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At 5/29/06 11:41 PM, KupaMan wrote: "...[A]fter the research on Carbon dating accuracy, as well as fossil deterioration, the team as well as I have reason to believe that Earth could be as young as 1.1 to 1.2 million years old"

See, there's your problem. Carbon is not used for any radiometric dating beyond approximately 50,000 years. Any "research" on it that has anything to do with millions of years is completely misguided and false.

Also, "fossil deterioration" has nothing to do with dating the age of the Earth. For the majority of the Earth's existance, there were no fossils because there were no multi-cellular organisms. Sorry, but your source is just spouting off scientific words to sound intelligent when the source is really just lying through his teeth.

I You can't mix blue and red and eventually get yellow. It doesn't work. You'd only be moving toward one solid and exact color; a perfect purple.

There's your problem, Kupa. That's not how evolution works. With evolution, you continuously mix pseudo-random colors into billions of paint blenders that are clustered in groups. Then you add more colors all the time, but favor different shades in different groups, and remove paints of certain colors over time from different areas. Eventually, your end product is completely different from your original paint.

Put simply, start with red paint. Mix in blue paint for awhile. Then mix in green paint for awhile. Then mix in yellow. Then brown. Then purple. Then green again. Then more blue. Then a bit more yellow. Then a bit more red. Now you have black. Going from red to black is like going from a fish to a human. It takes many stages that occur for different reasons at different times and push things in different directions.

At 5/31/06 03:16 PM, JadedSOB wrote: I automatically hate anyone who uses the term "Native American," the viking explored the North and Southern American continents before the indians were even settled in the new world.

Umm, Jaded, you do know there were "Indians" living on the Canadian islands where the Vikings showed up, and those same "Indians" fought with and attempted to kill said Vikings, eventually convincing the Vikings that it wasn't worth it?

At 5/30/06 04:00 AM, -metalstorm- wrote:

At 5/29/06 05:56 PM, Randall81 wrote:

At 5/29/06 05:46 PM, tru_calling wrote: He was 15 and the police are now trying to charge him with rape! What do you think? Bare in mind they are both under the legal age of 16 here in the UK!

It's only rape if she didn't consent, if she didn't consent then it's rape and they can charge. It doesn't matter if she's underaged of not.

Given the circumstances the boy would have been charged with statutory rape. You can be charged of ststutory rape regardless of wether the other party gives their consent.

It's only statuatory rape if one of the partners was above the age of consent. If both are minors, statuatory rape does not legally apply. However, you can be charged with rape regardless of the true circumstances because you can always be charged for anything.

That doesn't mean that you will be convicted of it, though, or that you can't sue the person for slander and reputation assassination. In this case, the girl is better off not trying to screw over the father.

At 5/28/06 08:06 PM, justaloser wrote: Alright if your saying that everything is planned and that we dont realy have freewill then tell me why is everything not perfect. Why are people building bombs to launch at eachother and starting wars. Is this part of the plan?

Justa, "determined" is different than "planned." Most Determinists don't require or mention any "Planner" (i.e. God) in their arguments, so Good/Evil events and other such things have no bearing at all on the feasibility or reasonability of a pre-determined Universe. They simply argue that the mechanics of the Universe necessitate a pre-determined path, which generally implies a complete lack of morality or responsibility in our Universe.

Building a bomb to kill people is no different than gathering food to help starving people in a pre-determined Universe because it isn't you doing it, it was the arrangement of two photons at the beginning of the universe.

At 5/27/06 09:57 AM, x_Toadenalin_x wrote: I do not believe free will exists, but I do not believe you need to approach is from any madcap philosophical view. You can demonstrate this with good ol' fashioned physics.

The mind, however wonderful it is, is a physical tool. It is subject to physical laws.

True, the brain is a physical thing, but you make two critical assumptions: first, that physical laws are absolutely defined, and second, that the human mind at any one moment has any validity as a model for the mind the next moment.

What reason do we have to believe that every physical law in the universe is absolutely defined? By that, I mean that many laws may be based on probabilities, not absolute certainties. For example, you may be able to predict that when you kick a ball with X force, it will travel Y distance, but the same does not seem to be true for electrons orbiting atoms. Theoretically, electrons can be an infinite distance from the nucleus at any time, so we are forced to say that "90% of the time" a certain orbital is correct, and ignore the other 10% as statistically insignificant.

Thus, based on modern scientific research, we can not conclude that complete knowledge of a situation will allow a perfect prediction. Quantum Mechanics in particular suggests that the underlying laws of our universe may actually be variable and probabilistic.

Even if we assume that the laws of the universe are absolute, using an infinite amount of time to compute the interactions occurring within a human brain at any instant will not predict the actions of that person. The human mind is not a static object; the very next instant, it changes. Every photon that hits our eyes, every sound wave that touches our ears, every neuron pulse inside our brains changes our minds, changes who we are and what we will decide. Any predicton you make in any instant must be rewritten the next.

And that's ignoring the greatest problem of all with any prediction you could make about the human mind: since the mind is, itself, an electro-chemical prediction engine, which means at heart it can be represented as a complex series of mathematical algorithms. To predict the results of any prediction engine with absolutely accuracy, you must have an exact model of that prediction engine. Or, in other words, you must have the mind itself, or a perfect equivalent to make any predictions. This means that the "perfect prediction engine" that would disprove Free Will is itself entirely reliant on and controlled by every individual. It can only predict after the fact because the events it seeks to predict are happening within it.

To summarize this all very simply:
1. The Universe isn't set in stone, so neither are our futures.

3. Since the hypothetical "universe predicting machine" would contain every bit of detail included in the real universe, it becomes nothing more than an observer, viewing a "clone" of the universe dialed forward a couple seconds in time.

WWIII? HA! Just look at the casualty statistics:

World War 1: 11,000,000 people dead
World War 2: 59,000,000 people dead
War in Iraq : 40,000 people dead

59 million is a tad larger than 40 thousand. The War in Iraq, and even the War on Terror, are not World War Three. Hell, the actual "war" part of the War in Iraq was over in 3 weeks. It's the Occupation of Iraq which is long, expensive, and causing problems.

Free will absolutely exists. Why? Because free will is not making absolutely random decisions, it is making your own choices. Free will exists regardless of whether or not Decision A was entirely and completely predictable according to Mechanism B, as long as Mechanism B is you. That is free will.

Many pro-determinism people make the mistake of assuming free will means "random element." That is completely and utterly false, because a universe in which human decisions are controlled by a random element is one where there is no free will. Even if a true random number generator is making the decisions, that's not you making it! Free will exists because true randomness does not exist within us, and it is we who make decisions-- not that tree over there, not your long-dead mother, not that bruise on your leg.

So long as the decision to do something occurs within a human body, and according to the command elements of that body (i.e. not a computer taking over your brain), then Free Will exists.

The use of the .50 caliber rifle is fairly obvious and simple: killing targets in a military-type situation. Should the United States ever be invaded, we can break out those .50 cals to blow the hell out of the Mexican/Canadian/Whoever invaders. The people may be armed to form Militias to defend the country or our freedoms.

At 5/21/06 03:34 PM, karatekid93 wrote: you are an idiot. communism is a way of economics not how you control the people. the true definition of communism is where everybody makes the same amount. it has nothing to do with fascism or totalitarian rule. it is just a coincidence communist leaders in our world were mostly bad. capitalism isn't the best anyways, the best is socialism.

And how exactly do you convince 300 million people to switch to Communism or Socialism? Through force, suppression, and outright violence. By their very nature, both systems seek to destroy the most individual and personal things you can find in our society: your property and your independent life.

You will never have Anarchic Communism because that requires a complete agreement by everyone in the community and complete, active participation, all without any negative incidents such as crime or feuds. You just can't get a community like that, and if you do, it's an artificial one that molds the people after the government (or lack thereof), not the other way around. Not to mention that you can't maintain even 1 million people, let alone 6 billion, without some organizational structure that holds authority (i.e. government). You can't have a planned economy without someone (who automatically becomes government) to plan it.

You will never have a non-authoritarian Socialism or Communism in any already-established, mature country. Why? If people have something to lose, it's tougher to take everything from them. Also, in mature countries, most people highly value their freedoms. Communism and Socialism both seek to completely divest you of any real freedoms in how you govern your life. For an economy to be planned, you obviously can't just have people running around and cavorting in whatever jobs or occupations they feel like doing. As soon as a Socialist or Communist society has the power to tell people where or how to work, it becomes authoritarian inevitably. Not to mention that whoever is telling people what to do is naturally part of an upper class based on authority and prestige, not money.

Socialism and Communism are both deeply flawed. They make a "Utopian" system work by ignoring reality. If you put your hands over your eyes and see a smiling face in front of you through the cracks, you may be stupid enough not to realize that it's really a bleeding, severed head. Pro-Communism/Socialism people place their hands over their eyes to make horribly ineffective, inefficient, hypocritical, self-destructive systems look "Utopian" or somehow better.

Democratic Capitalism is the best system. Democratic Capitalism is reality.

At 5/20/06 08:36 PM, GSgt_Liberal wrote: Because inorganic substances, as unlikely as it seems, could evolve into single celled archaea (archaeabacteria are REALLY old and REALLY simple).

Actually, GSgt, Archaebacteria are massively more complex than Eubacteria. They are further along the evolutionary chain of complex organisms that Eubacteria, and can achieve amazing complexity.

If anything, the original organism would be something astoundingly simple which was then completely out-competed by later organisms. It wouldn't be similar to anything currently in existance-- it would probably have just been a protein or two in a phospholipid membrane. The proteins would be enough to copy themselves until they eventually developed DNA or RNA for copying other protein forms.

At 5/18/06 08:32 PM, Penal_Disturbance wrote: I love how biased this is. Not only is that a MASSIVE exagerration, the more socialist countries in Europe have LESS problems with those things, such as Sweden compared to the U.K.

It's not a massive exaggeration. My uncle, a Canadian citizen, had to wait 10 months for a knee surgery. The hospitals were so crowded with hypochondriacs and "I have sniffles, send me to ER!" people that he simply could not get the surgery. He may have been an exception, as I hear the average wait is only 3-6 months right now, but it did happen.

Public school funding worldwide is a problem. I know the schools in my area have trouble even buying textbooks for kids once every three years. Why? Because public schools are funded and run in a Socialistic manner-- through community demands and community payments. I know this problem is pervasive throughout all the public school systems.

One poster just listed that Sweden was going to lower income tax from 42% to 39%. 42% is pretty damn near half your money, not to mention every other tax you then have to pay.

Every "exaggeration" was firmly grounded in reality.

In the U.S., it's far worse than that for a lot of people. Do you even stop to think about it? Logically, it CAN'T be any worse as a whole, just more even.

Yes, it can be worse as a whole because it destroys the system. Nothing is better than a mediocre something.

Face it, you do NOT give a shit about poor people.

Blah, blah, blah. I hate Ad Hominem attacks. Stick to the topic. Who are you to say I don't care about poor people? Has it occurred to you that maybe I think Socialism is more destructive towards them than anything else could ever be because it promises them hopes which it then promptly dashes by collapsing the entire system around them?

Then your country goes bankrupt.

Where?

USSR. East Germany. Hungary. Poland. Romania. China. Ethiopia. Cuba.

Every single Socialist country that has existed in the past 80 years has suffered from severe economic problems. Every government either went bankrupt or reformed the economy to include at least some free market Capitalism.

Capitalism is weakening and crippling the U.S. now. Real socialism has never even been attempted, and the diluted version is working in Europe just fine.

That's the same Bull that the Pro-Communism/Socialism people always pull.

Both Communism and Socialism have been implemented. The Real versions are those which have been made in reality. Imagine all the Utopian systems to want, but real life experience has proven the concepts thoroughly flawed.

You can claim that "Real Socialism" has never been attempted, but it's a total lie. The truth is that anything implemented in real life which doesn't work is something you'll deny. Otherwise, you might endanger your unrealistic Utopian fantasies.

Where is your backing for this?

See: Vast majority of Socialist/Communist countries. Particularly the USSR.

And then people would die as a result. Just another example of the low regard you hold human life in compared to your own ideals.

No one suggested actually cancelling it. It was merely an example of the bloated, inefficient, massively expensive systems that Socialism creates. Effective reform in favor of Capitalism could reduce Entitlements from 90% of our budget to much, much less.

Socialism is too expensive. It quickly becomes unrealistic.

Wake the fuck up. You're reciting bullshit you read in an uber-biased right wing textbook.

I've seen nothing of the sort in textbooks. What I'm telling you is that Socialism does not work. Period. It's a deluded ideal that never stood a chance

I'm sick of Right Wingers making arguments with no logical or factual backing.

I'm tired of Socialists and Communists making arguments in favor of total fantasies while completely avoiding any real consideration or argumentation of their ideals. Hey, they figure what opponents can't discuss directly, they can't attack!

If you blindfold yourself and refuse to look at the entire picture, a Socialist-leaning Capitalist country looks awesome.

But then you wait 10 months for a surgery because there's no room for you in overcrowded hospitals. Then you go to a school that can't even afford textbooks. Then you have to pay taxes that steal half your paycheck.

Then your country goes bankrupt.

Socialism weakens and cripples countries. It may seem awesome when someone else is paying for it, and it may seem great in the short term, but Socialism is unsustainable and will bankrupt the country or the people eventually.

Did you know more than 60% of the US annual federal budget pays for Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security? If the US government cancelled those Socialist-leaning projects, our entire national debt would be paid back in one year. I'm serious, just one year.

Socialism is too expensive. It quickly becomes unrealistic.

"Quick" Comment:
Why is it that, when communism fails, "human nature" is blamed? Many pro-communists always say, "Well, TRUE Communism can't be implemented because humans are greedy and corrupt and blah, blah, blah." This is completely untrue.

Government and society is for the People, not the other way around. If the majority of the People find a government or society unbearable, as everyone admits is unavoidable in Communism, then that government or society is flawed. It isn't a problem of the people, one you can fix through brainwash or force, it is a bad system.

"True" Communism will never work because it isn't an "ideal" system at all, it's a flawed system of enslavement.

Everyone always loves to refer to the book "1984" by Orsen Wells when discussing totalitarian governments and what can happen in Democracy Gone Wrong. Has it ever occurred to anyone that "1984" used Marx's proposed Communist government to rule the people and govern society? Communism, by definition, requires totalitarianism and a violation of everything that makes us human.

Communism is a cardboard butterfly. Pretty, and impressive, but completely and utterly fake. Too many humans are drawn to the bigger-than-life promises of Communism, but it's all pipe dreams and illusion.

At 5/15/06 04:35 PM, Gunter45 wrote: The mechanism for microevolution is natural selection and the mechanism for macroevolution is mutation.

Microevolution occurs because mutations provide reserves of variability, then natural selection skews the characteristics of a population towards "better" adaptations.

Macroevolution occurs because microevolving populations continue to drift genetically from their original point. This usually happens when a population, just part of the whole species, is isolated or the environment shifts dramatically.

Macroevolution and microevolution are not mutually exclusive. The former is simply an aggregation of the latter.

The only result of natural selection is that particular species that is adapting, as a whole, will be better suited for survival.

Isolation. Few species exist in just one environment. Look at humans: in our early years of civilization, we were isolated in the Americas, Europe, Africa, India, and China. Culture evolves just like organisms. Just as the Chinese developed silk and ancestor worship, the Romans developed concrete and polytheism.

Independent populations go in their own directions, developing new abilities and finding new forms, regardless of whether that means genetic and physical changes or cultural and technological changes. Populations of organisms are easily seperated, and when those seperations last for millenia, microevolution becomes macroevolution in new, exotic environments.

No, it does disprove macroevolution, or at least shows how incredibly unlikely it is to the point of impossibility. You'd need trillions upon trillions of years in order for that probability to have a chance at succeeding.

Gunter, what you described is called hybridization, an occurance completely independent of evolution. It means almost nothing to evolution because hybrids only occur after evolution has formed two species in isolation.

However, you also misunderstood hybridization. If any hybrid combination works, then every hybrid of the two parent species will produce fertile offspring, barring rare mutations. When the two parent populations meet one another, many hybrids will be created within a short span in a tight region. The meeting of two hybrids is very likely over extended periods of contact between the populations, not a nearly-impossible feat.

Fertile hybrids do not rely on rare mutations, they rely on which parents combine. A horse and donkey may not produce fertile offspring, but a polar bear and grizzly bear do, all the time.

It stands that macroevolution is fundamental to the creation of a new species, which is proven by current diversity in life on earth.

No, it doesn't stand. It's a baseless speculation.

Actually, you're right. His claim there was baseless speculation. Just as the rest of your claims about something "outside of time" are equally baseless. That's just the honest truth.

Gunter, I see one fairly simple problem with your entire stance. It is not based on knowledge of the subject, it is based on a total rejection of a misinterpretation of evolution. Evolution isn't some exotic concept or astoundingly rare event, it's really just a simple thing that slowly accumulates.

Think of evolution like working with a Lego structure. One day, you decide to start altering a castle you built 10 years ago with the Legos. You spend 30 minutes changing the color of the top layer of bricks, then stop. The next day, you make one tower of the castle 10 blocks taller. The day afterwards, you make another alteration. Continue doing this for a full year, changing the structure a little bit every day. Do you still have the same structure one year later, or does it seem like something completely new and unique?

That's evolution. It's a simple concept and one that is undeniably obvious in society, economics, and countless smaller scales. Why is it so hard to believe that organisms are any different than a company, or a computer operating system, or a culture?

Your attempts would be futile. Why? Most HIV spreads when the infected people do not even know they carry the disease.

Also, why would anyone ever visit a doctor, if he would castrate them? And how long do you think that violation of a person's rights would be tolerated?

If you have blood-to-blood contact, there is a 100% chance you will contract HIV from a carrier. How long do you think it would take for an angry, radicalized HIV carrier to use his own blood as a form of bioterrorism?

In short: STUPID IDEA

All of you are falling prey to a simple fallacy: you can not genetically engineer someone to be "smarter" or a "super athelete." There are thousands of reasons which make it an impossible feat. I'll list some of them to save time:

- We have a poor understanding of the human genome

- Almost no genes affect only one aspect of a person

- Genetics does not define intelligence

- Genetics only slightly affects athletic ability

- Finding ways to fix errors is easy, making additions is virtually impossible

- Every "positive" requires a tradeoff. Many of humanity's geniuses suffered from severe mental or physical ailments, like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

- No amount of genetic alteration can prevent problems caused by life-- such as injuries or nutritional deficits.

- DNA controls the actions of cells at a very minute level. Managing overall alterations of the body and mind is virtually impossible. General behavior changes are impossible to control or predict-- you may get a genius, but he may be a psychopathic killer as well.

- Genetics has little overall effect on a human. Only mistakes are noticeable, and these are almost always excerbated by life experiences.

At 5/4/06 04:15 PM, fli wrote: Why wouldn't the US not want to make illegal immigrants, legal?
The majority, after all, wants to be US citizens-- even going as far as paying taxes for several years with tax ID numbers.

Fli, what you forget is that nothing stops more illegal immigrants from entering the country. You can legalize as many immigrants as you want, but if the borders are still left open, more will come, and we'll be right back in this same predicament again in 10 years.

Illegal immigrants hurt the country both by bringing us problems and by being the victims for exploitative predators. Nothing they can possibly pass on to us can make that any better or make it more than a bad situation. Legalizing them all is just the weak man's "way out," but it doesn't solve the problem.

Come up with something that might actually fix the problem, not just brush it under the rug for a few years.

At 5/2/06 10:11 PM, JoS wrote: Oil for food alledgedly envolved people within the UN, but as far as I know it didnt envolve say Russia, or France.

When news first came out about the scandal, the Prime Minister of France and his son were both on the list of people receiving major kickbacks. However, I believe Russia only had some small-fries receiving kickbacks.

Is it coincidence that France was the only country in the UN who completely refused to support a US attack on Saddam's regime? Personal kickbacks > Justice + World Safety.

All of this stuff about "the definition of sex" is bullshit. It's called oral sex for a reason. Can this be any less blindingly obvious? Clinton intentionally meant to mislead the court with his testimony, regardless of the definition of sex. In the same way a three year-old will steal a brownie before dinner and lie to his parents with the chocolate still on his teeth and hands, Clinton lied to the court. You can't split hairs, you can't "bend the truth," Clinton lied under oath.

From browsing the Bureau of Labor Statistics website a few weeks ago, I am fairly sure that the poor have been getting poorer for the past 30-odd years since the 1970s, when inflation-adjusted wages for the lower classes reached their peak. Since then, wage increases have been slightly lagging behind inflation, but the actual total decrease in earnings has only been on the order of $200-300 per year for a minimum wage worker.

However, I am also fairly sure that the family cost-of-living has been increasing slowly during that same period, while the individual cost-of-living has actually fallen. I would suppose that most of the cost increases stem from increasingly-expensive childcare and education costs.

However, in comparison to worldwide cost-of-living increases, wage increases, and inflation, everyone in the United States has grown significantly richer, while most poor countries have remained the same and some have grown into fairly prosperous countries.

Also, remember that every person who died in the Atomic Bombings were explicitly warned to get the hell out of town. In the first city, the smaller of the two, the people did not take us seriously. Many people died. In the second, much larger city, most of the population fled and fewer people died. We dropped thousands of leaflets warning them for both attacks.

We wanted as little damage as possible, which was the entire point of using the atomic bombs. If we had to attack Japan traditionally, it would be the most brutal, destructive fight in history with unacceptably huge losses. The United States had a choice: fight a series of battles with an expected minimum of more than 11 million casualties or attempt to smash Japan by hitting with something so far beyond their capabilities that they had no choice but to surrender.

By bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima, we chose the lesser of two evils and saved as many lives as we could possibly manage.

At 4/17/06 11:54 AM, o_r_i_g_i_n_a_l wrote: But to assume that the Earth natural cycle moves as fast as it is now, with the increasing amount of unusual and deadly weather. I mean, obviously excluding the Tsunami, last year was the fucking craziest for fierce weather. Katrina, massive floods in Europe, the UK’s worst storm for a 100 years, need I go on?

The entire scientific community agrees: Global Warming had absolutely nothing to do with those events.

At 4/11/06 05:53 PM, Imperator wrote:

Five is mutualy exclusive of four. Something cannot be both five and four at the same time.

My math teacher actually did a really cool trick where he made 1=2. I wish I remembered how he did it though.......

Tip: If you examine the math, he divided by zero at one point. Anything divided by zero is undefined, thus invalidating the final equation. It's a common trick and necessary in every case of mathematical "magic tricks."

One of the pro-Marijuana people already posted the proof: Marijuana is not noteworthy for its physical effects. What that truly means is that arguments about how Marijuana is "not bad" because it has few physical effects are worthless.

This thread, as with every other "Legalize Marijuana" thread, has gone down a pointless, inarguably worthless route of discussion already. Instead of discussing something that doesn't even matter, why not discuss the important effects of Marijuana, the psychoactive effects. We need to discuss how it affects the user's thoughts, personality, mood, motivation, social interactions, and mental skills.

Marijuana's psychoactive effects are the reason it remains illegal. When you're high, your thoughts and mental abilities aren't just degraded, as with alcohol, they are distorted. You aren't reasonable, you aren't sensible, and you lose all sense of self control. Your normal personality and desires disappear, and instead others see a twisted, mutilated version of you that does stupid things and lacks any common sense whatsoever.

You lose most of your motivation and ambition, and often instead just vegetate, no better than a pile of garbage. You lack perception, and can't seem to understand the communication of others. You lose focus easily and look like a fool to everyone (who isn't high) around you. You're no smarter than a pet poodle, and everyone else notices.

Later, after you come down, you are tired and sluggish. Your mental skills are still dulled, and you look like a caffeine addict. You still don't think straight, and unless you're already generally considered an idiot, you are obviously moving slower and aren't fully aware.

In isolated incidents, this obvious state isn't an issue and people accept it because "those days" just happen. However, when it occurs consistantly, it is obvious that something is dragging you down, something is making you weaker and slower, something is ruining what you could have been. And people feel sorry for you. You're not amazing, you're not creative, you're not special, you're just a damn washout who can't handle the stresses of normal life. Regardless of whether that's true, it's what people see and it's the constant impression you give.

Marijuana is not beneficial. You don't need it, and it doesn't help. There's no reason you should want it, and thus there's no reason why it should be legalized. You don't need it, you've no reason to want it, and it is entirely unnecessary and expendable. So get rid of it.

Don't waste your time with something so useless. The only thing it can do is impair you and eat away at your life and mental abilities. It doesn't help your life at all, it's just a waste. Find something better to do with your life.

A. That is only a rumor. Nothing has actually been confirmed.

B. What's all this crap about "interfering with a democracy"? Are you people stupid? He's simply saying, at the next election that he wants a different Prime Minister. He doesn't want the guy to run for re-election, that's all. Bush isn't kicking him out or anything, he's just saying he wants another leader duly elected, at the appropriate time.

At 3/26/06 11:51 PM, FAB0L0US wrote: I found that rather funny also considering some of the rhetoric at the beginning of the war was how quick and easy it would be.

It was quick and easy. We totally steamrolled Saddam and his entire army in a matter of weeks. The war was over years ago. The occupation is lasting as long as anyone could reasonably expect: years.

The only thing that is slowing down the planned Iraq rebuilding process is the foreign legions of terrorists attacking the country. Otherwise, everything is going surprisingly quickly. The Iraqi constitution was written in less time than the US constitution.

At 3/27/06 04:44 AM, omgbomb wrote: what happened to freedom?

allow same sex marriage, they don't do ANYTHING to effect you.

Freedom doesn't apply to something that doesn't exist, and it does affect others.

Using your same logic, I could say, "What happened to freedom? Allow beastiality, it doesn't do ANYTHING to affect you." It's the exact same logic, but regardless of whether or not something directly affects me in ways I can predict, it's still wrong.

At 3/25/06 10:05 AM, Begoner wrote:

It's a fair system and it's proven to be succeessful. No other system has.

It's not a fair system. Not everybody has an equal chance. If you are born rich, you don't have to work a day in your life, but you can still afford to buy whatever you want and do whatever you want. If you were born poor, you are going to end up being poor. You can work as hard as you want, but you won't be able to get anywhere because the entire system favours the rich.

Complete trash. The rich lose wealth all the time, and the poor become wealthy all the time as well. Nothing in our society inherently limits or oppresses you except yourself. Regardless of your birth, you can become rich or at least reach middle class. Regardless of your birth, the lazy and incompetent can still become poor. It's all a matter of brains, determination, and charisma.

By the way, the system doesn't favor the rich. It's actually weighted against them intentionally.

No other system has. Please. Cuba is a shining example of the wonders of communism. In the 1950s, it was in terrible economic downfall. Then along came Castro, and Cuba is now a wonderful place to live. The quality of life is very high, everyone is satisfied with the government, and the rich do not control everything.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!

Sorry, but Cuba is currently in a horrible state. The people are not satisfied, and they are not doing well. The quality of life is fairly low, and quite a few people risk their lives to get the hell out of there. Their economy may have seemed to recover, but it hasn't yet, and everything they produce has suffered from a long-term economic starvation.

There's a reason Cuba refuses to publish any information about their average incomes or poverty level, and also a reason why they have many more emigrants than immigrants.

At 3/25/06 09:03 AM, GSgt_Liberal wrote: Capitalism works. Defenses like tariffs, you mean? Those stymie free trade, and free trade encourages growth.

GSgt, he meant defense as in rhetorical defense, arguing in favor of our system against Communists, Socialists, etc. You've probably noticed that whenever those people talk, they attack Capitalism and tell us we must defend it, but they never actually explain their end, they just attack ours.

Capitalism doesn't need a defense because it is the only system that ever worked. It is those other systems which much prove themselves, not the other way around.

Regardless of market regulation, that's still Capitalism. Who cares if a country uses a free market or a regulated one within this context, it's a matter of Capitalism vs. everything else.

Also, Capitalism doesn't stifle mental or emotional health. It does the opposite, in fact: it encourages creative thought and actions, as well as self-education and individual growth. The people who do those things succeed and push our nation forward.