the circumstances surrounding international conflicts is beyond me.
Since WW II, the U.S. has loomed as the most militarily and economically powerful nation in the world. Now China is making a bid to become a hegemony of its own. This is a Good Thing [tm].
Superior might through superior technology has always been the mantra of developed nations. Consequently, the U.S. experienced huge gains over the last few decades due to (perceived) competition with the Russians. Like it or not, most of the best technologies we have were originally purposed for military applications, financed through the Pentagon system, and then gradually re-purposed for civilian use (the Internet being a great example of this). This has always been the silver lining.
It would be melodramatic to claim that the U.S. is on the brink of another Cold War, this time with the Chinese. However, "friendly" competition with China will help the space program, it will help Silicon Valley--it will help the United States in any area in which there is a perceived technological deficiency.
We stand to gain so much if we're not all blown to bits first.
It keeps getting mildly upgraded and resold to the same people time after time. It will die when they do.
Hey guys, it's me, Justin. I just wanted to touch base with you guys and give you a heads up! Listen, this whole x86 computing thing is just a fad. Amigas are still taking over the computer world. Just give it more time, you know? You just have to wait until like, um, 2009. Okay?
- Justin
P.S. You bros are the best! My mom says hi.
There probably is some trick like that out there, or at least a handful of Vista cracks, but I'm not too interested in finding them. If the May/June expiration date holds for this release as well, then I'll be pleased--that's a more than generous amount of time to test-drive the OS. It's free-as-in-no-purchase-necessary software, after all, and it just seems a little skeezy to want to compromise it like that. It just feels too much like stealing shareware (and a shareware-quality OS, too ;)
Mod parent up, s/he's got a great point! I haven't tried Vista yet, but initial takes on the RC1/RC2 releases have been positive. From a software compatibility perspective, you might as well be running RC2 now if you know for sure you're going to just be buying Vista anyway when it hits the shelves: Whereas the old betas were fairly crash-prone and didn't run much besides Office, the RC releases are apparently much more polished and well-suited to everyday use. Windows beta testing superstar Paul Thurrott has been throwing everything he can at the 32-bit RC releases and has yet to find an application that doesn't work (we shall see if the same thing holds true for games).
That's pretty impressive for Microsoft, especially considering how poorly major Windows updates have been handled in the past. Does anybody still recall the Windows 98 --> Windows 2000 transition? It was pretty ugly stuff. Even a year after the Win2k release, drivers were still breaking, plenty of older software had weird compatibility issues, etc. It seems that Microsoft is really trying to avoid a repeat performance.
When does RC2 expire? May of next year as well?
That's all true. Very few people were willing to take a chance on sci-fi in those days. She green-lit the series despite the risk and the cost (180-200k an episode was not chump change in those days). Without her, there very likely would have been no Star Trek at all, and possibly even no Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, and so on.
...and many of those 70 year olds get their disinformation from shows like the O'Reilly Factor, where the average age of the viewers is 71. That's right, a frightened, bigoted generation of "warriors" who haven't been in touch with the world since the Depression votes en masse to shape our political landscape. It makes logical sense, I suppose--wouldn't you vote for people who didn't care about long-term environmental or human rights issues and offered only short-term tax cuts if you weren't long for this world anyway? If somebody wanted to use your property tax money to help pay for public schooling, wouldn't your selfish, asshole answer be "I'm old and my kids are grown up, so why should I care about the schools..let's switch to a vouchers-based system?"
Well no, I wouldn't think and vote that way either when I'm that age. But many of these ignorant bluehairs do.
You know, "demonic" can just mean fiendish, cruel, evil, etc. It doesn't tag along with an entire belief system (or lack thereof).
No, actually I thought "This is one of the worst movies I've seen all year. I can't believe this got good reviews" and the four other people I saw it with all agreed. Between the wooden acting, gratuitous gross-out scenes, and hamfisted symbolism that assumes the audience is retarded, it was just an overall bad time. Innocent, popcorn storytelling is one thing--shitty moviemaking is another.
"It's not about being brave, Jimmy." *groans*
Give me the 1933 classic instead any day.
It's the same problem that can befall any prequel: Inconsistent production values! Sure, the episodes from the original series represented the state of the art for the 1960's (and cost Desilu a ton to produce each episode). And sure, the original series-based movies used movie-making technology from the 1980's/1990's...but how do you make a new film that looks like it belongs in the original series star trek universe but still incorporates modern production values? Seems tricky.
It's just like in the Star Wars prequels, where due to advances in special effects and costuming, the newer Star Wars movies (episodes I-III) look far more modern even though they're meant to be prequels.
In Soviet Russia, all-seeing demonic eye watches you!
Non-nerds usually consider The Voyage Home the best one (Non-Nerd: Is that the one with the whales in it??). But I agree, The Undiscovered Country was great. Kirk rules, Picard drools!
*ahem* Desilu Productions? You forgot that part of the story!
*Ricky Ricardo voice*: Luuuuuccyyy, I'm back from the Romulan Neutral Zone! (hits bongo drum)
- Bee Tiberius Beard
Does this mean that we'll get to see a shirtless, drunken Rupert Murdoch dragged kicking and screaming over a mobile home lawn covered with broken Playskool toys and empty beer cans?
I've been keeping tabs on the Diebold stories coming from U.S. news sources, and it's not like the Diebold problems have been kept secret. Nevertheless, many Americans have reacted to the information with a collective yawn.
So here we have a similar set of circumstances--only the nation at risk has really changed--and the Dutch appear to be fighting mad over this. What gives?
The lack of an apology or retraction is symbolic. It demonstrates how Republicans are so unwilling to admit any fault or immoral activity such that they would rather claim that two men who are so clearly their own--Foley and (Republican House Majority Leader) Hastert--were congressional Democrats instead of Republicans. The lack of an apology or retraction is just more proof to add to the pile of evidence demonstrating that Fox News isn't interested in journalism, but in disinformation.
I suppose if it's repeated often enough, delusion becomes reality, and we can rewrite history? Repeat after me: There were WMDs in Iraq...there were WMDs in Iraq...
Why not E.T. for the Atari 2600 running on a console emulator? After falling in a pit for the 1000th time, they'll swear they thought video games were a lot cooler and give them up for good ;)
As far as the contention that any television/computer time on school nights, I'm a little skeptical of that claim--especially because they didn't seem to use any common metric for measuring the student's performance (you know, like grades?...) and instead asked the kids. I "kid" you not:
Huh?