AlexCrowley

With much respect I think that your interpretation might be flawed. When I started going thru the civics stuff last night (remember, i'm not a native) I read Jeffersons Biography, John Lockes work because I wanted to find out exactly what a 18th century gentlemans idea of 'self-evident' rights were. Even the most open reading of Lockes work shadows the DoI incredibly, with much of the language mirroring what Jefferson wrote. In fact, the opening paragraph of the DoI is taken almost wholesale from the paragraph I mentioned - except the paragraph mentioned is far wordier. In the Treatise a form of government is suggested that closely resembles the original form. We also know from the DoI draft that Jefferson included wording about the nature of slavery, again something that is covered explicitly in Lockes work. I think it a stretch to think that Jefferson merely plagarised the syntax while ignoring the intended context. I dont know if this is what you study in high school or not: Of the State of Nature, John Locke I look at it with a social slant because Locke was considered one of the 'Age of Enlightenments' liberal philosphers, that being his intention I consider that those influenced by him enough to adopt his theories, and using his words, and try to apply them in reality may also have had some liberal leanings. It's the whole 'self-evident' 'unalienable' key words. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

I'm sorry that it offended your moral fabric but if: 1. The bible says love god 2. be nice to each other. 3. the rest is fluff, basic rules of behavior that are secondary to everything else. Now I realize that your interpretation of the Bible leads you to believe your thing. Mine leads me to believe mine. As i think I mentioned, the gospels clearly showed me that Jesus thought the minutia of religious law was BS, that loving God completely was the most important thing, and those 'experts' that interpreted the scriptures in grating detail to tell the people what God did and did not allow were obstacles to be ignored. That the accepted method of worship was wrong. You know, there are whole sects of Christianity that teach this version of the religion, without the Pharisee-like attention to detail and enforcing strict interpretation to the Bible. In fact, some teach that there are only two commandments now based on what Jesus said (from which all other commandments would be covered if you think about it - rather than the apologists who recreate them from other passages - thus completely misunderstanding the intent). I didnt talk about 'lost books', I'm talking about the Council of Nicea, and the apocrypha. Protestants believe only in the Bible, the Catholics (who've been around longer and arguably could be said to have helped compile the it) contend that the Bible is not the only inspired work, it does not reveal all truths that have been revealed - As The council of Trent in the 16th Century would state explicitly when dealing with the 'heresies' of the Protestants - thus continuing the tradition of people in silly hats messing up a perfectly good religion. Their belief was that Christianity was an oral tradition, not everything was written down. Jesus did not write stuff down, talked. He didnt start and end with his scriptures, they were a guidebook - his teachings expanded or re-interpreted that. It was a tool, not the be all and end all. Coincidentally this is why I think those Christians who blindly quote scripture, without adding their own thoughts, in defense of anything have completely missed the point. And no, I wasnt raised Catholic and didnt know about the Council of Trent, it just seems kind of logical that if your Messiah, in his recorded history, had a habit of ripping a new one on anyone that tried to quote scripture at him for why he was doing something wrong then there may be a pretty good argument against one of his followers pulling exactly the same shit using his words. Hell, I know I'd be pissed. Even more so, if adherence to the letter and law of what Jesus said is a universal constant and addition or alteration of that message is heretical/wrong, then how do you reconcile the fact that all the books written after Jesus death were written by men who had access to the written texts and lifestory of Jesus but still came up with new stuff to say about what God wanted everyone to do? Maybe because they walked around and talked to people too, using all the available scripture but then teaching beyond that, in the spirit of the scripture NOT the absolute, undynamic, dead words. In my humble opinion, if the defense of that is 'Because God still spoke to people back then and then figured the Bible said enough and he wasnt going to interact with people anymore except thru that book' then God is dead and he's sending the junky pornstar. The Jews were wrong, "God had something else totally different in mind that did not fit with their agenda." What on earth makes you believe that perhaps God knows what he's doing and that his plan is going to fit with your agenda? I did not say 'trial and error' I said that Jesus stepped up to clarify what God said because human beings had f****** up the intent of his message. I'm sorry junky pornstars offend you, but Jesus hung out with hookers and didnt seem to have a problem. It would seem to me that if God is true to form then 1) you guys wont recognise his return and 2) he'll come up with something that is the opposite of what you're expecting. Which seems like a pretty cool god to me, and I'm not even christian :) TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

You're absolutely correct, and I'd sound crazy if I explained what I said what i said:) TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Be nice to each other. Once you strip out all the other bs what does it all boil down to? TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Ok found it. thanks. Thats just stupid. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Thank you for articulating so succinctly my garbled question/statement regarding the 'socialism' of universal health care. The US psyche has some weird issues with liberalism being a dirty word. Having spent the evening studying stuff that 9th graders read in US history I find the gung-ho, free-market, right to do as I please because its in the goddamn DoI that I have unalienable rights attitude even more funny now I have discovered how very liberal the main inspiration for the DoI was. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

I said he took a lunch break! TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

There's a fundamental difference. US rights are based around a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Not health, nor health-care. Should they be available, basics can make it I think. But beyond that, forget it. I work for everything I have and I wouldn't want it any other way. You know, this was really asking for trouble. Bring up something an information junkie is interested in but doesnt know much about. In the last couple of hours I've read the history of the DoI, related parts of Jeffersons Biography and a lot of highly influential 18th Century philosophy. So here goes, if you get bored easy you can skip this........ First, you start the quote in the middle: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" Now, I'm not a great with history, but I can read: "We hold these truths to be self evident" seems to say "We realize this is pretty obvious but...." so, "among these" self evident truths is the inalienable right to Life, perhaps its just me but the word life has always led me to think of a functioning entity, and I might argue that to keep an entity functioning requires both food and adequate access to technologies to maintain that life. Of course, you could argue that Virginias declaration of rights - on which the DoI was influenced has an almost identical opening passage "Section 1. That all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." Does it mean thats what the DoI means? Or, looking at history and Jefferson, we see that he - like many educated men of his time was greatly influenced by the writing of John Locke, a philosopher who pretty much created the 'unalienable natural rights' of a man within society. The blueprint of these self-evident truths, and the a method of governing that would support the rights of the individual is 'Two Treatises of Government' available all over the web for free in pdf form. His argument w/regards to rights is: as an individual you have a god given natural right to life, liberty and property. By entering into a compact with your government you agree to let those rights be controlled to a certain extent by a democratic government that follows a design similar to the one in the DoI. This government is formed by the people for the people to maintain equality for all. (chapter 2, page 106 of the pdf version.) Part 6 of these self evident truths is probably most interesting to this discussion: [while man has these certain basic rights he does not have the right to harm another person within his society and infringe on THAT persons rights, to murder another person or himsefl, he should harm no one...]...."And, being furnished with like faculties, sharing all in one community of Nature, there cannot be supposed any such subordination among us that may authorise us to destroy one another, as if we were made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures are for ours. Every one as he is bound to preserve himself, and not to quit his station wilfully, so by the like reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he as much as he can to preserve the rest of mankind, and not unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another." ---------------------------------------------------------- "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" - Thank you Gawain, getting this far has been a fun ride

I'm not sure tort reform numbers really create that big an impact, although I've not seen the numbers myself. I do agree that insurance requires major reform, I can live with greedy pharmcorps if the health insurance companies aren't such money grubbing enablers. The numbers on HMOs are staggering, as the report goes into great detail regarding. Yeah, I know their small, I didnt think scale was the issue, I thought the socialist evils of universal healthcare were under discussion. Your comment about corruption and abuse are right on - health care is seen as a universal human right in these countries (not premium awesome super care, but quality health care) and as such theres less tolerance of bullshit. Of course, the issue is less complex to manage. But it does show that a logical mix of premium paid health insurance + quality state managed care can be of value in terms of human lives and managing health care costs. Those with more cash purchase additional insurance and have greater access to better care - something which is totally logical. I certainly am not one to scream for equal health care for all - just health care that is denied to no one person for any reason, and isnt going to destroy their lives when they recieve the bill. I used northern europe in my example, you wanted to show financial problems by using comparable economies - fine by me. I merely listed the countries/regions that are officially part of northern europe, and in all honest I can never remember is it's Iceland, Sweden or Denmark that have the super-awesome two tier medical system - but their all quite similar, with one of those three leading....saw a show on TV about it not so far inthe past (within the last 3 years), also talked about parents rights in the workplace and the other human quality of life issues that were being provided with only a marginal and for the most part, happily accepted additional tax burden. ..............we've only just begun..... TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Unfortunately this is nothing new. The difference is that California took a step in the right direction by passing a law that requires companies to step forward and admit to a break in if there is a possibility of their customer database being exposed or stolen. Until the passing of this bill it was common for companies to hide these situations as long as possible - no one was liable. In a lot of cases financial companies would bow to blackmail from hackers who stole their data and threatened to go public with it - which happened several times during the .com period (egghead.com -> newegg.com was famously compromised). I realize that most people use their computers to actually do real stuff, but some of us use them as a means to themselves - and most of us distrust Microsoft XP + Internet Explorer. PM for details as to why this combination is such a horrible idea and why new vulnerabilities are discovered weekly, and why it's the IE users that get nailed hard on these sorts of criminal schemes. To minimize your exposure to these kinds of invisible download tricks: Use Firefox No system will ever be 100% bug free or 100% invulnerable, but even taking a simple step such as not using IE will dramatically reduce the chance of malicious or unknown activity on your computer by a criminal. Don't buy into security vendors hype. The following example is the equivelent to me having a 4:1 wingloading, do not try this unless you know what you're doing: As an experiment I've been running my computer without any virus protection. My cable modem/wireless router has a built in firewall, but that doesnt impact my experiment. By using Firefox and Thunderbird* and surfing the internet and using my computer for WAY too many hours a day (12.5 hours of systems time today which is 30 minutes above average) I decided to do a virus scan yearly and see what nasties my computer caught. I dont download a great deal of illegal software or content - which greatly reduces the risk, and I follow basic email safety (dont run attachments). For the last two years I have had 0 viruses. I have had 1 case of major spyware (whcih was installed with a video game I purchased at Best Buy, and quickly disabled). Minor cookie tracking and harmless info collectors I dont worry about too much, as most of the web stops functioning if you get overly paranoid (although its simple to handle with Firefox). So basically: free, efficient internet software that protects you from the majority of nasty BS out there without having to pay out huge sums of cash to consumer "security companies" (btw Nortons stuff SUCKS, but so do their competition) to stay safe. Basic modem NAT firewall (or even XPs built in firewall I guess - not as good tho), firefox and thunderbird. More secure, generally a faster user experience and far more stable on my machines than Internet Explorer has ever been - with or without backdoors, spyware and silent malicious software installs. *both free, a web browser and email client maintained by the free software community, use the link above. edit: fixed clicky. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Wow I missed that one. I remember people bitching about impeachment on other reasons but never that one. Was this in the liberal blogging universe? That'd be the one that rubs the same Universes as the Freepers universe both are overlain by the 'insane babbling baboon' universe. As is totally evident by the BS spouted by both extremes. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Why, YES, I did. How did you know? I did my AFF Level 4 & 5... quite a huge triumph for me as I had been stuck in Level 4 for almost 2 months. I tried and tried, but couldn't pass. So I went to the wind tunnel a couple of weeks ago, and lo & behold, I passed yesterday! I feel like a heavy burden has been lifted from my shoulders. Thank you for asking. Thats awesome! Congratulations. I know exactly how you feel, getting thru a mental block can seem really daunting, when you finally get through it it's a breath of fresh air. My block was with wrestling and the night of a 1000 bumps (actually closer to 100). Overall Bible message? I think that's best summed up by James Dalton, Head Bouncer Double Deuce Club regarding the OT "If somebody gets in your face, I want you to be nice. Ask him to walk. Be nice. If he won't walk, walk him. But be nice. If you can't walk him, one of the others will help you, and you'll both be nice." His take on the NT is similar "If someone gets in your face, be nice. If they punch you in the face, be nice." Hell, even Patrick Swayze in a crappy (yet strangely addictive - Sam Elliot is God) 80s movie can sum up Christianity without the extraneous bullshit that causes the hate and bigotry so often justified by using the Bible in the name of God. I gotta find me a wind tunnel I just got thru my Category something (hop and pops etc) this Saturday - I guess my new DZ works thru it in the right order :), plus my new rig arrived, plus my Neptune was fixed and returned, plus I got my new analog alti and a new jumpsuit. Generally a pretty good week for falling from great heights. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

As a former employee of Pfizer: They have more sales staff on their executive board than scientists. All drug breakthroughs are reviewed by this board. The majority vote wins and it's generally based on marketability and profit. From a report cited below: "In 2002 the thirteen largest U.S. pharmaceutical companies allocated their sales revenue to particular objects of expenditures and profits as follows: cost of goods sold, 25.3 percent; selling and administration, 32.8 percent; R&D, 14 percent; taxes, 7.3 percent; and net after-tax profits, 20.6 percent" So, free market economics are fine, but my sense of morality within says 'Ethically is it correct for a company with a monopoly on a new, potentially life saving drug to have the freedom to charge 'what the market will bear' *if* we accept that all life is sacred. I know, it's unpopular to suggest that we, as society, should provide a safety net. I wasnt suggesting radical reform to pay anyone but doctors and medical companies to give access to a basic human right to health care without crippling economic ruin in the future. Example: My chronically disabled friend is forced to use Medicare and Medicade, lets just say that the system is designed for him to fail. Gets himself a job? Fine, loses all benefits immediately (his disability check). How many people do you know that can walk into a $60,000 first job? (which would barely cover his rent plus his annual medical bills) The kid's a genius, well educated, has won presidential awards and can't get himself off Medicaid/Disability because 'the system' says that gimps can live in a home and have their lives paid for or they can go screw, get minimum financial assistance and if ever they should try to be a normal person the system will ass rape them so hard that they'll never think about getting a job again. Three months ago he had an epileptic fit in public and passed out, he woke up in a state mental hospital and discovered he had ZERO rights as a person, he was 'incarcerated' for 4 weeks. He has refused to comment on it except for the day he got out and was finally able to call me (his emergency medical contact) when he gave a one sentence "they kept me hostage" and "I'll call you in a week once I've got over it". Medicaid/Medicare did not cover the life support and hospital stay required for my kids grandfather that I mentioned earlier. I'm wondering how his relatives are going to handle the burden of a medical bill that runs into the $400,000s. Your examples of European 'big boys' are not part of whats commonly called northern Europe: Denmark, Estonia, Faeroe Islands, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom. In addition, the reasons for the crumbling finances of the countries listed has very little to do with overburdening their healthcare system, as I'm sure you realize. So, given that I can't argue economics and you dont know European geography lets remove it from the conversation:) I dont think one can over-socialize a basic human right like health, but like I said, I base that on my own moral compass. Like you I believe that total socialism is inherently flawed because people like stuff, but I do not believe that we, as individuals, should ever consider corporate responsibility to stock holders and profit margins to come before human lives - which, like it or not, is how the current system works. My perspective on safety nets comes from a year of being homeless and working my way across the US, not because I think government sanctioned handout abuse is an ideal. From the research paper: US Health Care Spending in An International Context - which I urge you to read to ensure I am not manipulating in any way, plus its a very interesting read: Using the US as the 100 percent total health cost spending per capita United States 100% Switzerland 68% Norway 60% Germanya 57% Canada 57% "administrative costs for insurers, employers, and the providers of health care in the U.S. health system (not even including the time costs patients bear in choosing health insurance and claiming reimbursement) were “at least” $294.3 billion in 1999, or about 24 percent of total U.S. health spending" The paper also tackles some of the other points you bought up, since I can understand them but not defend them I'll leave it to you to check the sources :)

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

I have to disagree. As someone who watched this unfold and spent many hours following the story in the media (and having far too much interest in how intelligence agencies work) I was aware of a 4 - 6 week lag in media coverage from Europe to the US. What were front page stories in Europe which debunked Chalabi claims (via Judith Millers exclusives, a large part of the 'available intelligence' used to justify the war to the public) only got traction if the story didnt die and then would be reported on timidly by the mainstream US press. I know I can't ever convince any of you believers out there of that but in this case the pattern occurred every single time. Not once did the US break one of these stories, not once did they get on board the story until several weeks have passed. Unfortunately due to the Plame case trying to find any impartial commentary from that time period has become impossible between the freepers and the moonbat bloggers poluting the fact stream. However, feel free to search on the background of the Niger papers, their emergence in 2002, their almost instant debunking as forgeries, then the attempted coverup by Italian intelligence - to whom the original forgery has been credited from the available counter intelligence and comments by experts in the Intelligence field. While Senate and Congress may have made decisions based on available intelligence the CIA were leaking everywhere and giving interviews to european journalists bemoaning the way intelligence analysis was being conducted, that it wasnt overt manipulation that was malicious in nature, but that thru stubborness and inexperience a system had been created that gave credence to information which the CIA considered of low credibility. Bear in mind that all the prewar intelligence was filtered through another group which did not possess the knowledge base or field experience to provide solid analysis. Thats the reason why both the CIA and George Tenet started getting so much flack - or at least, thats very much how the picture developed to an outside observer: CIA leaks that new agencies methods suck, leak enough info to debunk intelligence or at least severely damage its credibility, and then they got publicly assassinated as payback. I'd cite my sources, but its the end of my day. Look into stovepiping intelligence stories for the 4 months running up to the war, if you can wade thru the blogging crap. The major papers in europe (Times, Independent, whatever the big German news magazine is called, Times of India, Pakistan Times (both English editions) - Times of India has since gone subscription, but they were on top of a lot of these stories. The Telegraph covered a lot, but also tends to do a lot of MI6 press releases (check out their ownership history for details)). I may have jumped to entirely the wrong conclusions, but based on the many articles I read on the intelligence and the methodology critiques published I think it extremely inaccurate to state that decisions were made on the best available intelligence at the time. If me, a guy who had too much time on his hands and a fast internet connection, was able to source material that refuted official statements *as they were being said*, not after Googling it, not after blogging it, these were major stories in the rest of the world that did not gain traction in the mainstream US media. You'd think that with the staff these politicians have that perhaps they'd have better quality intelligence (that history has since vindicated as being totally accurate) than some IT geek who likes to read. There is a side of me that says that an Iraq war was an way for the US to move their army bases from Saudi - which was reportedly on the edge of major civil unrest (according to the Egyptian papers of the time) because of US Infidels (military bases there since Iraq War 1) on their soil, and moving them across the border would provide permenant bases without conflict and therefor help stabalize Saudi and help control oil price fluctuations (which an unstable saudi would cause ........urm, is causing?). Again, feel free to google all that too. Not sure how much blogging coverage it got since everyone took a side and decided to make it about some sort of conspiracy. I'm willing to accept that my conclusions are inaccurate, but the timeline of events is as accurate as I can recall (which is pretty detailed) TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

parajito, I mean absolutely no disrespect to your beliefs or the value of your faith (or even really care if your idea of God does or does not exist), but my problem with your argument is that it's totally illogical. Neither do I believe that it 'simply requires faith' to believe it. My argument here is with the P and S or MAPS, in otherwords, not whether the Bible is true, but how it's believers defend its truth. That was the point of the final paragraph:" Many cults do this very thing (e.g. Jehovah’s Witnesses & Mormons). You’re absolutely correct in saying that your prophesy doesn’t mean a damn thing unless it can be shown to have come into fulfillment. The “failed” prophesy of the Watchtower Organization is a huge example of why it is not to be trusted and is not “of God.” " To anyone outside of your belief system the Bible is exactly the same thing. The book holds no validity for millions of people around the world, it's teachings hold no spiritual truth. I realize that this causes the average Xtian to have varying reactions including denial. Belief is a very powerful thing that can blind us to logic. Very simply, Christianity, like any other religion you can use as an example, is self contained and defends its own teachings to create its own structure. To say that one testament backs up another testament is not proof of anything more than doctrinal consistency - and even then its merely a subset of available books that were chosen for the specific purpose of providing a clear and simple handbook for that particular belief. A clear example of this is to stand outside on a good day and say 'the sky is blue'. you look up, you see the sky, it's blue (unless you're color blind - the fact you may see 'red' and i may see 'blue' dont matter, its still obviously the label you were given as a child for the color of the sky). Now imagine never having seen the sky and having to use your sense of smell to guess the color? It would require some faith and to be convinced it would need some leaping thru logical hoops 'its green because it tastes like trumpet solo' and that pretty much sums up my take on religion and its ability to recognize it's own (in my opinion) perfectly acceptable imperfections and contradictions. Overall Bible message? I think that's best summed up by James Dalton, Head Bouncer Double Deuce Club regarding the OT "If somebody gets in your face, I want you to be nice. Ask him to walk. Be nice. If he won't walk, walk him. But be nice. If you can't walk him, one of the others will help you, and you'll both be nice." His take on the NT is similar "If someone gets in your face, be nice. If they punch you in the face, be nice." The rest of the stuff is fine. Now the big question is. If the books so big on prophecy that is SO clear - 2 part question.... 1. Why was he not recognized by more Jews during his lifetime (a biblical passage explaining how the savior was going to be ignored is NOT an answer, the question is regarding prophecy and how obvious it is). 2. If the Jews didnt recognize their Messiah the first time around, who as a population generally had a much greater knowledge of their scripture and the prophecies, how do Christians know that they're not going to make exactly the same mistake again? Isnt it a little presumptious to assume that the majority of Jews back in the day were too dumb to notice the Son of God wandering around? These guys knew the Torah backwards, they had the entire thing memorized, yet they missed it. Could it be that they got so wrapped up in scriptural laws, trivial matters of behavior, and had such a concrete firmly set belief that their god would return as HE-MAN savior of the day that when a small carpenter stepped up it didnt fit into their worldview. In your mythology Jesus presented a new agreement between God and Man. Which was basically 'forget about beating the crap out of each other, be nice!'. Now bear in mind that I think Paul F'd up Christianity's basic precepts, but Jesus stepped forward and said 'God thought about some of the stuff in the OT, realized that he probably wasnt providing all the tools that humans need and felt that a little compassion could go a lot further than needlessly slaughtering each other just because they gave you a funny look'. To me there is no difference between the Jewish priests and religious lawyers who condemned your messiah over points of jewish law and the attitude of many Christians today being so sure of what their God REALLY meant. Here's my prophecy, "When Jesus comes back it'll be as an recovered junky pornstar, she'll be totally ignored by the militant christians, but gather a faithful following of disciples who were both Christian and non-Christian and in 2000 years people will argue about the best way to perform the ceremony of 'The Giving of the Head' and what she really meant when she said "you know, bombing the fuck out of people simply because you dont understand them is a very silly idea indeed". hmmm meds wore off, sorry for going on so long:) TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Personally I think preemptive action is a BAD IDEA© but thats my own philosophy. Perhaps you could explain how Saddam would have accomplished this mass taking of US lives, because I had thought they didnt actually find WMDs or any long range weapons and that his actual capabilities were more in line with the weapon inspectors than the stories told the CIA by Chalabi. As someone who tries to pay attention I can confidently say that I recall the point where Bush and his spokesmen stopped making speeches about Saddam's WMDs and instead started refering to discovering the existence of a WMD Weapons Program. If you go through the whitehouse transcripts of the daily briefings around that time you can find that quite clearly. I'm sure some liberal sites must have collected them somewhere. I noticed only because I was studying linguistics at the time for a project I was doing. For those of you who may be confused: 1. Cut and paste the following to a text file: -------------------------start-------------------------------- I am going to print the AES encryption algorithm on a t-shirt and send it to my friend overseas, when I get around to it. // Copyright in this code is held by Dr B. R. Gladman but free direct or // derivative use is permitted subject to acknowledgement of its origin. // There are no guarantees of correctness or fitness for purpose. // Dr B. R. Gladman #ifndef AES_H #define AES_H const int n_row = 4; // the number or rows in the state const int n_col = 4; // the number or columns in the state const int n_maxr = 14; // the maximum number of cipher rounds typedef unsigned char aes_elem; // a finite field element in GF(256) typedef aes_elem aes_col[n_row]; // a column of four GF(256) elements typedef aes_col aes_state[n_col];// an array of columns for the state class aes { aes_state key_sch[n_maxr + 1]; // the key schedule int key_len; public: aes(void) : key_len(0) {}; bool key(const void *key, int keylen); bool encrypt(const void* pt, void* ct) const; bool decrypt(const void* ct, void* pt) const; }; #endif Oooo I'm eeeeeeeeeevil. -----------------------------end---------------------------- 2. Print out, or put txt file onto storage medium. 3. Bury paper or storage medium under flowerbed. Thats all there is to it. You now have your own illegal weapons program! See how easy that was? ...ok, back to BASE jumping in GTA:SA. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Dont really think it's a strawman because I was talking about a small section of posts. Luckily someone was kind enough to explain everything to me in an email, much of it echoing your post here. Light has dawned and I now understand the argument better. But I still wasnt asking for a resume ;) TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

The UK, at least when I lived there, had a public and private healthcare system that seemed to work...sorta. Quite simply you got what you paid for. If you couldnt afford private healthcare you would be put on a waiting list for non-essential operations - which could be as long as several years. Successive governments butchered the original structure and started trying to treat it as a business (sure it is, I'll explain), and discovered that when you cut taxes and alter funding principles and forget why the national health service was created it starts to fall apart. On the plus side there was never any BS about which drugs my doctor said were ok vs which drugs my insurance company says is ok. Given that generics have a 20% variability of the active ingredient and no regulation of 'inactive' that can be a big problem. I never had to worry about which doctors were in network, as the private system was modeled on the universal public system. Every doctor was in the system, so no inflated costs for specialists, or discovering that the one guy with expertise for whatevers ailing you is going to cost you $1000 every visit. And if you were going to die no one would tell you that the life saving operation wasnt covered or within your network. As opposed to little things like my kid's grandfather who at 55 had a series of massive strokes that left him mentally at age 5 with $500,000 of medical bills because he didnt have health insurance that covered that particular situation. I'm not sure where Americans get the idea that public healthcare is a bad thing. The private system here is on the record as being hideously inefficient. Of the $x hundred I put in per month for family coverage only a couple of dollars actually get put into health care, the reset just maintains an insane system that like the oroburos feeds on itself. Your medical companies here charge 2 to 3 times more for EXACTLY the same drug - ie, one with the same ingredients, manufacturing process and testing requirements - in fact, in some cases better testing than the FDA provides. That stuff about the Canadian FDA not being as good? yeah. Go ask your physician to make some calls if they dont already have the details. Perhaps someone can untangle this conundrum for me. 1. It would be a government tit to suck on and that is a very bad thing. To suggest otherwise is unamerican. 2. Human life is absolutely sacred, it should be protected at all costs. Nothing, NOTHING is more sacred than human life, whether it be brain dead human life or Clumpy the 3 day old fetus. Now, in my - admittedly limited - experience of Americans there's a very large overlap of people who believe both point 1 AND point 2. Perhaps someone who identifies with that overlap can expain the following to me: If life is sacred then why do you support a privatized system that means you have to pay to play. A system that allows a private profit driven company that is beholding only to its shareholders and profit margin to deny you treatment because 'its not covered by your medical coverage' wouldnt appear to be holding up their end of the 'life is sacred' reality. Why is it so heretical to try and formulate a workable public system that would protect every human life and provide affordable treatment for everyone, regardless of the brain's functional state or it's development of skeletal structure and organs. The argument of cost flies in the face of the facts as I understand them, which is Americans pay more per head for less health care than Europeans. The UK isnt the best example as a model for public healthcare as it's been stripped down and destroyed over recent decades, however most of Europe has universal healthcare systems that work, do not drain their economies and they're all driving BMWs so I'm thinking the 'tax burden will be crippling' might be a myth. The northern european countries consider life and health basic human right and have workable systems and healthy (although much smaller) working economies. Any illumination, correction or opinions would be valued. thanks. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

So how exactly was your national security in any serious threat from little old Iraq? Que to spew out the same old, same old...... 1. They had WMDs 2. They were sponsoring Al Quiada 3. They bought/tried to buy uranium 4. They had aluminium tubes 5. Saddam was an evil man who killed his own people, a lot. 6. Regime change 7. They had terrorist training camps. 8. The ruling elite were muslims who supported terrorism. 9. The UN were abusing the Oil for Food program. 10. The Iraqi public were ready for democracy and waiting for someone to lead the way. 11. Chalabi was a liar and a fraud and lied to the CIA 12. Saddam was in contravention of UN resolutions w/regards to weapons technology in general. I make no judgement with this list. I have avoided contentious phrasing. Each item on this list has been quoted by the media (please note, I said MEDIA, not THIS ADMINISTRATION) as a reason why America went to war with Iraq. [obligatory Rev Bill Hicks Quote]I think the word 'war' is a little misleading, usually a war has two armies fighting each other. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Thats because you limeys are liberal socialist assholes who want to give these psychos therapy! How will the UK assist with the war on TERRORISM if they're going to coddle these cold blooded killers by swaddling them up with a justice system rather than shipping them to countries with highly questionable human rights records for daily torture^H^H^H^H^H^H^H debriefings? What next? Tucking them into bed with some Koranic bedtime stories and Ovaltine??!?!!? Next someone in their leadership will step forward and try to talk some whiney liberal nonsense to communicate with these murderous thugs rather than simply flying our F-16s over Muslim neighborhoods and bombing the shit out of them - hell, lets take out half of London if it means forever ridding the world of TERRORISM. Remember if you think that killing these animals with extreme prejudice is wrong then you're a helping them win! You bastards! Terrorist-helper-winner! 9/11 showed the world what TERRORISM IS. No one knew what it meant before that day. And at that point those extremist islamic bastards showed their true colors. The world knew that we were at war at that moment. The legal system, filled with liberal activist judges would keep them safe, give them rights...huh, using a Koran as toilet paper is torture? Bullshit! Now, burning a flag - THATS TERRORISM RIGHT THERE!!!!! Its a battle, the world is the new battlefield and on a battlefield in war there are no rules! Did I do that right? TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Ron, I really like the original post here. Your first statement is total Zen. I was driving back from the DZ on Saturday having completed my HnPs (catagory something or other) and we got into a long discussion on the topic of mastery. It's an attitude I try to maintain in all things that I do, and in some things I feel I achieve that point of knowing nothing. Until I realized it was totally impractical I was considering an approach similar to the martial arts, by using white cords for the pin necklaces everyone wears. In martial arts the novice begins with a white belt, as he works towards mastery it gets dirty and slowly turns black, over the years it frays and gets worn and turns back to white again. I've found that the more I learn the more I realize that I know nothing. There's a fun programmers guide to Zen, which is only enlightening and humorous to techie geeks, but I'm tempted to bring all these 1 line teachings together. Perhaps it exists, but The Zen of Skydiving seems like it might be a fun read. *Zen is not a religious belief, it is not structured, it's an attitude - at least in the context I'm using it here. Thanks to everyone else on the thread that contributed. If I get a few minutes later I may start it. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Osama thanks you for your support. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Look, these are the rich elite. The same mold as GWB, or even Cheney or Teresa Heinz-Kerry. They stop at nothing. In fact, this ad was intentionally misrepresenting skydiving gear in order to undermine our civil liberties and promote the steady decline to governmental facism. It's been on the agenda of organized government from the free masons and the Rand Corportation for 2 centuries. Most people know that if you'd just open your mind. So, speaking of eaglenrider..... TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

Ditto. I have nothing but respect for everyone who's out there doing their duty. Thank you. TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.