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| 2004/3/12-13 [Computer/SW/OS/Linux] UID:12634 Activity:high |
3/12 RedHat, Suse, or Debian? I am seriously thinking of installing
one on my machine...
\_ Free RedHat as you know is has reached it's end. RedHat 9 was the
last of it. There will still be RedHat Professional, which is
RHEL but only costs $90. I highly recommend Fedora if you want
to keep up with the latest and greatest in Linux.
http://fedora.redhat.com -shac
\_ Die SuSe ich nicht fur die motdhozen unt warezhausen.
\_ USE LINUX!
\_ have you used linux before? you can start with Knoppix. It doesn't
touch your harddrive, just boots from a CD and runs. it's useful
for those who want to taste linux before they actually commit to it
\_ Yes, I've used slackware back in the old days...
\_ RIDE BIKE!
\_ Debian. It's a communitty, not a corporation. It's the easiest
to maintain. Once you've installed it, you can upgrade
everything, including the kernel. No need to reinstall
a net version later.
\_ Suse detects the hardware for you, with Debian, do I have to know
what my hardware is?
\_ You want hardware detection? Install Knoppix. Knoppix is a
Debian distro. Boot from the cd, then do a hdx-install.
Knoppix is the best HW detecting distro I've seen. Then use
apt-get to get up to date. Did that the other day at the
office, was the easiest linux install yet.
\_ Debian's hw detection isn't as good as SuSE, but it is
fairly good. (SuSE isn't perfect either, we've had lots
of problems with video cards/fb's with SuSE 8.1, 9 and
SLES).
\_ I don't understand why all distributions don't have the
exact same quality for HW detection. Aren't the routines
open source and GPL??
\_ So? That doesn't mean everyone uses the same one.
Each distribution has its own installer.
\_ Yes, yes, but underneath what is the excuse for not
borrowing the HW detection code for different parts
from each other? Why reinvent the wheel? Isn't
that supposed to be one of the benefits of OS?
\_ Not everyone wants to build all the bits
the same way. RH and SuSE build the bits
differently (incorporating different patches,
testing different kernel versions, glibc
version, XFree86 fb drivers, &c.). RH's
hw detection requires you to have things
built in the same way as RH builds them,
since SuSE (and Debian) do things differently
(for various reasons, i18n/l10n, stability,
&c.) RH's stuff won't work for other
distros.
\_ what? I'm talking about HW detection,
not how drivers are installed or what
version. The hardware is the same. So
why don't they all *detect* the HW to
the same level of quality?
\_ which one is debian's hd detection? it doesn't detect
much for me.. do i need to run it manually?
\_ Hardware is usually obvious. Read the numbers on the
chips. and '/sbin/lspci'. Google for specs.
\_ If you have never used Linux before but have some familiarity
with svr4 type systems (Solaris, HP-UX), then I would recommend
RH 8 or 9. RH is easy to setup and provides a pretty good learning
environment to get comfortable with Linux. If you want to deploy
RH for some real purpose you may start running into problems with
their default tool-chain (RH has shipped with buggy snapshot jvms
and gcc versions instead of stable versions) and RPM-hell.
If you have already used Linux, try Debian; it isn't as easy to
get running but it is far more stable than RH and is much easier
to maintain (apt is very nice).
I've heard good things about Debian-Gentoo which is supposed to
provide /usr/src and /usr/ports type source access but I haven't
tried it out yet.
\_ it's just gentoo, it's got nothing to do with debian.
\_ Sorry my mistake. Someone at work told me that Gentoo
was part of the Debian GNU/{Linux,HURD} stuff.
\_ Define what you mean by "RPM hell"
\_ i imagine rpm hell is the situation where you're trying to
install an rpm not built by redhat inc. and there is a
bunch of other dependencies you have to find rpms for. this
doesn't happen in debian or gentoo because they have
centralized repositories for this stuff.
\_ Rpm dependency handling is problem. Rpm determines the
dependencies of an rpm on files and libraries when the
rpm is built. If the system that you are installing the
rpm on has a different set of files and libraries (say
you've applied some security/stability patches) than
the system the rpm was built on you often run into
install problems forcing you to use --force or --nodeps
which can leave your rpm db in an inconsistent state.
RH frequently releases updates that must be installed
in some specific order otherwise you can't install all
the updates. The problem is also present in commercial
pgms that try and build one set of rpms for a large set
of systems (RH 6 and newer and most versions of SuSE).
\_ What are you using now? *BSD? *Windows?
\_ http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/10.0/features
URL self-explanatory.
\_ Isn't that French? Plus it has all that gay star/magic motif.
cf. TV magic queers.
\_ you'd rather be running "potato"?
\_ woody !
\_ forget mr potato head, go with the sarge!
\_ Try it.
\_ Debian. It's maintained by a communitty, not a corporation. It's
the most efficient to maintain. Once you've installed it, you can
upgrade everything, including the kernel. No need to reinstall a
new version later.
\_ You should use SCO UNIX.
\_ I like Suse, but ymmv. I'd stay away from RedHat because they've
abandoned non-commercial users.
\_ I don't have time to mess with Linux now. Back when I did,
Mandrake was actually the first one I tried. I don't really
see the point of Mandrake now, it seems redundant.
If I was going to use one now I'd probably go with Gentoo.
I don't know what I'd use for "real work". |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/China] UID:12635 Activity:high |
3/12 Why does the Chinese govt. care about forcing WiFi chipset makers to
support WAPI? Is it beaurocrat muscle-flexing, technical advantages
of the spec, or added dissident-spying features?
\_ They know they have a lot of market muscle. So they want to use
that to help the Chinese tech industry. Foreign companies have to
license WAPI from China and basically share technical know-how
when implementing it. There's no real technical reason for it.
They're trying to do this with DVDs as well, with their "EVD".
I understand the logic, but still think it's a bad way to go about
it. When they split the market for everything it's just annoying
for people who travel, and for companies who need to make the
different versions. But hey, more useless tech jobs for us!
\_ The reason is actually a lot benign than that. China, like
rest of the (semi-conductor) manufacturing powerhouse, need to pay
royalties for producing equipment that is in compliant of the
standards adopted by the West. This Royalties and license fees
can be a significant cost to the equipment they manufacturs.
Unlike Korea, or Taiwan or Singapore, which essentially said:
"we got bullied, but there is nothing we can do about it." China
is flexing its market muscle, coming up with thier own standards
so they don't have to pay those IP-related fees. Wifi is just one
of many moves that China made recently (heard of TDS-CDMA?).
Where to go from here is anyone's guess. If I am the Premier of
China, I would eventually use these home-grown stardards to
influence the existing one, thus, neogiate a better term for
licensing technology such as GSM and other specifications.
However, there is an undercurrent of unreasonable national pride
beneath all these, which may cause Chinese market isolated from
rest of the world... similiar to what happened to USA and Japan.
And... China's market is going to be too big to be ignored by
anyone and thus, they can get away with all that.
\_ I was unaware that there are royalties for WEP...
\_ I thought WEP encryption was lame anyway?
\_ Everyone keeps saying China's market is too big to ignore but
doesn't most of China still live in small villages growing rice?
\_ you are correct. the rural urban breakup has gone from
80-20 to 70-30, but it is still mostly rural. OTOH, 30%
of 1.3 billion ain't bad. WSJ says China is already
the world's biggest beer market. I didn't read the
details but I would guess it's by volume consumed not
average price * volume consumed, cause they drink quite
a bit of cheap local brew.
\_ So are you saying the 'China is a huge market' thing is
for real or bullshit?
\_ I am saying it's a huge market for beer.
\_ But only cheap local beer, right?
of 1.3 billion ain't bad.
\_ Well said.
\_ So it's basically "We're really big. If you want to sell us
stuff you'll have to give us tech know-how and a discount on
royalties."
\_ the WSJ had a story a few weeks ago about how GE
wanted to sell power turbines to the Chinese market,
but in return the Chinese government wanted significant
discounts AND the plans to the technology used in
making the turbines so they can make it themselves
cheaper down the road, stuff that GE has invested billions
in over the years.
\_ Was GE stupid enough to do this?
\_ According to the article, they reached a compromise
- some technology transfer but the most leading
edge part was kept secret. GE had to compromise
a little because otherwise China will just go to
European companies. The good thing is, as the
article noted, often the transferred technology
quickly becomes outdated as even newer technology
becomes available. The technology itself is
important, but even more important is the ability
to invent new technologies.
\_ I remember the article quoting a chinese
manager saying that, in technology transfers,
the foreign companies show them what to do,
but not why they do it, and not how they discover
to invent new technologies.
that's the way to do it. |
| 2004/3/12 [Finance/Investment] UID:12636 Activity:nil 75%like:29867 |
3/12 What's the best/cheapest online brokerage these days?
\_ freetrade offers 20 free trades per month.
\_ I use scottrade, which is cost effective if you don't trade often.
But if you trade more than twice and less than seven times a month,
I have a co-worker who started using sharebuilder for a flat monthly
fee.
\_ OByermom
\_ I've been using Ameritrade for some time. I don't know if they
are the cheapest but I've never had problems with them and they
provide an acct exec for people with more that $50k so that you
have someone to talk to if there are any issues with your acct. |
| 2004/3/12 [Transportation/Car/RoadHogs, Transportation/Car/Hybrid] UID:12637 Activity:very high |
3/12 I know this is a liberal pipe-dream, but imagine that, instead of
spending $87B on Iraq every year, hundreds of billions on tax cuts,
and the prescription drug [company] benefit, we spent $300B a year
on a simple program: Hand in any car that gets less than 30 MPG and
you can go out and buy a 50+ MPG hybrid car for FREE. We could replace
15 million cars a year on this program, and oil imports would soon
drop like a rock ... This seems a lot simpler than invading country
after country, plus domestic car manufacturers would quickly start
cranking out competing models so it would help the car industry too.
People want to drive big SUVs, not hybrids but I'll bet plenty of
people would switch if you get a new car for FREE.
\_ Ok, great, and where does the power come from for these cars?
Hybrid cars dont make power from thin air. It's a hybrid of a gas
engine and a battery. The power for the battery comes from either
energy drained off the gas engine and thus reduces MPG and/or from
an electric socket. The power for that socket comes from...? Yep,
you guessed it, burning oil, coal, or nuclear. I won't even go
into the abuse your program will cause when we suddenly see the
price of broken ancient $150 gas guzzlers go up just so people can
turn them in, nor will I mention that oil is not the source of
Islamic terrorism. It isn't a liberal pipe-dream. It is just a
pipe-dream.
\_ I don't think the point of an electric or electric-hybrid car
is to get energy for free. It's to improve efficiency. Electric
cars (that plug into a socket) use energy generated from a
gas turbine power plant (or nuclear, solar, hydroelectric,etc.).
Gas turbine engines are far more fuel efficient than piston
engines. Hybrid cars work under the principle of using a low
power engine (which tend to be more efficient than a high
powered one) and using that to recharge a battery.
\_ plus the battery allows regenerative braking, and shutting off
the engine quickly when idle.
\_ Pretty much no hybrids on the market are built to recharge from
an outside electricity source -- you are thinking or pure EVs,
which are pretty much on hold. OP is referring to the reduction
in required petro due to increased fuel efficiency alone and he
is correct that the change would be dramatic. Hybrids can get
double the mileage of standard vehicles.
\_ Most of the milegage gain is from making the cars lighter.
\_ Must research before talking out of ass. Apples vs.
apples, hybrids are heavier.
http://www.hondacars.com/models/specifications.asp?ModelName=Civic+Hybrid
http://www.hondacars.com/models/specifications.asp?ModelName=Civic+Sedan
\_ Let's assume we replace around 20% of all cars (because not
everyone can or wants to trade-in). We'd cut automotive
petroleum use around 10%, and total petroleum use ~5%. We'd
probably replace ~30 million cars at a cost of ~$60 billion.
$60 billion seems a bit high for a 5% drop in oil use.
\_ To my mind that depends how much of a petro decrease would
be sufficient to no longer require massive military
operations every few years. The cost of the current Gulf
adventure is at about $105B.
\_ We're not there for the sweet,sweet oil. We're there to
battle Islamic terrorists who were operating freely
under a secular Stalinist dictatorship.
\_ Whoah. Somebody believes this?
\_ It's probably just sarcasm, but yes, some
people actually believe this.
\_ The 105 includes Afghanistan but anyway....
\_ No. Total appropriations in the two wars so far
have been about $150b.
\_ Oh, I thought you meant the current war plus
afghanistan, not gw1+gw2 and not afghanistan.
The numbers are similar.
\_ The 105B is for Iraq alone, but anyway...
http://costofwar.com/numbers.html
\_ It's always fun to play with numbers. You do
understand that a lot of that money would have
been spent on people, weapon's maintenance and
training anyway, right? Probably not, but it's
cool to think you know what you're talking about.
Gives you that "I'm smarter than you" feeling of
superiority even if it's false.
\_ I like that idea, but I think there is a better way to spend the
money. How about instead of buying efficient cars for everyone, we
give everyone a lobotomy so they won't _like_ gas-guzzlers (and
while we are at it, we can make sure they won't discriminate based
on race, or want a handgun in their home). In fact, we might as
well make sure they will all agree abortions are ok. Sure, it will
be expensive, and there is a slight loss of free will, but think of
how much better off our society will be! -- ilyas
\_ that was an awesome ilyas style rant. it's quite easy
to poke fun at people truly concerned with how global
energy resources are being rapidly depleted without offering
anything remotely like a viable solution by somehow linking
this all to gun ownership, abortion, and paranoid extreme
libertarian sexual fantasies.
\_ (a) The op was a troll, not a concerned citizen. Buying
everyone a hybrid is a stupid idea for practical reasons
(as others pointed out), as well as moral reasons.
(b) I do have an alternative. Do nothing (at the government
level). Let's check back in 20 years to see who is right.
If I am wrong, I ll eat my words, like Mr. O'Reilly did.
Will you? You didn't even sign your name. -- ilyas
\_ [ non-sequitur deleted ]
\_ Did that deletion make you feel better, though?
\_ The non-sequitur wasn't really insulting, but it was
random. Patriot Act? wtf?
\_ Ah. So ilyas jumps from hybrids to lobotomies to
abortion, but my extending his statement about "loss
of free will" to the most recent source of govt
infringement of civil liberties is a non sequitur.
Just making sure I follow.
\_ You are barking up the wrong tree. I don't like
the Patriot Act. I also don't like grand schemes
for 'societal betterment' at taxpayer expense, which
was the point I was trying to make in that clumsy
way of mine. Also, I was under the impression the
main danger of the Patriot Act was the increase
in spying powers of the government, rather than
explicit prohibitions. The only possible relevance
explicit prohibitions. -- ilyas
of PA to op's post is that it is "a bad thing the
conservatives did" rather than "a bad thing a
liberal is proposing we do." You can always make
another thread to laugh at conservative stupidity,
there is plenty to go around. -- ilyas
\_ Invading Iraq is a pretty grand scheme and it
has cost a fortune. So far the big results are:
Saddam Hussein in jail so he can no longer
\_ Your reaction is very interesting, ilyas, especially all the
extensions you make. Did somebody maybe press a button?
which use Li, not Pb.
threaten us with non-existant WMD, Iraq going
from oil exporter to oil importer, everyone in
the world even MORE pissed off at us, and 500+
soldiers dead. My point was, if we are going
to spend billions and billions of dollars, why
not just spend directly on stuff that we know
will actually make a difference as opposed to
stuff that might fix problems.
\_ I thought I was the only conservative
isolationist on the motd. Did you vote for
Pat, too?
\_ Hybrids are a ruse. They make people feel better about wasting
resources--it's like residential recycling programs, which make
practically no impact on resource usage. If we really wanted
50 MPG cars, we could do that with or without making them hybrid,
and hybrids have additional toxic waste problems. -tom
\_ By toxic waste, surely you're not refering to the batteries,
which use Li, not Pb.
\_ Yes, some smaller cars are already close to 50mpg but it would
mean making them even smaller and lighter which seems unsafe.
\_ bigger, heavier cars are more dangerous than smaller, lighter
cars.
\_ no.
\_ do you not understand the concept of kinetic energy? |
| 2004/3/12 [Politics/Domestic/Election] UID:12638 Activity:low |
3/12 Can't his advisors get Kerry to STFU and stop mouthing off?
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040312-120719-7926r.htm
\_ Can't his advisors get Reverend Moon to stop trying to destroy
our government? |
| 2004/3/12 [Computer/Domains] UID:12639 Activity:nil |
3/12 Can I provide a PO Box when registering domain? I didn't find a rule
against it.
\_ If you've ever done a whois you'll see other people put in all
sorts of bullshit. This is the internet, there are no rules. |
| 2004/3/12 [Computer/Domains] UID:12640 Activity:nil |
3/12 What's the cheapest place for registering a domain (or is there a
comparison shopping engine for that?)
\_ I really like http://gandi.net. They're pretty cheap and I've never
had bad service from them. -John
\_ I had one domain with http://godaddy.com and two with <DEAD>stargateinc.net<DEAD>.
stargateinc recentely raised their fee whereas godaddy's fee went
down since I first registered. I just finished moving two domains
from stargate to godaddy as well as registering another one.
\_ I've used godaddy in the past. This time I went with joker.
Other ones I've looked at were gandi and dotster. NSI can suck it.
\_ Why did you not use godaddy this time? The only time I used
stargate instead of godaddy last time was because godaddy doesn't
provide free dns service. |
| 2004/3/12 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:12641 Activity:low |
3/12 Might be a nice gesture to drop some flowers at the Spanish
consulate or something. They were pretty decent 2 1/2 years
ago. -John
\_ never knew the motd was so kind.
what was the motd like on 9/11/2001?
\_ IIRC, motd was shut down for several days because of excessive
kindness. I believe the unofficial part was made less publicly
accessible due to kindness poisoning also.
\_ I believe it was given a cooling off period because a few
jackasses were talking about taking revenge on any "towelhead"
they saw.
\_ It was shut down because paolo's (he of the every-3-minute
MOTD deletion) girlfriend complained. -tom
\_ And she was damned right to do so. Did you read some of
the posts she included in her email? It was more than
casual race baiting; people were talking about guns. If
nothing else, that sort of thing would have gotten the
csua shut down if it had been made public.
\_ You can't shut down an organization because it
provides a forum for wackos. Berkeley won't get
shut down because of all the nutjobs on Sproul.
In fact, you put yourself at more risk by attempting
to control a forum, because then you implicitly
are approving everything that shows up in it. -tom
\_ I guess a broken clock is right twice a day.
\_ Kind of OT, but what kind of relegion is Sihkism? All I
know is they don't cut their hair, they wear a turban and
carry a ceremonial knife.
\_ what do you mean pretty decent 2 1/2 years ago?
\_ Meaning that after 9/11 a whole lot of people in Spain
and other Euro countries were pretty consoling and tried
to make whatever symbolic gestures they could. Not
a big deal practically speaking, I guess, but I think it
meant a lot to them. Dunno, you decide. -John
\_ Have you ever considered putting flowers in front of the Israeli
consulate?
\_ Because that's not terrorism, it's a war.
(and "war on terrorism" doesn't count)
\_ oh, so you think it's ok if Israeli rolls in the tanks
and just flattens all the arab areas? After all it's
war and you've just said that killing civilians is ok.
\_ good attempt at a troll.
\_ Why does the Basque people want independence from Spain?
\_ The usual. They feel they are oppressed and ignored by the
Spanish political and social support system.
\_ Ask not what you can do for your country but what your country
can do for you!
\_ Why did the Joos want their own country? |
| 2004/3/12 [Computer/SW/Languages/Misc] UID:12642 Activity:moderate |
3/12 I'm very very impressed at how quickly the motd formatting god
formats my intentionally ill formed posts. I'm wondering if it's
actually a croned formatting script or something, and if so, can
you please post the script? Thanks.
\_ It's no script.
\_ That's no moon. |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Uncategorized] UID:12643 Activity:low |
3/12 Will you ever admit you are depressed?
________________________________________
/ Uh, why wouldn't you? Half of the fun \
\ of being depressed is wallowing in it. /
----------------------------------------
\ ^__^
\ (oo)\_______
(__)\ )\/\
||----w |
|| ||
\_ denial stage.
\_ can you draw one with primary and secondary sexual characteristics?
\_ never heard of cowsay? |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Finance/Investment] UID:12644 Activity:nil |
3/12 Ugh! Why is the online broker thread deleted?! Stop being a
selfish self-important asshole!
Recommendation on online brokers -
\_ I use both scottrade and ameritrade (datek was bought out).
advantages of scottrade:
* lower commission for market trades
* low key branch offices where you can deal with real people
if the need arises (mine have 3 persons there), and you can
call them instead of some anonymous call center.
advantages of ameritrade:
* lower commission for limit trades
* shorting works (shorting at scottrade always results in
a message saying "please call your branch office",
and sometimes they can't get the shares I want even
when I call them.
* extended hours trading |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Computer/SW/Languages/C_Cplusplus, Computer/SW/Languages/Misc] UID:12645 Activity:nil |
3/12 Iway'may eryvay eryvay impressedway atway owhay icklyquay ethay otdmay
ormattingfay odgay ormatsfay may intentionallyway illway ormedfay
ostspay. Iway'may onderingway ifway itway'say actuallyway away
onedcray ormattingfay iptscray orway omethingsay, andway ifway osay,
ancay youay easeplay ostpay ethay iptscray? anksThay
\_ It's no script.
\_ That's no moon.
\_ Why do YOU care?
\_ Wow, motdedit fixed up my post pretty funny. This was
supposed to be on the Jessica Lynch post, but someone
deleted it. I can't say it's any less applicable here
though...
\_ The motd formatting devil was here
\_ I'm pretty sure there is no script as this is a pretty complicated
problem (context sensitive flow analysis with statistical
inference, etc). However, I do think that whoever does the
formatting is equivalent a very complicated finite state automaton
that runs in an infinite while loop.
\_ it's not that hard. parse the motd looking for a newline
followed by a number to get the start of a post, then anytime
you see a "\_" or "\-" preceeded by tabs or spaces you get a
change in authorship. the actual reformat is trivial.
FUCK its hard because there are so many corner cases. For _|
U example, suppose I interrupt your line in the middle, then
C your parser will get fooled. The other example is if I
K start posting in ascii pictures. Then what if I jive your
F content? And what if the indentation IS indeed unusual
like a C/Java code? ANd what if I use letters
I_ to indicate a response? And the list goes
on and on, but the point is, it's very easy
for the naked eye to catch infinite weird
cases, but putting them into smart/self-learning
generic rules is just as hard as writing
spamassassin.
\_ Corner cases? fuck em, its the motd. this isn't one of
hilfinger's courses.
\_ I am Gunnery Seargent Hartman, your Senior Drill
Instructor. From now on, you will speak only when
spoken to, and the first and last words out of your
filthy sewers will be "Sir!" DO YOU MAGGOTS UNDERSTAND
THAT?!
\_ SIR YES SIR!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
| 2004/3/12-14 [Politics/Domestic/Election, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:12646 Activity:moderate |
3/12 American Research Group: Kerry Increases Lead Over Bush, Democrats more
united than Republicans:
http://www.americanresearchgroup.com/presballot
\_ If I was a foreigner I'd be cheering positive Kerry news, too.
\_ why? foreigners cheer for bush. outsourcing, big trade
deficit all good for foreigners.
\_ gee, and here the left has spent 3 years telling us how the
rest of the world now hates us because of bush. which is
it? having your cake and eating it too? don't be stupid.
\_ oh, that's mostly just the nato allies, and some moderate
used to be friendly muslim nations. But India and
the east asian nations love bush. In short, the
ones with whom we should have good relationships
hate us, while those that take advantage of us love
us. Bush screwed up both politically, and
economically.
\_ not really. Which East Asian (i presume you are talking
about north east asian countries) you are talking about?
Anti-American sentiment is running all time high here
in North East Asia. South Korea's president
in North East Asia. South Korea's president won
won election on his tougher stands against Americans
(even though it's all election rhetrics). In short,
many countries think Bush is being a big bully, which
has a lot of truth in it.
\_ there you go. even s. koreans, who honored the US
as an old friend by sending troops to iraq, think
the bush gang is a big bully and warmonger.
\_ no this is just a case of "what have you done for
me lately?" france is the ultimate example of
this. without the US france wouldn't exist today.
how much thanks do we get for that? its just the
way the world is. everyone has their own best
interests at heart which makes sense and is the
way it should be. this is totally normal and has
nothing to do with who the president is. if the
rest of the world loved our president i'd wonder
why and what it was costing *me* and my country
so the president can feel popular around the
globe. i'd vote against the residing president
on that basis alone.
\_ without France, there will be USA today.
There are more casuaties on the French side
than American soldier during the Revolutionary
War.
\_ yes and so what? at what point did we
backstab france? this has nothing to do
on that basis alone.
War.
with anything i said.
\_ huh? so you prefer that the rest of the world
hate us like say how they hated the
soviet union? that will be proof for you
that we have a good president?
\_ they didnt hate the soviet union anymore
they ever hated us. they were just the
other super power and all the little
countries you're so concerned about played
the 2 off each other for most of the 20th
century. hating us isn't proof we have a
good president, liking us isn't proof we
have a bad president but each is evidence
in that direction.
\_ Complete bullshit. Who loved the Soviet
Union? Pretty much all of Europe admired
the USA and most of the rest of the world
the bush gang is a big bully and warmonger.
on that basis alone.
that we have a good president?
have a bad president but each is evidence
in that direction.
too. The USSR was simply an empire, and
only opportunist dictators found profit
in alliance with it.
\_ no one ever said anyone loved the USSR
where are you getting this shit from?
if youre going to post please try to
read what you're replying to and dont
reply to your own self created straw
man arguments that others never made.
\_ I think you've got the two directions
confusd. each is evidence of the other
direction. And no, it wasn't about
playing offthe two superpowers. It had
always been about supporting the US for
what it respresented.
\_ Why are you guys babbling about foreigners? The link is
a poll of AMERICANS.
\_ Because, if you read a news paper or read it online,
you'd know about Kerry's recent quote about unnamed
foreign leaders who are pulling for him. Of course this
was a provable lie, but hey, it's only politics. |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Computer/HW/Laptop] UID:12647 Activity:kinda low |
3/12 http://home.comcast.net/~groovyr/HELPDESK.WAV (headphones only) \_ and this friends, is why you remove your HD *before* sending it in for service... oh yea... and have backups anyways. \_ Oh my god -- that's freaking horrible! \_ Ha ha! What a dipshit. Is that for real? It sounds like he says "Canon laptop computer"... I didn't know they make computers. \_ He seemed a bit upset. I sent mine in with the drive but I didn't care if I never saw any of the data again. It came back ok. Poor stupid bastard.... |
| 2004/3/12-13 [Computer/SW] UID:12648 Activity:nil |
3/12 I want to find the inflation rate and cost of living changes from
2001 to now. Does the government have that on some website? I'm
not getting any love from google. Thanks!
\_ CPI. Train harder and you will find it on the web.
\_ Thanks. I didn't know what it was called.
\_ Hitler.
\_ WHAT??? |
| 2004/3/12-14 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/China, Politics/Foreign/Asia/Taiwan] UID:12649 Activity:nil |
3/12 So Taiwan seems to be a pretty developed country, why is it still
considered a third world country?
\_ state your source.
\_ because they are not yet white and the quota for nonwhite is 1.
\_ idiot, why do you even bother wasting bits with your racist
hateful shit?
\_ did you really go to cal?
\_ because they don't have the political, economic, military, or
diplomatic power to be considered a major power.
\_ don't forget the congressional brawls.
\_ hey, we've got them too now! - random Korean guy
\_ Taiwan is *NOT* a developed region, not even close. For one thing
Taiwan is lack of rule of law. This is a major issue which most
American has overlooked because it is not as cachy as "democracy"
and "human right" etc et. Mind you that rule of law is the
fundamental building block of democratic government, and a democracy
without rule of law is actually in many ways more chaotic than
dictatorial form of government. Things you have taken for granted,
such as (relatively) independent judicial branch does not exist
here. Law enforcement is selective, tend to be charged with either
political motive or influenced by bribe.
Infrasture wise, when you step out of Taipei, you will find that
Taiwan is still pretty damn underdeveloped.
Even in Taipei City... give you an example, the waste water
treatment plant just went online recently. Can you imagine a city
of 1.7 million live on local septic tanks?
Lastly, Taiwan is not a country. The Constitution of Republic
of China state that Taiwan is part of China and the constitution
is designed for entire China in mind. Read them if you can actually
read Chinese.
\_ I like that argument for the annexation of Taiwan. "Our
Constitution says so!" If only the Germans had amended
their Constitution to say Austria, Poland, the Low Lands,
France, etc. were a part of the Reich, there wouldn't have been
a problem! And before you bring this up, most of those
territories (along with Spain) were in fact Hapsburg possessions,
and part of the Holy Roman Empire at one point or another.
-- ilyas
\_ Haha, there may be problems in his argument, but not the one
you are dwelling on. He was referrring the consistituion of
ROC (i.e. taiwan), which claims it to be part of China. You
made fun of yourself, again.
\_ Ok. Show me where:
http://www.taiwandocuments.org/constitution01.htm
-- ilyas
\_ I don't have to. I don't care about taiwan or china or
roman empire. I just saw you misread another post in
such an obvious way and went ahead pouring your vast
"intelligence." You should ask the guy to whom you
original replied to show that and thank me for helping
with your reading comprehension.
\_ I don't know. Are you sure you schooled me?
Taiwanese constitution doesn't say (or at least
I couldn't find anything about this) "Taiwan" is a
part of "China". It was merely a non-communist
constitution which was meant to apply to all of
china once the nationalists won. They never did,
and it applies to a small island instead. If you
really want your 10 motd points, you can have them,
however. -- ilyas
\_ The constitution specifically said that no one
allowed to alter the soverign territory of
the Republic of China, and at the time, the
constitution covers entire chinese mainland.
and this claus of contitution still exists.
- someone who actually can read chinese
and read the damn constitution, unlike ilyas
\_ It has nothing to do with what any constitution
says, but has everything to do with the carrier
we want to buy from ebay for you. I donate the
10 points toward its purchase.
\_ Tell you what. How about I spare you the
trouble of replying to me in the future. I am
nothing but a stuck-up, stupid, rabidly
libertarian, selfish, blind, easily offended,
unattractive, smelly, kooky, ridiculous,
no life loser with the attention span and
reading comprehension abilities of a 10
year old. I should fuck off and die like my
libertarian ilk, and keep my rabid
politico-sexual fantasies to myself. Can we
just agree on that? I default on all the motd
points. Any future argument between us you win
automatically. I accept any remotely clever
jokes you make at my expense in advance. I
surrender unconditionally. -- ilyas
\_ You're not allowed to. Sorry, but you lose
on losing, too. That's impressive!
\_ Yes, outside of the big cities, there are people living
at shocking levels of poverty. It's really quite
frightening, and the gov. seems uninterested in changing
anything.
\_ When I swang by the mainland China, I was shocked by the
difference in standard of living between the city and
the country side (and I didn't even wonder off to any
really poor country side neither). For a moment, I thought
Taiwan is much better in this regard. Then, I realize
that I *RARELY* step outside the Taipei city.
\_ just because you rarely see outside of taipei doesn't mean
taiwan is full of countrysides with poor rural bumpkins.
taiwan is much better in this regard.
\_ I don't dispute that. However, Taiwan is much smaller
and at least in my view should of done a better job
closing the gap between the country side and the city
than what is on the table right now.
\_ I am not very familiar with Taiwan's government system,
but are you sure about your claim that Taiwan does not
have an independent judiciary branch? Can you back it
up? I read a book or two by Li3 Ao2, and even under
KMT rule (under CCG, I presume?), which he sharply criticized,
he was able to win case after case in the courts. That
would be unthinkable in say, commie China.
\_ I am sure, because I live in TW right now and I have heard
enough share of horror stories, to a point that I had to
constantly remind myself that this is not the way things
suppose to work. The supreme court, for example, is extremely
weak and they are subject to president's political pressue.
This is one of the reason why nobody ever bother to ask the
supreme court to interpret the legality of laws and the
referendum conducted solely by the president right now.
The prosecutor general is essentially a servant of the
president. Those who doesn't cooperate, including judges
and people on the prosecution team, gets rotated out of the
trial while the trial is in progress.
\_ When I was in Singapore, I remember once where some international
organization reclassified Singapore as a developed nation.
The local government controlled media started trumpeting the
achievement all over the place. Then PM Lee Kuan Yew spoke up
and says Singapore is still a third world country. Lee Kuan
Yew is smart because one still gets some advantages (trade,
loan, etc.) by being a third world country in name. The
government controlled media then did a full reverse course
and started pumping out articles on why Singapore is not yet
a developed nation. It was kind of funny.
\_ Funny in the way that government controlled media is funny.
\_ pray tell us how else could it have been funny?
\_ exactly my point.
\_ Guys, you shouldn't compare everything with US. America is an
exceptional country, one which is founded on a sound principle
and evolve along a sound trajectory, has always had an unbiased
judiciary and a functining democracy. If you have to measure
against the US, then no other country is developed.
\_ blah blah america is bad, the worlds problems are all our fault
and if it wasnt for america the world would be utopia, so lets
just raise taxes, slash the military to ribbons and pay off the
rest of the world to like us because their liking is us is so
important as if international politics was a playground game |
| 2004/3/12 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:29866 Activity:high |
3/12 http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/South/03/12/jessica.lynch.ap/index.html Why do people care about her still? Actually why did people even care about her in the first place? \_ You're supposed to be thinking about how an innocent GI got rescued, not the poor sods blowing up on a roadside bomb \_ ohhhhhhh. thanks. |
| 2004/3/12 [Finance/Investment] UID:29867 Activity:nil 75%like:12636 |
3/12 What's the best/cheapest online breakfast these days?
\_ freetrade offers 20 free tacos per month.
\_ I use scottrade, which is cost effective if you don't trade often.
But if you trade more than twice and less than seven times a month,
I have a co-worker who started using sharebuilder for a flat monthly
fee.
\_ OByermom
\_ I've been using Ameritrade for some time. I don't know if they
are the cheapest but I've never had problems with them and they
provide an acct exec for people with more that $50k so that you
have someone to talk to if there are any issues with your acct.
\_ I use both scottrade and ameritrade (datek was bought out).
advantages of scottrade:
* lower commission for market trades
* low key branch offices where you can deal with real people
if the need arises (mine have 3 persons there), and you can
call them instead of some anonymous call center.
advantages of ameritrade:
* lower commission for limit trades
* shorting works (shorting at scottrade always results in
a message saying "please call your branch office",
and sometimes they can't get the shares I want even
when I call them.
* extended hours trading |
| 3/15 |