Date: Thu, 17 Mar 2005 23:25:01 -0800 From: "Ted Mittelstaedt" <tedm@toybox.placo.com> To: "Jerry McAllister" <jerrymc@clunix.cl.msu.edu>, "\"Marco Greene (ML)\"" <mweg@sympatico.ca> Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: RE: Stupid ASCII loader prompt Message-ID: <LOBBIFDAGNMAMLGJJCKNOEMLFAAA.tedm@toybox.placo.com> In-Reply-To: <200503171952.j2HJqXP04586@clunix.cl.msu.edu>
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> -----Original Message----- > From: owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org > [mailto:owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org]On Behalf Of Jerry > McAllister > Sent: Thursday, March 17, 2005 11:53 AM > To: "Marco Greene (ML)" > Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org > Subject: Re: Stupid ASCII loader prompt > > > Well, by now we are gleefully off topic for this list, so... > Why not! ;-) > > The USA system attempts/purports to _protect_ the minorities. This > exists because supposedly the system tries to protect everyone, not > specifically the minorities. It is only an artifact that sometimes > minorities find themselves able to use the system to influence some > outcome. They do not seize control. They wield whatever > poser/influence > they can muster, but they do not seize control. > What control exists, they do seize. Certainly, much of the actual control of the US system resides lower down in the food chain among the professional bureaucrats who survive administration after administration, regardless of who happens to be at the top. But, there still is a lot of real power at the top, and the people at the top are also able to make decisions that have implications that stretch far, far beyond their own brief period in power. As for example the decision to invade Iraq. Long after the Republicans are out of power, the US is still going to be involved there. Because by that time there will have been such a great loss of American life that even the strongest Democrat will not be able to pull out, because the hawks will claim that if he does he's throwing away everything that that large number of soldiers have given their lives for, and nobody will be able to survive that kind of criticism. As a result we will have permanent military bases there. And as a result we will have to keep going back in there year after year whenever the population there (who really does not want bases) manages to get a strong enough government in place that can threaten those bases existence. And also, Saudi Arabia wants us in there because that way we will control oil production, and thus not destroy OPEC's power. Iraq is the only country in the world that has the oil reserves large enough to destroy OPEC if they wished, and OPEC is Saudi Arabia's child. And independent Iraq with it's own government has always been a threat to OPEC and now that is gone. And because of all of this, our Energy policy has been permanently altered to be oil-based. We will never be able to return to conservation, solar, geothermal and so on. The dial has been stuck on Oil and will remain there until all oil reserves in Saudia Arabia and Iraq have been completely tapped out. And because of that, American soldiers will continue to die over there until that happens in maybe a century or so. And this is -exactly- what the ultraconservatives want. They wanted a US that is the world's policeman with an economy that supports a tremendous military-industrial complex, and that is what they got. > Next, it was not exactly a failure. The use of alcohol went down > very significantly. > We don't really have any way of knowing that because none of this stuff was tracked, as it was illegal. And you might consider too that a still isn't practical in a densely populated area, it is likely that out West where the population density was much lower, that they were far more common than anyone would believe. > Sure, each 'ultra' group contains the seeds/tools of its own > destruction. No, not true. The Amish for example are definitely an off-the-bend "ultra" group, but they have a consistent internal philosophy, and the way they apply their philosophy is non hypocritical, thus they survive. The Quakers, the super-Mormons, even the survivalists, there are many of these out-in-left-field groups that are non-hypocritical in the application end. As a result they don't carry the seeds of their own destruction. Rather, there are other reasons that they can never grow beyond a small minority. There's plenty of stuff that you can fault the ultraliberals for, (stupidity, no common sense) but hypocrisy is not one of them. That particular problem is a speciality of the ultraconservatives. > So, lets leave this topic at that. Either the > ultra-anti-beastie or ultra-pro-beastie movements will destroy > themselves. > The ultra-pro-beastie movement is defined as the status quo, so it's impossible for it to destroy itself (except perhaps by apathy) Ted
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