Article
Khadr was 15 when he was captured in Afghanistan in 2002 and imprisoned in Guantanamo. He was accused of throwing a grenade that killed American medic Sgt. First Class Christopher J. Speer.
Human rights groups argue that the Guantanamo military courts are illegal because they do not offer the same protections as U.S. courts.
Goodness !
Apparently "Human Rights Groups" = Terrorist Puppets.
their opinion seems to be "Let the terrorists shoot you , dont' shoot back. Let the Terrorists kill you , then let them go free and pat them on the back in a friendly manner"
They don't discuss such concepts as Self Defence , or I have rights too , don't I ?
Nope. The Terrorist is always right. The Beligerent Evil Satanic Inspired USA is always wrong.
Can we put these groups on the list of terrorist organizations for providing material support for terrorism ? Come on ! The guy was caught red handed lobbing a grenade at a medic , not even a soldier , and you want him off scott free ?
You're on my list of terrorist organizations , even if no one else put's you on theirs, thats for sure.
Monday, September 24, 2007
And I hate your phone too !
Article = none , personal experience
My relatives came down for the week to visit. And they showed me their cell phone. It had a camera ! Hurray !
You can't email the pictures, or side load them (hook up a wire and load them on the computer) or anything. How do you get at those pictures ?
You PAY a fee for a special company , chosen by their phone company so there's no possibility of there being any competition, to print out the picture and mail it to you. You only get YOUR pics by shelling out money.
Yeah , I hate that phone too. Definately a rip off if you ask me.
My relatives came down for the week to visit. And they showed me their cell phone. It had a camera ! Hurray !
You can't email the pictures, or side load them (hook up a wire and load them on the computer) or anything. How do you get at those pictures ?
You PAY a fee for a special company , chosen by their phone company so there's no possibility of there being any competition, to print out the picture and mail it to you. You only get YOUR pics by shelling out money.
Yeah , I hate that phone too. Definately a rip off if you ask me.
CENSORED
article = none , personal experiance
So , my aunt and uncle and other relatives came over this week. And
we drank a tonne of coffee and talked and talked and talked.
And my aunt told me all about CENSORED and CENSORED , and how she
and her CENSORED , in their younger days ? They CENSORED CENSORED
CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED . It was really sad.
Then she told me "If this makes into your blog , we're through ! "
She reads my blog , I'm so gratified to have an audience.
But it got me to thinking. I started this blog because I wanted a
place to put down my thoughts without worry of interference. It's
anonymous, and I stay away from saying anything about my work because
even without names it isn't hard to guess who said what if you know
those people personally. I figured it was safe, and I could get away
with it.
Apparently not. No one is safe from the CENSORED .
This applies to newspapers too. I've seen a few articles where they
deny it totally. They accept money in the form of advertising from
businesses , but they claim not to be influenced by this money.
When Cubic Zincronium stones, immitation diamonds first came out, I
got a thing in the mail trying to tell me a fifty dollar Zincronium
ring. I checked with the jewelry store downstairs and they told me
their price on a zincronium stone that size was like three bucks.
So I called the newspapers and reported this.
"This kind of thing happens all the time. We'd be swamped in
complaints if we bothered to publish this. " was the response I got.
"Besides, it's standard business practices. No laws are broken."
Except perhaps the laws of shame for charging fifty bucks for a
three dollar stone.
But the newspapers have decided no one wants to hear about it.
And there's the problem of the french. No one actually speaks
french in this country. They speak Quebecois, which is only spoken in
quebec, or Fringlish in vanier ottawa, or Acadia in or near
newfoundland , or a dozen other dialects. None of which are french.
None of which have text books to teach you how to speak them.
This becomes important in my younger days when I get a text book
for french (parisian french , the kind spoken in paris and the only
kind of french on the book shelves) and guess what ? I can't
understand a word these people are saying I must be so stupid ! Until
a friend of mine invites me out to dinner with his new girlfriend.
From France. And I can understand her great !
You must speak french to get into the government.
But if you come from quebec , they don't bother to test you , they
only test us stupid englishmen. On Parisian french by the way , which
is not spoken in this country. And they have inspectors that ocme
around, and ifyou don't speak quebecois ! You get booted out.
In effect , work in the federal government has become a pure make
work project for quebecer's only. No one else is permitted in.
And if you go to the news paper ,or the local radio shows ? This is
a "hot button" issue. Everyone gets all emotional about it, so any
discussion on the matter is shut down real quick , and any attempt to
get anything about it published in the paper is also refused. Anyone
who tries to start anything on the matter is quickly painted as a
racist bugger and you should ignore this guy.
I look at old newspapers sometimes, the library used to have
microfilms that went back before 1900 and sometimes I would read back
from the very beginning forward.
I wonder how much of what I read is true, how much is simply
skipped for being a hot button issue, and how much is just plain
CENSORED .
I now understand the place bloggers have cut for themselves in the
world, and why they won't go away.
My personal prejudices for not annoying members of my family, and
reluctantly passing on saying anything about the place where I work
(but I'll happily babble on about any other place) are small potatoes
against the "proffessional" reporters who have to face editers ,
editers trying not to have their advertising revenues sink into the
floor because they might annoy the businesses that actually purchase
ad's in their paper. Editers that decide they're going to try and
influence elections to favour big business because , lets face it ,
they ARE a big business and it would be idocy to let that opportunity
pass by , so every time an anti-business government gets into power
they start ragging on them mercilessly from the very beginning !
Bloggers don't do that.
Bloggers are free from such influences.
The thing about my aunt , and my sister worrying about those two
articles on CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED that I erased so I wouldn't
annoy her ? Small potatoes, an overhead people will happily pay,
because they frankly don't care about the comings and going of a small
group of people.
But they sure wanna know that that 50$ Zincronium ring is actually
only worth 3$ , even if the papers feel it isn't worthy news.
So , my aunt and uncle and other relatives came over this week. And
we drank a tonne of coffee and talked and talked and talked.
And my aunt told me all about CENSORED and CENSORED , and how she
and her CENSORED , in their younger days ? They CENSORED CENSORED
CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED . It was really sad.
Then she told me "If this makes into your blog , we're through ! "
She reads my blog , I'm so gratified to have an audience.
But it got me to thinking. I started this blog because I wanted a
place to put down my thoughts without worry of interference. It's
anonymous, and I stay away from saying anything about my work because
even without names it isn't hard to guess who said what if you know
those people personally. I figured it was safe, and I could get away
with it.
Apparently not. No one is safe from the CENSORED .
This applies to newspapers too. I've seen a few articles where they
deny it totally. They accept money in the form of advertising from
businesses , but they claim not to be influenced by this money.
When Cubic Zincronium stones, immitation diamonds first came out, I
got a thing in the mail trying to tell me a fifty dollar Zincronium
ring. I checked with the jewelry store downstairs and they told me
their price on a zincronium stone that size was like three bucks.
So I called the newspapers and reported this.
"This kind of thing happens all the time. We'd be swamped in
complaints if we bothered to publish this. " was the response I got.
"Besides, it's standard business practices. No laws are broken."
Except perhaps the laws of shame for charging fifty bucks for a
three dollar stone.
But the newspapers have decided no one wants to hear about it.
And there's the problem of the french. No one actually speaks
french in this country. They speak Quebecois, which is only spoken in
quebec, or Fringlish in vanier ottawa, or Acadia in or near
newfoundland , or a dozen other dialects. None of which are french.
None of which have text books to teach you how to speak them.
This becomes important in my younger days when I get a text book
for french (parisian french , the kind spoken in paris and the only
kind of french on the book shelves) and guess what ? I can't
understand a word these people are saying I must be so stupid ! Until
a friend of mine invites me out to dinner with his new girlfriend.
From France. And I can understand her great !
You must speak french to get into the government.
But if you come from quebec , they don't bother to test you , they
only test us stupid englishmen. On Parisian french by the way , which
is not spoken in this country. And they have inspectors that ocme
around, and ifyou don't speak quebecois ! You get booted out.
In effect , work in the federal government has become a pure make
work project for quebecer's only. No one else is permitted in.
And if you go to the news paper ,or the local radio shows ? This is
a "hot button" issue. Everyone gets all emotional about it, so any
discussion on the matter is shut down real quick , and any attempt to
get anything about it published in the paper is also refused. Anyone
who tries to start anything on the matter is quickly painted as a
racist bugger and you should ignore this guy.
I look at old newspapers sometimes, the library used to have
microfilms that went back before 1900 and sometimes I would read back
from the very beginning forward.
I wonder how much of what I read is true, how much is simply
skipped for being a hot button issue, and how much is just plain
CENSORED .
I now understand the place bloggers have cut for themselves in the
world, and why they won't go away.
My personal prejudices for not annoying members of my family, and
reluctantly passing on saying anything about the place where I work
(but I'll happily babble on about any other place) are small potatoes
against the "proffessional" reporters who have to face editers ,
editers trying not to have their advertising revenues sink into the
floor because they might annoy the businesses that actually purchase
ad's in their paper. Editers that decide they're going to try and
influence elections to favour big business because , lets face it ,
they ARE a big business and it would be idocy to let that opportunity
pass by , so every time an anti-business government gets into power
they start ragging on them mercilessly from the very beginning !
Bloggers don't do that.
Bloggers are free from such influences.
The thing about my aunt , and my sister worrying about those two
articles on CENSORED CENSORED CENSORED that I erased so I wouldn't
annoy her ? Small potatoes, an overhead people will happily pay,
because they frankly don't care about the comings and going of a small
group of people.
But they sure wanna know that that 50$ Zincronium ring is actually
only worth 3$ , even if the papers feel it isn't worthy news.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
U.S. suspends diplomatic convoys throughout Iraq
Article
And here we go with the accusations of Blackwater security corruption.
Between eight and 10 people opened fire on the convoy "from multiple nearby locations, with some aggressors dressed in civilian apparel and others in Iraqi police uniforms," according to a State Department report.
so guys dressed as civilians , and cops , tried to erase the convoy , and in typical al-queda stupidity fired a thousand rounds and maybe hit one or two actual people.
Civilian observers (how do you know they're civilians , the terrorists half of them were dressed as civilians) claim the security force killed a wack of innocent people, and so the company is banned from doing business in Iraq.
First problem is who's story do you believe. The security company or the "civilians" that might or might not be terrorists. Heck the bloody cops are shooting at these guys and it's not the first time so it's well known the police force is infiltrated.
Second problem is the law of the land. The Shari or islamic law. If a muslim accuses a non-muslim of something, the non-muslim is automatically found guilty as charged. Not because anyone believes he's guilty , but because it is believed you must put pressure on non-muslims and make them convert by making their life miserable until they give up their infidel ways.
So one terrorist can happily accuse any guards of anything and win in the local courts if you subject these people to local law.
Third problem is if you give them a blank slate to do as they please, there are corrupt individuals who WILL run around shooting people at random on the american side.
Fourth problem is that this is a war zone. People have guns to their head, and families taken hostage. You cannot hold any kind of fair trial when the opposition is hhappy to take a few hostages and generate a few witnesses to accuse you of any terrible crime they care to imagine. Some kind of independant legal system dependant on local witnesses is also a no-go.
The solution ?
Civilians have no place in a war zone , and never did. They have too many legal difficulties. They should be replaced by army troops. Period. End of story.
And here we go with the accusations of Blackwater security corruption.
Between eight and 10 people opened fire on the convoy "from multiple nearby locations, with some aggressors dressed in civilian apparel and others in Iraqi police uniforms," according to a State Department report.
so guys dressed as civilians , and cops , tried to erase the convoy , and in typical al-queda stupidity fired a thousand rounds and maybe hit one or two actual people.
Civilian observers (how do you know they're civilians , the terrorists half of them were dressed as civilians) claim the security force killed a wack of innocent people, and so the company is banned from doing business in Iraq.
First problem is who's story do you believe. The security company or the "civilians" that might or might not be terrorists. Heck the bloody cops are shooting at these guys and it's not the first time so it's well known the police force is infiltrated.
Second problem is the law of the land. The Shari or islamic law. If a muslim accuses a non-muslim of something, the non-muslim is automatically found guilty as charged. Not because anyone believes he's guilty , but because it is believed you must put pressure on non-muslims and make them convert by making their life miserable until they give up their infidel ways.
So one terrorist can happily accuse any guards of anything and win in the local courts if you subject these people to local law.
Third problem is if you give them a blank slate to do as they please, there are corrupt individuals who WILL run around shooting people at random on the american side.
Fourth problem is that this is a war zone. People have guns to their head, and families taken hostage. You cannot hold any kind of fair trial when the opposition is hhappy to take a few hostages and generate a few witnesses to accuse you of any terrible crime they care to imagine. Some kind of independant legal system dependant on local witnesses is also a no-go.
The solution ?
Civilians have no place in a war zone , and never did. They have too many legal difficulties. They should be replaced by army troops. Period. End of story.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Skype users warned against new IM worm
Fans of peer-to-peer Internet telephone system Skype have this been seen the unwanted appearance of a new computer worm attack that rears its ugly head in the form of a seemingly innocuous instant-messaging chat invitation.
It's the new way of doing business.
You run a phone company ? some upstart giving away free telephone service to pull your customers from you ?
Hire someone to write a virus.
Oh don't tell the staff of course, they'll blab to the nearest newspaper. But pull a half million out of the company in "bonus's" , no one asks what you do with your personal dough, hire a few people from the dark side of the internet under a fake name , and voila ! Your competition takes a publicity hit from being hit with a virus and hey , our equipment isn't subject to that !
It's the new business model. The new form of industrial sabatage. And it's so easy to do. Only one , maybe two people in the whole company have to know, there's no paper trail because it's his "personal" funds, and he is more than repaid when the stock goes up after the competition takes a hit.
It's like ... you're a CEO , and you know if you step down your stock price will go way up , so you quietly buy as much stock as you can , and then step down , and then sell it all the next day when the price shoots up ...
Business is a dirty dirty thing , and the internet isjust the latest opportunity for them.
I hate my phone.
Article = none , personal experiance.
It's a Samsung m610.
I had a doctors appointment on monday, and I was happily listening to the tunes I had side loaded on it (side load = download from my computer , not the internet, phone holds over a hundred mp3 music files:: edit :: phone only holds about 10 songs, I paid $45 bucks for a 1 gigabyte expansion card and with that it holds a whole wack more :: :: )
But ...the hospital has no cell phone coverage. So when I stopped the tunes, I couldn't start them again. All I got was this annoying "connecting to network" message , and it hung there. And it hung , and hung ...and I couldn't do anything with it. Not play my tunes , not play the chess game I downloaded, not even have it tell me what time it was !
If it's not connected to the network, it's totally useless !
I have to wonder how much use I'm going to get when the three years is up on my contract with it. Is it going to still play my mp3's ? Or is it simply going to hang trying to connect, and of course bell canada will say "you're not a paying customer ? Get out of here !!!!"
(edit)
there seems to be a philosophy out there by big business. We will give you all the features you could ask for ! But we will do so in the most inconvenient and annoying manner possible so as to continue to extract as much money as possible from you.
My phone is the incarnation of that philosophy , I think. It looks so good on paper, it has so many cool features on paper ... but actual use ? So many holes ...
It's a Samsung m610.
I had a doctors appointment on monday, and I was happily listening to the tunes I had side loaded on it (side load = download from my computer , not the internet, phone holds over a hundred mp3 music files:: edit :: phone only holds about 10 songs, I paid $45 bucks for a 1 gigabyte expansion card and with that it holds a whole wack more :: :: )
But ...the hospital has no cell phone coverage. So when I stopped the tunes, I couldn't start them again. All I got was this annoying "connecting to network" message , and it hung there. And it hung , and hung ...and I couldn't do anything with it. Not play my tunes , not play the chess game I downloaded, not even have it tell me what time it was !
If it's not connected to the network, it's totally useless !
I have to wonder how much use I'm going to get when the three years is up on my contract with it. Is it going to still play my mp3's ? Or is it simply going to hang trying to connect, and of course bell canada will say "you're not a paying customer ? Get out of here !!!!"
(edit)
there seems to be a philosophy out there by big business. We will give you all the features you could ask for ! But we will do so in the most inconvenient and annoying manner possible so as to continue to extract as much money as possible from you.
My phone is the incarnation of that philosophy , I think. It looks so good on paper, it has so many cool features on paper ... but actual use ? So many holes ...
China cigarette packs to get skull health warnings
Article
BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese cigarette packs will have skulls, blackened teeth or diseased lungs printed on them ...
...
And the new measures could make the problem worse, it said, quoting youth expert Zhao Cuiping as saying. "In analysis over the past decade on what young people like, they far prefer skulls and other scary images to cats or dogs," she said.
I propose a new cigarette legislation.
All cigarette packs must be pink and have cute fluffy animals on them.
lol !
I'm joking ...but really , I'm not.
Whatever works !
BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese cigarette packs will have skulls, blackened teeth or diseased lungs printed on them ...
...
And the new measures could make the problem worse, it said, quoting youth expert Zhao Cuiping as saying. "In analysis over the past decade on what young people like, they far prefer skulls and other scary images to cats or dogs," she said.
I propose a new cigarette legislation.
All cigarette packs must be pink and have cute fluffy animals on them.
lol !
I'm joking ...but really , I'm not.
Whatever works !
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Nearly 200 soldiers kept home from Afghanistan over drug use: report
Article
Nearly 200 Canadian soldiers slated for deployment to Afghanistan have been kept home because they tested positive for drug use, documents show.
So only healthy people go to war, the dopers get to say hope and dope up ?
Of those who failed, the majority tested positive for marijuana, while other tests showed harder drugs, such as cocaine, methamphetamine and amphetamines.
Quick ! Gimme a joint ! I've just been scheduled for deployment to afghanistan and need an excuse to get out of it !
lol !
This is ridiculous. Send the dope smokers to the front, don't reward them ! Send them first ! sheesh !
Nearly 200 Canadian soldiers slated for deployment to Afghanistan have been kept home because they tested positive for drug use, documents show.
So only healthy people go to war, the dopers get to say hope and dope up ?
Of those who failed, the majority tested positive for marijuana, while other tests showed harder drugs, such as cocaine, methamphetamine and amphetamines.
Quick ! Gimme a joint ! I've just been scheduled for deployment to afghanistan and need an excuse to get out of it !
lol !
This is ridiculous. Send the dope smokers to the front, don't reward them ! Send them first ! sheesh !
Monday, September 03, 2007
Can Microsoft’s open source problem be solved?
In his recent piece about how Microsoft should be afraid of open source, our own Matt Asay stumbles on a solution to the problem.
He offers this nifty Forrester chart (right) showing how software revenues have changed in the last few years, from licenses to maintenance, with services declining as well.
insert chart showing licenses and services going down fast, but maintenance revenue going up fast
All of which leads to my cunning plan.
Stop selling Microsoft software. Rent it
Rent my operating system ?
Instead of selling Windows for, say, $150, through an OEM, sell one year of it for $99. Require registration for updates, and then charge $75/year for maintenance, just like the anti-virals do.
Update what ???? What exactly do you update on an operating system that I care to spend $75 a year on ?
This fails the "would I do it ?" test (ie: I personally wouldn't even consider it). What makes you think anyone else would either ?
Now you’ve got recurring revenue, you’re actually getting more than retail (because people keep PCs for three years, not two), and you’ve got constant access to the customer’s PC in order to provide the service that customer is paying for.
Thanks for pointing out the huge security risk that some profit oriented company is poking around in my computer deciding what I can and cannot do.
Plus there’s constant customer contact and the ability to upsell. Companies like-y the upsell.
There's no upsell. Either you're dealing with 10 000 employe's who'll direct you to their manager , or you're dealing with a private individual who'll yell at you for spamming them.
So, tell me I’m crazy here.
You're crazy.
The only reason I'm still on Windows at all on even one of my machines is because of the online games. Drive too many people off of windows and onto linux, and that machine doesn't get replaced when it's three year warrenty runs out.
Oh yes, why I started this article in the first place.
Can Microsofts Open source problem be solved ?
The only problem MS has with Open Source is that it exists, and it would like to kill it quick. Unfortunately if you look back over time you see the open source movement , in particular Linux and the software that runs on linux , has only been getting larger and larger, not the reverse. People working for free, and giving away their labours for free, that's kind of inevitable. Throw in a few Microsoft Made Messes to tick people off....
No, the Open Source problem cannot be solved. Open Source in the end will likely rule the Operating System World.
Now putting proffessional games on Linux (pay to play games) , thats another matter. I think that would work just dandy. Dump windows , move to Ubuntu , keep my World of Warcraft ? Works for me.
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