Teaching is like carpentry. Most people can figure out how to use a hammer, saw, nails and some planks to make a useable chair. Making a Windsor chair is a different thing. Or, a more slashdottian example: most people can learn how to make a "Hello world" by reading a book, but it takes a bit more to write kernel modules for Linux.
Technology probably (not scientifically proven yet) has quite a bit to offer in the field of teaching, but its not a replacement for teachers. If you want to know what works (scientifically proven) , try John Hatties metastudy of metastudies, "Visible Learning". He shows that feedback and more importantly, feed forward and feed up, are key elements of improving learning in the classroom.
Nope. The greatest threat to personal liberty in the US comes from the military-industrial complex you have let fester and the paranoia that seems to be the basic state of many americans. Personal liberty is only encroached upon by government if there is a demand for it from its citizens to give them "security". Just like with the bomber gap and the missile gap you quickly closed the terror gap when the citizens screamed. And hey, "security" has a price.
Morally there is very little difference between terrorists killing people they disagree with using IED:s and rifles and the US using drones to do the same.
Nope. The US problem is that you have built all your cities for cars instead of for people. Rural areas are about the same in any western country, you will need a car for some things. I live in Sweden and in the countryside most people need cars to get around as well. Our cities however are built for people, with sidewalks, bicycle lanes and decent public transport.
Having a car engine designed for gas mileage instead of as a penis extension also helps a lot with gas costs. I was in the US last summer and drove around the south with my brother. The car was a small, normal car but it used at least 1.1 litre of gas per 10 km. A comparable car in Europe uses something like 0,6-0,7 litres per 10 km. Plenty of cars are avilable over here that use 0,4-0,5 litres per 10 km, and no, they arent just Priuses.
All this hand-wringing about fracking is a mirage from the looney anti-fossil-fuel greens. There have never been any proven detrimental impacts from fracking when done with modern techniques. Fracking, our golden chance for energy independence, is being attacked as if these dangers were proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, as opposed to lacking a shred of hard evidence behind them.
If the greens succeed in killing this opportunity to end our dependence on foreign oil, I hope they will be proud the next time we go to war to defend our oil lifeline.
...except for seismic events when faults slip due to increased lubrication, contamination of groundwater and increased hydrocarbon emissions from the fracking sites. But I guess you can hand out disposable dust masks and BRITA water filters. Problem solved ?
Sweden is more likely to follow the rules of EU commissions.
Exactly. As for what hes accused of, think of it this way : Having protected casual sex is not such a big thing. Having casual sex without a condom is. The fact that Assange is the kind of guy that would run and hide in an Ecuadorian embassy is why Interpol are involved in the first place. Assange has put pride in the fact that he has no fixed address and that he is "on the run", that in itself would make any prosecutor in any country reach for an international warrant.
"And remember: Evil will always prevail, because Good is dumb." -- Spaceballs