6/24    Hmm, even Christians over there are doing "honor killing".
        http://www.kurdmedia.com/news.asp?id=7133

6/24    Someone was asking for attribution for this quote:
        "the West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values
        or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized
        violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."
        This is from Samuel P. Huntington, a political scientist:
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_P._Huntington
        \- The explosion with Serge Lang [occasional UCB Math] was kind of
           funny. It ocurred about when Kenneth Waltz [fmr UCB Political Sci.]
           was the President of the American Political Science Assn. There
           are definitely some social scientists who got carried away with
           things like game theory or chaos theory, including pretty prominent
           people. Waltz is a great prof, and this controversy put him in an
           awkward situation. BTW, for an well-thought out and not super
           difficult or specialized theory of the sources of inter-state
           conflict see Waltz59: Man, the State, and War. It disagrees with
           ideas such as "dominating source of conflict will be cultural"
           from Huntington.

6/24    $8.8B in Food For Oil money missing:
        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1427771/posts
        \_ It is not controversial unless the UN steals it.

6/24    Well, we wouldn't want our documentary to come to any conclusions
        we don't like....
        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1429939/posts
        \_ don't you just hate it when documentary producers go in with
           an agenda of supressing the African lion's evil, man-eating,
           eco-system destroying predatory aspects?  Such bias.

6/24    a comment on Eminent Domain.  This is what is happening in beijing
        every day. a lot of Beijing denizens' properties are being seized
        give out to developers for the sake of city revitalization, etc.
        \_ That's ok, China is seen by the world in a more favorable light
           than the states.
           \_ "Less worse".  -John
        \_ China destroys cities to build the greatest Dam and hydro generator
           in the world for the benefit of 10 million men. The State destroys
           houses to build the greatest building in the United States for the
           benefit of 100 million Americans-- Walmart
           \_ Then Walmart is more cost-effective than China.

6/24    Media watchdog group hassled by police:
        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1316683/posts

6/24    Has anyone else had experience with FedEx's relatively new "Ground"
        service?  I ordered a brand new dual G5 from Apple which just vanished
        into thin air after leaving a Sacramento facility the evening before
        it was supposed to arrive.  So far FedEx Ground seems to have no idea
        what happened to it, and all they do when I call customer service is
        tell me they are putting a "tracer" on it and that they will "call
        back" (which never actually happens).  Anyone have a clue what my
        recourse is here?  Basically I'm out $2400 and my computer has vanished
        into thin air.  I've heard that FedEx Ground's claim process takes
        4-6 *weeks*.  --lye
        \_ Bug fedex every single day. Document each time/day and response
           you get. Printout and also save all
           screenshots/webpages of apple and fedex pages.
           Contact/inform both fedex and apple. If no results in
           reasonable time, also consider cancelling charges on
           your credit card after consulting/informing apple.
           Fuck that 4-6 weeks, give them 4-6 days.
        \_ Call your credit card company (I assume you used a credit card) NOW
           and reject the charge.  The consumer is always right.
        \_ In this situation, you're not FedEx's customer -- you're Apple's
           customer.  Apple is FedEx's customer; let Apple deal with FedEx.
           You shouldn't be the one filing a claim with FedEx because you
           didn't ship that package.  Call Apple, tell them you didn't
           receive your computer, point out that the company they contracted
           with to deliver it to you seems to have misplaced it, and suggest
           that Apple try it again (perhaps with a different shipper).
           If Apple wants to delay shipping a replacement system while they
           wait for FedEx's investigation, then insist that they refund your
           money until either the original system is found or a new one is
           shipped to replace the lost shipment.
        \_ I shipped something for my mom via fedex ground last week and
           it arrived w/o any problems. Given you situation, I agree w/
           the other suggestions. BTW, any reason you picked ground shipping
           for a g5 vs the other shipping options (apple has given me free
           non-ground shipping on all my orders, including for my g5)?
           \_ Apple did not say it was shipping ground.  The "free shipping"
              option simply said "FedEx," as far as I can recall.  The other
              choice was "expedited," but since I was adding memory and a hard
              drive along with other things (thus delaying the ship time), that
              seemed unnecessary.  Since today is Monday, I'm trying to get the
              ball rolling on the above suggestions.  I will let you all know
              how it goes. --lye
              \_ It gets worse.  Apparently since this computer was purchased
                 through the employee purchase program (long story), the Apple
                 store customer service people won't even talk to me.
                 Meanwhile, FedEx has absolutely no clue where the package went,
                 although they have a "trace agent" in Pittsburgh "looking into"
                 it.  According to him, if the package was put on the wrong
                 truck it could literally be on its way to anywhere.  Fuck
                 FedEx Ground - they have permanently lost my business.
                 Meanwhile, any idea what I should do with Apple?  Oddly enough
                 I *was* able to deal with an EPP support guy on Friday, but
                 now that route is apparently closed to me. --lye
                 \_ Keep on Fedex, call your CC company to cancel, and call
                    Apple again but start from scratch since you hit a dead
                    end.  Don't tell them it was EPP unless there's a specific
                    EPP complaint group you can talk to.  I understand why
                    you're upset with Fedex, IMO you should be just as upset
                    with Apple and crawl all over them.  They're the ones who
                    have your money but didn't deliver your product.  Fedex is
                    just some middleman and not as important IMO.
                    \_ Well, I started from scratch with Apple and yelled a
                       lot, which seemed to get me further.  They have now
                       opened their own investigation into the matter, and
                       say that they should be contacting me within 3 days.
                       As soon as they consider the shipment lost, they will
                       overnight me a replacement.  We shall see where things
                       go for now.  In the meantime, I would urge anyone
                       shipping via ground to avoid FedEx ground.  Their
                       overnight service seems outstanding, but apparently the
                       ground service was originally a company called "RPS"
                       that FedEx bought and rebranded.  I've looked around
                       and talked to people about them and have heard many
                       horror stories like this, all involving mysteriously
                       vanishing shipments.
                       \_ Similarly, "FedEx Kinko's" is Kinko's, not FedEx.
                          Today I got to hear a FedEx person rant about how
                          much time she spends tracking down the packages
                          that Kinko's loses.