While this makes no practical sense, it seems to be consistent it's own logic. Leading me to wonder if it'd be possible to build a working two way converter.
But seriously, your entire philosophy of law should not be based on a technicality.
Utah Senator Mike Lee (R) doesn't seem to understand that if a study doesn't exist about number of guns vs. number of gun related murders, you can't just make one up.
Utah Senator Mike Lee (R) doesn't seem to understand that if a study doesn't exist about number of guns vs. number of gun related murders, you can't justmake one up.
75% of all statistics are made up on the spot... Or was that 85%?
While one could provide anecdotal evidence to support his claims; Standing there and musing that there must be supporting research is not right.
In all of this I did hear something that made me get a bit miffed. Olbermann made the statement that the US experiences 12 times more gun fatalities than either England or Japan. WHY DID HE COMPARE A COUNTRY THAT HAS MORE GUNS THAN ANY ONE ELSE IN THE WORLD WITH TWO COUNTRY THAT MAKE IT ILLEGAL* TO HAVE THEM!?!?
*I know you can get them in both countries but, as i understand it, it is stupidly difficult to get them.
I've been less and less impressed with Olbermann and Maddox as they have started to slant things into the realm of 'not entirely true'. They are rapidly becoming the Fox News of the left, unfortunately. I have been using factcheck.org and politifact.com for a while now.
Here's another doosey. Remember Tom DeLay? He was convicted of all kinds of shifty dealings and funneling money illegally into Republican war chests. Continuing the Bush era mantra of "We're never wrong about anything ever", he insists the following:
"I was tried in the most liberal county in the state of Texas, and indeed in the United States," explained DeLay NBC's Matt Lauer in an exclusive interview. "The point is that this is a political campaign."
Right, so, obviously you did no wrong and there was a conspiracy by liberals to make up a story to take you down. What a douche.
I'm a big fan of Ed Brayton's blog "Dispatches from the Culture Wars" over at scienceblogs.com (also home of PZ Myers). He has a regular feature called "Dumbass Quote of the Day" and he has a real "goodie" this time. As he relays from the Texas Freedom Network's blog:
“[T]he Voting Rights Act is a nearly 50 year old law that unconstitutionally discriminates against southern states. It’s a racist law that presumes black people can only be represented by black people, and that white voters in southern states are wicked racists who are always out to deny black people their right to vote.â€Â
And just to prevent some misunderstandings, the TFN is actually a really good secular organization. It just has a weird name that sounds like one of those fake grassroots groups. They're making a point against this colossal racist fuckhead that is Peter Morrison.
That's some pretty spectacular fake victimization right there.
It's just par for the course. In this part of the state, the kooks tend to be taken seriously because some of the population is generally ignorant. Not everyone, but enough. Also, its really embarrassing when one of your neighbors starts spouting this bullshit. This guy lives a few towns over from me, and this is the first time I've even heard of this guy. What a creep.
Net neutrality is an innocuous sounding term for what is really media Marxism. This is an ideological attempt by those on the left to control the greatest means for the distribution of information ever devised. It provides a playing field which the government does not control, and this is immensely troubling to those on the left.
There are two pieces to net neutrality:
Equal Access: Equal access says that everyone should always have equal priorities to the flow of information on the internet. In practice, this means that if I am updating my Twitter account, and my neighbor is downloading a movie, he shouldn't have access to more bandwidth than me. Right now, the large providers manage access, with some handling over one million URL requests a second. They are doing a phenomenal job. Net neutrality would prevent them from doing so, and would essentially "socialize" the internet.
This would also create some horrendous situations with the providers being unable to provide more bandwidth and priority to a hospital downloading an emergency transmission of an MRI, than they provide to me while I update my Twitter feed. We are obviously against this.
Equal Rates / Equal Service: Proponents of net neutrality are also trying to stop providers from offering "tiered" service plans. Think "first class," "business pricing plans for phone service etc." According to proponents, under net neutrality, everyone has to be charged the same, and provided the same services. This is the antithesis of capitalism, and would result in the stifling of technology development. Providers spend billions developing the technology; it is their right to charge as they see fit, and to create pricing plans that serve the needs of real customers in a real marketplace.
Our position is that net neutrality is simply government interference in the most important communications medium in history. Tea Party Patriots across the nation are very concerned about government regulation and interference in the internet, and we will be continuing to educate them about the reality of net neutrality, and the damage it will do to both the progress of technology and to the operation of the free market.
The stupid, it buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurns. Yeah, allowing every business the equal opportunity and equal access to the web is completely anticapitalistic. It's not like they should be able to fight out for superiority in the marketplace based on the merits of their business. No, that should be up to their internet access providers and how good an access they can afford.
And of course nobody would think about giving emergency services such as hospitals, firefighters or the police strong access because they're fucking essential. And having equal access to information is COMMUNISM OMGZ!!
Looks like intentional misinformation exploiting people's lack of understanding of how the Internet works to me. Straw man arguments can be so manipulative...
What they suggest is "equal access", that everyone should have the same amount of bandwidth at all times, is patently ridiculous and almost impossible. They also completely misinterpret what is generally meant by "tiered service" in the context of network neutrality - the issue is not ISPs offering plans with differing amounts of bandwidth, it's offering plans with differing levels/quality of access to specific websites...
When I am dripping money from a few successful years of Interventional Neuroradiology, I'm going to start a lobby (and maybe a campaign) entirely based on tech and information interests to counter this stuff. Count on it, bitches.
Can the actions of the Israelites legitimately be called genocide?
The term “genocide†means a major action “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.†Some twentieth-century examples are the extermination of six million Jews by the Nazis and the slaughter of 800,000 Tutsis by the Hutus in Rwanda in 1994. Going by this definition alone, the destruction of the Canaanites would seem to have been genocide.
But there is a major difference. These twentieth-century examples were basically people killing people simply because they hated them and/or wanted their land. The Canaanites, by contrast, were destroyed at the direction of God and primarily because of their sin. Because of this, I think the term should be avoided. The completely negative connotations of “genocide†make it hard to look at the biblical events without a jaundiced eye.
One’s background theological beliefs make a big difference in how one sees this. If God was not behind the conquest of Canaan, then the Israelites were no different than the Nazis and the Hutus. However, once the biblical doctrines of God and of sin are taken into consideration, the background scenery changes and the picture looks very different. There is only one true God, and that God deserves all honor and worship. Furthermore, justice must respond to the moral failure of sin. The Canaanites were grossly sinful people who were given plenty of time by God to change their ways. They had passed the point of redeemability, and were ripe for judgment.
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But seriously, your entire philosophy of law should not be based on a technicality.
Answer: "Ladasha"
If you want to verify that independently, read Freakonomics. Same kids get a reference.
I'm just going to watch her slowly ruin herself.
In all of this I did hear something that made me get a bit miffed. Olbermann made the statement that the US experiences 12 times more gun fatalities than either England or Japan. WHY DID HE COMPARE A COUNTRY THAT HAS MORE GUNS THAN ANY ONE ELSE IN THE WORLD WITH TWO COUNTRY THAT MAKE IT ILLEGAL* TO HAVE THEM!?!?
*I know you can get them in both countries but, as i understand it, it is stupidly difficult to get them.
Well, that and John Stewart.
What a douche.
And just to prevent some misunderstandings, the TFN is actually a really good secular organization. It just has a weird name that sounds like one of those fake grassroots groups. They're making a point against this colossal racist fuckhead that is Peter Morrison.
Yeah, allowing every business the equal opportunity and equal access to the web is completely anticapitalistic. It's not like they should be able to fight out for superiority in the marketplace based on the merits of their business. No, that should be up to their internet access providers and how good an access they can afford.
And of course nobody would think about giving emergency services such as hospitals, firefighters or the police strong access because they're fucking essential. And having equal access to information is COMMUNISM OMGZ!!
What they suggest is "equal access", that everyone should have the same amount of bandwidth at all times, is patently ridiculous and almost impossible. They also completely misinterpret what is generally meant by "tiered service" in the context of network neutrality - the issue is not ISPs offering plans with differing amounts of bandwidth, it's offering plans with differing levels/quality of access to specific websites...