Comment You know... (Score 1) 451
There is a Facebook that works well for the 99% and the remaining 1% as well, its called Facebook. If they don't like Facebook there are other existing options.
There is a Facebook that works well for the 99% and the remaining 1% as well, its called Facebook. If they don't like Facebook there are other existing options.
The Russians got off easy when it came to the Soviet Union compared to others. Russia dominated 14 other countries to create the Soviet Union. How many of them stayed when they had the chance to leave? How many of their citizens share the view of the Russians?
Also I knew a Russian back in college, good friend, he definitely was not a fan, his whole family risked their lives to escape.
I wouldn't call it just the western view, from what I've seen it was the view of many in the countries that Russia took over to form the Soviet Union.
How many of those countries wanted to stay in the Soviet Union, to my knowledge none, that is why Russia is Russia today, and not the Soviet Union as those other countries that were forced in left when Russia fell on hard times.
Communists act the part while the movement is happening, but when they take over they are anything but.
Once they have control those in power move to maintain control, in two separate countries (china and the soviet union) these governments caused the largest amount of peace time deaths in the history of nations, then it happened again and again. Under Stalin and Mao you will find several instances of this. They let their own people starve to death either in an effort to control them or through lack of caring. This and other brutal measures are what was required to keep said government in power. Ironically they never even met the stated goals of Communism after decades of "trying".
Oh? Interesting, I'm in that bottom 2/3's, at least twice a year I am able to schedule appointments with my senator and representative (both Democrat and Republican, and on the national as well as state levels) and have a conversation with them about what is happening, where I, a voting member of the populace stand in regards to what the politician has done and why, what my concerns are and such, as well as where we are going in the future. Some of these meetings have gone for hours. On in particular, my current Senator from what most would consider the "other" party is in the habit of scheduling an afternoon off for these meetings. They think its refreshing to hear views and concerns from an opposing viewpoint that does their research rather than spout off with popular one liners as many people in both parties love to do.
Every time I have done this I have treated them with respect, and they have returned the favor, even if we vehimitly disagree on pretty much everything.
You would also be surprised as to how much research on pretty much everything I do for these meetings, I am always the better prepared.
To say that because I'm not rich I have no representation is ridiculous, I have seen first hand that this is NOT true.
I've been to my state capital for these, and one of these days I intend to make it to Washington DC for a meeting or two. Who knows, I may get a tour out of it...
Try it. Do your research, be respectful not argumentative, don't be afraid to ask the tough questions and have several examples ready rather then just hearsay and opinion, take notes, rinse, repeat.
If more people did this it would be better for everyone.
You say same percentage, I say same relative impact to standard of living.
Fair means different things to different people.
Be careful with that argument as well, its as ambiguous as what I was responding to earlier with the line "Define Fair Share."
I could easily take what you just said to mean that if I get a raise that taxes should go up to include all of my new income... After all, a raise has the effect of increasing my standard of living, which would be an impact...
I'm about 90% sure that that is not what you meant, however it could easily be interpreted that way.
...It's our patriotic duty to make sure they pay their fair share for this country...
Define fair share.
To some people that means they need to pay a higher percentage.
To others that means they need to pay the same percentage.
The two political parties aren't exactly the same. You have the bad one and then worse one. Depending on your point of view which is which can vary...
Unless of course your a hack for one party or the other, in which case you believe your party can do no wrong and the other is the most evil entity that has ever existed...
From what I'm reading we are very close in principle.
As I said in my last post, in the world today there is no reasonable way to meet said principle.
Also I would also extend the doing it yourself to any plant life you consume. Just my opinion, but I think you can't have one without the other without being, as you say, a hypocrite.
You are missing the entire point and going off on your own tangent.
Am I?
I made no assertions about current levels of healthcare or whether or not poor people are, in fact, currently dying in the street today. That is all you. My statements were hypothetical, note the important little word "if" in there a few times.
the premise I actually put forward is simple:
OK...
IF you are not ok with giving poor people health care, ONLY if you do not have to see them die in the street, that is EQUAL TO being ok with eating meat but NOT being ok with killing animals, in terms of cowardice and hypocrisy.
And to this I simply suggested you use a less political comparison. Health Care is a hotly debated issue in my country today and people have strong feelings on both sides. There are those that will take your hypothetical metaphor as a direct link.
No argument here.
If you eat meat now, but would not eat meat if you had to kill it yourself, you should not eat meat now because someone else does the killing for you.
In principle I have no problem with this statement either. There was a time in our past where pretty much everything a family group/clan ate they killed/picked/harvested themselves. Unfortunately in the modern day world today it simply isn't feasible.
If it came down to it and it was a choice of me surviving or that animal over there, well sorry animal.
If you don't know if you would kill for meat, you should probably figure that out. It might, at the least, change how much meat you eat.
I have been camping where we brought no food, we fished for everything we ate. We ate well. As I mentioned above, if it comes to it, I have no problem with it.
exactly similar would be IF... IF... IF.... you were willing to say no one should get health care they cannot pay for, but were unwilling to stick to that principle when faced with a dying kid. You'd be a monster, IMHO, if you did stick to your guns in that case, but you would not be a coward or a hypocrite. If you can imagine that you would not be able to stick to those guns, then it would be important to recognize that you do, in fact, believe that people should get health care even if they can't afford it. How, why, how much, when, none of those questions apply to my HYPOTHETICAL statement.
If you look at my original reply to your first message that I replied to I simply said that using something other than a sometimes fiercely debated political issue as an example, one that many people reading will assume you have a specific political viewpoint on a topic other that what is currently being debated.
As far as the meat, and as I posted already, I struggle with this already myself, as I'm not sure I would eat as much meat as I do now.. or at all... if I had to face the killing of it myself directly. I haven't had the courage to face this concern of mine as of yet. I just don't rationalize my cowardice, or my hypocrisy. At least, not as successfully as some others in this thread.
It depends for me, if it comes down to it I know I would do it for survival. However I simply don't see something like this happening in the modern day world. Where would we put the animals, and for that matter plants in a city environment today...
Long story short, I agree with you in principle, however I don't see it being feasible in the modern day world, and, as I said in my initial reply, I suggest using a less hot button issue than healthcare in any form to try and get your point across, even if it is only hypothetical.
I challenge you, then, to illustrate how the two things are different. If you are not ok with watching poor people die on the sidewalk walking into a hospital, but you also do not think we should give them health care, then you are just as hypocritical as someone who thinks it's ok to eat meat but that it's not ok to personally kill an animal.
the fact that your level of comfort with the two situations may be different doesn't make the situations themselves different.
Show how they are different? Thats easy, animals are a food source, the "poor" are not. The article is talking about a food source and an opinion on a certain method of obtaining meat. Are you saying we kill "poor" people for meat? These two are only the same if your answer is yes.
I would also like to point out that this same group of people have access to a measure of health insurance. Its not official, and they don't pay anything (everyone else pays for it through their insurance actually, one big reason insurance rates are so high) but its there. Hospitals are, after all, not allowed to refuse anyone for emergency service. Ironically this provides better health care to the "poor" than many universal health care systems that are in theory designed to try and help them, usually hurting the rest of the populace in the process.
Is there a better way to do cover them? I'm sure there is, however that debate has no place here when taking about personally killing animals for ones food as opposed to having some invisible third party do it.
You will notice the word poor has been in quotes every time before now, this is because many of these "poor" people apparently make more money than I do. Many of the "poor" people in this country are poor because they spend to much of their income on the wrong things.
Also before you read into the above I'm not saying that there aren't any truly poor people in this country, and I"m not doing to say that there aren't any that die on the streets alone. This, however, is also true for those countries that have this so called "universal" health care, and if you were able to find an accurate source of numbers I think you would be surprised as to how many this happens to in countries with universal health care...
Am I a hypocrite? No. As I said before, you are putting two things together here that have no relation.
Now I'm not going to talk about the poor or healthcare any more here, the article in question simply does not warrant it.
...That's like saying I'm fine with not giving poor people health care as long as I don't have to watch them die.
You had me up until you compared it to a personal political view. This is being debated enough that a comparison to a political viewpoint doesn't need to be inserted.
I am curious how many people noticed that it stated that he has largely been a vegetarian... Well this is slashdot so I'm guessing not many...
I went hunting once, killed my first and only deer. It made me feel bad inside. I also learned just what it costs to keep someone alive...
Look, I'm not into the whole "political" thing.
But it isn't "Mr." Obama; it's Mr. President or President Obama.
You could also use The President or POTUS.
Saying "Mr." Obama isn't just disrespecting him, it's disrespecting The Office of the President. It's tacky.
Its been almost 20 years since I respected the person who holds the office. The office I respect, the people who seem to make it there lately are another story.
Take a look at presidents even in this time period and you will find that various presidents respect the office to varying degrees. There is one that dresses in a suite and tie even if he has to just run by the office and pick up a piece of paperwork that he needed. He simply would not enter unless he was dressed for it. There is also one in particular that clearly shows no respect for the office.
...with abysmal graphics...
Honestly many of the best games I have ever played had no graphics or old style graphics at best. To often modern day games substitute content for beauty. In the end beauty only goes so far.
This is just an opinion and should be treated as such, odds are yours is different.
As I recall Windows NT 4.0 was independent of hardware. They had this concept they called HAL, which did all of the communication when it came to hardware. You had an alpha chip, no problem, just get a alpha HAL. I have in person seen Windows NT 4.0 running on other architectures, including alphas and apples of the day (long before they switched to intel equipment).
I'm guessing they dropped this capability with one of the newer incarnations...
"Unibus timeout fatal trap program lost sorry" - An error message printed by DEC's RSTS operating system for the PDP-11
