6/13    NSA NSA NSA!!!
        http://www.businessinsider.com/nsa-prism-keywords-for-domestic-spying-2013-6
        \_ I am shocked, *SHOCKED* that the NSA spies on foreign and US
           citizens and foreign governments. This Snowden guy must have
           been born yesterday to think he is revealing anything of import.
           \_ Most people seem to have been surprised by this.
              \_ Most people are idiots, but in general the attitude of
                 the general public seems to be indifference.
                 \_ http://tinyurl.com/nsa-obama-poll
                    "It is clear that revelations about NSA surveillance
                     programs have damaged Obama's standing with the public"

9/3     Bad news for global warming problem:
        'BP Makes "Giant" Oil Find in Gulf of Mexico'
        http://www.csua.org/u/ozl (finance.yahoo.com)
        \_ The US produces over 8 million barrels a day now.  This find
           "could contain over 1 billion barrels," and "it could be the
           second half of the next decade before the find is producing."
           Peak oil isn't about running out of oil--it's about taking too
           long to bring new production online to be able to meet the
           demand curve.  -tom
           \_ I see.  Then maybe it's not that bad of a news for global warming
              problem.  -- OP
              \_ The really bad thing for global warming is when conventional
                 oil fields decline enough to make heavy crude and oil sand
                 production economically feasible.  That won't save us from
                 peak oil, but it will dump a whole bunch of extra greenhouse
                 gas into the atmosphere.  -tom
                 \_ Coal. We have lots of it and it is cheap. That is what
                    we should be worried about.
                    \_ Yes, coal-to-gas has similar (worse) issues.  -tom
        \_ just stop the gulf stream, instant ice age.

11/12   http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7650415.stm
        lulz, Pirates have spokesmen now?
        \_ we should Bailout the pirates

11/12   http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7650415.stm
        lol, Pirates have spokesmen now?
        \_ everyone has spokesmen.
        \_ http://marketplace.publicradio.org/segments/working/pirate.html
           paints a different picture of piracy.

1/7     'Iranian boats "provoke" US Navy ships in Hormuz: CNN'
        http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080107/ts_nm/usa_iran_ship_dc
        \_ Why is 'provoke' in quotes?  You don't think their actions were a
           provocation?
           \_ If Iranian battle ships are sailing as clost to our
              border as we are, you bet we'll provoke them as well, haha.
              Now go back to work.
              \_ 12 miles, kids.  It's the law.  International law.  Outside
                 12 miles you're in international waters and free to float.
           \_ I just copied the title verbatim from the web page.  -- OP

10/5    http://tinyurl.com/2aahwq (pensacola news journal)
        "Police have said he arrived at the airport carrying a Dora the
         Explorer doll, hoop earrings and a jar of petroleum jelly."
        \_ I really, really didn't need to read this.
        \_ He has no regard to the girl's health.  He should've brought KY
           jelly instead of petroleum jelly.
                \_ Obviously he wasn't planning to use condoms ... What an
                   asshole.

11/02   Just FYI, here's the Heritage Foundation's study about who military
        recruits are.
        http://www.heritage.org/Press/Commentary/ed112905a.cfm
        \_ I like how they're "better educated than the national average"
           Given that being a member of the armed forces has standards at all
           and being a member of the country doesn't... why is this at all an
           interesting result?

10/7    I've been watching HBO's Rome series (about 80% historically accurate,
        20% gratuitous), so this Robert Harris NYT OpEd piece struck home:
        http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html

3/27    "Polar melting could raise sea levels six meters by 2100: study"
        http://csua.org/u/fc9 (Yahoo! News)
        \_ That's sooo last week!  (was in friday's SF Comical)
        \_ Well, before that happens, the Gulf Stream will stop or even
           reverse because of decreased salinity fucking with the convection
           currents in the Atlantic.  Goodbye, habitable Europe...
           \_ that would be neat.

2/2     For those interested in the http://latimes.com "about 10% [of oil imports are
        from the Middle East]" vs. the doe.gov link, according to this other
        doe.gov link from the the http://factcheck.org URL, it's very likely that the
        L.A. Times reporter should have written "about 10% of domestic oil
        consumption depends on imports from countries from the Middle East",
        as someone else wrote.
        http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/mer/pdf/pages/sec1_15.pdf
        The math works out about right with the "60.0%" net imports of
        petroleum figure from the above PDF.  I don't want to go through the
        math because the ~ 22% number from yesterday was crude oil, while
        the PDF is for petroleum (crude oil + refined petroleum + whatever)
        and the 60.0% is for net imports (includes U.S. exports I suppose).
        Are you asleep yet?

12/12   http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1920074,00.html
        "Israel's armed forces have been ordered by Ariel Sharon ... to be
        ready by the end of March for possible strikes on secret uranium
        enrichment sites in Iran, military sources have revealed. ...
        Since Israel destroyed the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq in 1981,
        'it has been understood that the lesson is, don't have one site, have
        50 sites', a White House source said. ...
        'If we opt for the military strike,' said a source, 'it must be not
        less than 100% successful. It will resemble the destruction of the
        Egyptian air force in three hours in June 1967.'"
        \_ An Israeli air force attack is the one thing that won't happen.
        \_ "We'll nuke you if we have to!"
        \_ They should annex some land while they're at it. That worked out
           real well for them last time.
           \_ You do realize why they did that and why it has, in fact,
              worked out well? Oh wait. This is motd. Nevermind.
              \_ Gaza worked out well???
                 \_ Do you realize *why* Israel annexed Gaza?

10/20   Partial transcript of Powell's number one while Powell was Sec State
        http://news.ft.com/cms/s/c925a686-40f4-11da-b3f9-00000e2511c8.html
        "Under Secretary of Defense Douglas [inaudible], whom most of you
        probably know Tommy Franks said was the stupidest blankety blank man in
        the world. He was. Let me testify to that. He was. Seldom in my life
        have I met a dumber man."
        \_ This guy? http://www.defenselink.mil/bios/feith_bio.html

10/6   Bush:  "The militants believe that controlling one country will rally
       the Muslim masses, enabling them to overthrow all moderate governments
       in the region, and establish a radical Islamic empire that spans from
       Spain to Indonesia." Replace a few words and you get the original
       Bush/neocon plan for spreading democracy in the Middle East. Neat trick!
        \_ Have you ever heard of the psychological term "projection"?
           90% of what comes out of that guys mouth is explained by it.
        \_ He and his gang of cronies may be a bunch of lying, incompetent
           fuckwits, but you need to seriously consider looking up the term
           "empire".  Or maybe that's one of your few words... -John

6/21    World's first solar sail in jeapardy: http://csua.org/u/cge
        \_ Does it say anything about the reliability of Russia's ballistic
           missile?  Or is that an outdated missile model no longer used by the
           military?

4/23    This country is the biggest threat to world peace. Anything else pales
        in comparison. Shut the fuck up.
        \_ Agreed, let's vote him out!!
        \_ You fool!  Don't you know this country could destabilize the middle
           east for years to come?!
           \_ you mean destabilize it enough that terrorist wouuld come
            over to the US and fly planes into our buildings? already happened
            \_ Why do you hate America?

12/9    Bush continues to win "hearts and minds" in the Middle East"
        http://www.csua.org/u/57q
        \_ yeah. Afghan is in the Middle East.  They are Arabs too...
           besides, Muslim == Arabs == terrorist.  With such strong
           conviction, we will prevail.
        \_ "... if noncombatants surround themselves with thousands of
           weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition and howitzers
           and mortars in a compound known to be used by a terrorist we
           are not completely responsible for the consequences."
           If I read this right, I think the Army is saying:" those kids
           are playing around with these ammo, thus, they deserved it."
           \_ Uhm, no.  More like, "It's not our fault."
              \_ Didn't work for the FBI at Ruby Ridge either.

10/29   Here it is.  Dean in '04.  No one cares about anything but the royal
        mess we're making out the Middle East:
        http://csua.org/u/4ue
        \_ Dream on.  It's about the economy, stupid.
           \_ Hey, you know what?  Fuck you.
              I feel so much better now.  Thanks.
           \_ Yeah, it is: "And despite a quicker pace of recovery, 41,000
              jobs were lost in the third quarter to bring the number of jobs
              lost since President Bush took office to 2.6 million."
              (Reuters)

8/26    http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD55603
        \_ This has got to be some kind of joke.

3/28    News of Foreign Sources:
        * Morale of US troops start to budge.  Troops start to avoid
          certain color  of candies as believed they bring bad luck
        * Some units of US troops' rations are reduced due to supply
          issue
        * 8 civilian death 33 injured in latest US bomb raid
        \_ Rather than posting from "Foreign Sources", how about you state
           where you got each bit of news, with a URL if it was from the
           web?  Anyone can make shit up and post it on the motd.  Also, I
           know anti-American propaganda and American defeatism isn't the
           only thing "Foreign Sources" are publishing yet I note that's the
           only thing you are posting.  Sources would increase credibility.
        \_ Keep this up. Some (but by no means all) of this I haven't
           heard about, particularly after Al-Jazeera got shut down.
           Even the Guardian has been curiously monotonous about its
           coverage. -- ulysses
        \_ they will bring the 70,000 sunni kurds from the north.
        \_ Those damn green M&Ms.  Gonna get laid? In this desert? Lying
           sacks of sugar.
                \_ That's funny.  The army here ride these 40 year old 3-gear
                   monsters that weigh a ton.  Says something about how well
                   they built them that they're still in use.  -John
        \_ Did they report about those 40,000 gorillas from Brazil that
           Hitler is training to storm the Maginot Line, or the Gulf War
           Virus?
        \_ I hope the military equipped the soldiers with Linux.
           \_ I think you're joking but all of that equipment will need
              some sort of rudimentary operating system. Most of it is
              probably Wind River stuff but just imagine an army powered
              by M$ equipment....wait some recent news is starting to make
              sense...
              \_ "Windows: Famous for stranding billion-dollar battleships at
                 sea."  http://csua.org/u/bdc
           \_ They will all ride bike.
              \_ http://www.militarybikes.com/military.html
                 \_ That's funny.  The army here ride these 40 year old
                    3-gear monsters that weigh a ton.  Says something
                    about how well they built them that they're still
                    in use.  -John
                    \_ Maybe they just can't afford new ones?  Example, "It
                       says something about the T-55 that it's still in use".
                    \_ The paratroopers aren't as good as the old
                       American and British bikes (I used to have
                       a 35 yr old Raleigh) but they are still
                       better than what passes for a "rugged" mtb
                       these days.
        \_ Yes, keep posting.  We want to know.

3/21    We've taken the first step towards the extermination of the muslim
        race from the middle east.  Bravo!  This will make the middle east
        safe for the Israeli settlements.  And more room for expansion!
        \_ Hi trollboy.  Extermination?  *laugh* Uhm, got a url?  Oh, I know,
           you think the news reports of tanks driving across empty terrain
           are all faked out in Nevada.  Do you think they're using the same
           sets they used to fake the moon landings too?  Is your Earth still
           flat?  Oh yeah, obKillTheJews!

2/2     I'm about to buy a magazine subscription. I'm trying to decide
        between: Harpers, The New Yorker, Harper's Bazaar, Vanity Fair,
        and The Economist. Any opinions/suggestions?
        \_ Sign your post. This was one of the better motd threads!
        \_ liberal!
           \_ hm... more of an indictment than a suggestion. But thanks! -op
           \_ The Economist is pretty damned conservative. They are totally
              in favor of bombing Iraq, w/ or w/o the UN.
         \_The Economist seems like somewhat of an odd duck in that selection.
            \_ you mean it doesn't suck? yeah, i agree.
        \_ Quite amusing. I used to subcribe to three of those (Harpers,
           The New Yorker, and The Economist). It really depends on what
           you're into.
           1) The New Yorker -- nowhere near as good as in Tina Brown's
               days, but stil worth reading for (a) the cartoons and
               (b) Seymour Hersch' occasional exposes.
               \_ I can't speak for current New Yorker, but Tina Brown era
                  was, relatively speaking, pretty bad.  Brown sold issues
                  because she was good at hyping the magazine, but not much
                  else.
           2) Harper's -- give you nice warm fuzzies if you're a
               midwestern small college, Madison Wisconsin-educated,
               Prairie Home Companion-listening type. The articles
               tend to be good, if a bit self-righteous, plus you get
               to read Lewis Lapham's monthly whinings.
           3) The Economist -- I've been a subscriber to this since I was
               seventeen. I joke that it's an excellent British humour
               magazine. Still, it has good international reporting,
               plus has in-depth analyses of a specific country or
               business or trend every few weeks. An excellent way of
               knowing what's going on in the rest of the world, especially
               if you tend to feel your intelligence insulted by
               Time or Newsweek or the like.
               \_ Agreed.  I used to read it exclusively for the news and
                  ignored the bits about business and the economy.  Its
                  politics are refreshingly obvious, which makes them
                  easy to ignore. --erikred
           If you want more details, email me -coganman
        \_ I subscribe to the same three as coganman, but I am letting
           my New Yorker subscription lapse, as half of it is about the
           New York art scene, which I am not interested in. The other
           half has some gems, but not worth wading through, imho. Harpers
_
           is consistently good, comes once a month and can be read in one
           sitting. The Economist is always well written, but often about
           quite esoteric subjects: how interested are you in the exchange
           rate of the Ringgit, for example, which they seem to write about
           every week. The Economist comes weekly and is quite dense, expect
           to spend 3-4 hr/wk reading it. It is also relatively quite expensive.
           You should add Atlantic Monthly to your list, btw. -ausman
           \_ the new yorker has had some really interesting
              middle east and afghanistan articles lately
           \_ I second the Atlantic Monthly recommendation and recommend
              checking out their website once in a while.
           \_ this has proven to be quite a hard decision. yes, I was
              considering adding Atlantic Monthly to my list as well. I
              am currently living in NYC... so the half of the New Yorker
              about arts in  the city would actually be interesting to me.
              \- the economist before anything else. then the NYker.
                 i like the NYRevBooks too. buy the Atlantic if they have a
                 long article you are interested in. atlantic is pretty cheep.
                 forget the rest. do you have time to read 3mags/wk? --psb
                 \_ I read NY Review of Books online...
        \_ Economist is not as good as it used to be.  There used to be
           more writings about the Ringgit, but now it is more and more
           like Time magazine, with a US-centric view of the world.
           The magazine feels more and more dominated by Yankee editors.
           It's not that they are necessarily wrong, it's just that I might as
           well watch CNN for that.  Still I would take Economist over the other
           two, since I fall asleep reading the other two.
                \- well i agree the e'ist has slacked off a little. however
                   if you want general purpose weekly where the science
                   writing that doesnt have to remind you the nucleus consist
                   of protons and neutrons, pick the e'ist. if you want to
                   not only read an article about the asian currency crisis
                   talking about the USD-ringgit exchange rate, but you want
                   to read an article 5 years later about "new acdemic inter-
                   preations of the asian meltdown", again this is soemthing
                   the economist "economics focus" will write on, but others
                   will not. TIME is written for 8th graders and the e'ist
                      average 8th graders and colleg students, which is
                      minute.  If you read e'ist for a while and have
                   for people who went to college. --psb
                      analysis over time, you will find it at the same level
                      as Larry King Live or 60 Minutes.  It is the same kind
                      packaged to different education background.  You might
                      have information there you do not find mentioned on the
                      rest of the stuff that you read, but if you belive what
                   \_ Yes the difference in the level of actual intelligence
                      subscribe to USA Today only.  It does not cost that much.
                      between e'ist and time is similar to that between
                      average 8th graders and average college students, which
                      is minute.  If you read e'ist for a while and have
                      the attention span or concentration to compare their
                      analysis over time, or if you examine their article on
                      subjects you are familiar with, you will rank it the same
                      as Larry King Live or 60 Minutes.  It is the same kind of
                      stuff packaged to different education backgrounds.  You
                      will have information there not covered on the other
                      things that you might read, but if you belive what
                      you read based on where it is printed, you might as well
                      subscribe to USA Today only.  It has more weight/buck.
                      \- it's not a matter of beliving it all. the relevance
                         is as follows. 1. the articles are shorter because
                         the dont have to include details like "iraq, a country
                         in the middle east, ...". 2. often they indirectly
                         allude to stuff that will give you an extra level
                         of understanding if you are familar with an academic
                         approach to the topic. for examples the terrorist
                         and the time bomb is kind of a classic from philosophy
                         classes. if you are not familar with that, you get
                         some appreciation of the issues taking it at face
                         value. if you are familiar with the "trolly problem"
                         discussion, you get some bonus material. 3. they have
                         have some funny and semi obscure jokes that are fun,
                         like the article "ave atque vale" some issues back.
                         4. in terms of subject material, there is some stuff
                         that will be of interest to the educated classes which
                         you will NOT see on 60min or L. KING. bright people
                         who are not economists will not read econometrica
                         or other professional econ journals or working papers
                         but they may be interested now and then on interesting
                         reasearch developments on say refinements to the
                         neoclassical growth model, post solow, or to say
                         a new theory about NAIRU ... obviously if you dont
                         know what NAIRU is, like most TIME readers, this will
                         be of limited interest. 5. the e'ist typically has
                         better graphs, charts etc than other people because
                         the can opt to choose more complicated graphs ...
                         probably not an option for usa today because usa
                         today readers would probably confused by a
                         thermometer that read both degF and degC. --psb
        \_ Weekly Standard or National Review if you actually want to
           provoke thought.
           \_This comment would be funny if it weren't so sad.
                \_ Can you elaborate on your erudition or do you lack
                   the pretense?
                   \_ if you're going to use big words, you really should
                      figure out what they mean first.  -tom
                      \_ Fascinating how every time I see criticisms of WS or NR
                         they are ad hominem.
        \_ 1. The Economist 2. Nation 3. Atlantic Monthly.
           Honorable Mention: Harpers, Foreign Affairs

7/6     Tuskegee Airmen leader Davis dies
        http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/711661/posts

i disagree with you.
\_ Indeed.

4/3     pointless middle east politiking removed - funny stuff retained:
        \_ Uh yeah, whatever.  Maybe we should gather at Sproul and have a
           rally or a sit-in for peace and send good vibes around the world.
           Hey, are you 420?  Let's get together!

10/14   You know what, there is some MOTD in the Middle East somewhere,
        where they are saying the exact same things, but about the USA.
        \_ I doubt it. "some MOTD" = message board / chat