Don't give me that false equivalence BS, you don't have a different viewpoint, you have a demonstrably bad viewpoint.

I don't hate you, I pity you. I'm not the one that hates homosexuals and minorities,

people like you and lantern who judge people on the basis of skin color, and sexual orientation....

...are not good people, it's that simple. You are relics of the past.

It is socially acceptable to shame and call out people like you and lantern when we catch you voicing your antiquated ideas. Your social viewpoints are becoming less and less acceptable with each day. Even the right is slowly backing away on their attacks on minorities and homosexuals.

Your ideas...don't work, they never did.

I've told you and your pal lantern many times that you are free to be as backwards thinking as you want in the privacy of your own home and your own brain. But when you voice your bad ideas in public, expect to be called out and shamed.

You can play the victim card all you want. but you know it's not just me picking on you. Long before I ever showed up, you've been called out and shamed by many others here and you've been reprimanded by the staff of this website on multiple occasions. I'm willing to bet that unless you live in a hole in the ground in the deep south, you know better than to voice your ideas in public in real life since you know you'll get in trouble. Being an anonymous troll on a website is the only place you can voice your bad ideas, isn't it?

I understand that you're angry. The world changed on you and you're too set on your old ideas to change with it. Well you better hang on, because it's going to keep on changing and people who share your viewpoint will keep dying of old age. As it should be.

As I told lantern, start taking your own advice. You keep claiming that gays and minorites need to "suck it up".

Suck it up bob, suck it up. Why don't you practice what you preach about "rugged individualism" and quit whining? Take it like a man, right?

If you don't like it, go find a website that shares your viewpoints. Freedom of speech does not exist on a private website.

Deal with it. Your prejudice is only going to keep getting called out and you will continue to get shamed.

The American Government education system is an anti education system.
Kids today get a less quality education than before.

I don't mind these dumb kids today because it means added job security. You are too dumb to know better. Someone needs to serve me lunch and sweep my floors.

You must be one of them. You were taught and firmly believe that Liberalism is good and capitalism is evil and must be destroyed. The fact of the matter is the exact opposite, Liberalism is evil.



And yes educators do want this dumbing down of students. They have been doing this for years. Finally the education is controlled by union controlled liberals. They have been in control for decades. We are not #1 or 8th, we are down in the middle of the pack down at 20. For all the money we spend per child and to be in 20th place.

http://www.breitbart.com/InstaBlog/2013/11/15/Mom-Furious-After-Son-Makes-Honor-Roll-With-C-s-and-D-s

http://worldtop20.org/

Did they put someone in jail? Are they stopping them by force?

Sorry but they are not a threat to free speech, they are voicing their opinions. Come back to me when someone puts you in jail for your opinion and I'll do something about it.

Freedom of Speech is alive and well in America, for example when the Guardian was forced to destroy all their computers and hard drives with the Snowden leaks on it in Britain they weren't here. Britain may have asked but the US Government knows better, they can't do it and not because of some law but because of the principle on which that law stands. That and we'd fucking riot like hell. Free speech is something we constantly have to fight and look out for, but it's not under threat from bored mothers. Even if they are a bunch of cunts.

This is soul-crushing. Even I could tell him a number of things that would vastly improve his chances. I hope someone who knows better gets in touch with him to point out the obvious missteps he's made and help him out.

> "[Austerity] frees up resources for private investment" is a statement that
> does not match my perception of reality"

Well, far be it from me to try to introduce you to some basic epistemologies to which you may not be familiar: like rationalism, deduction, etc, in order to move you away from "authority" as the only path to knowledge you seem to use. Unfortunately, however, this "authority" method is inappropriate to the study of economics.

> "So, demand vs supply... we all know that discussion won't be resolved here,
> ever."

Keynes and Hayek were at it for a while. It's all in the two hip-hop videos.

> "It's utterly pointless."

Yes. There is nothing new not covered by Keynes vs. Hayek.

> "Shamelessness was my addition, my interpretation. "

Bad thymology (my interpretation).

> "He "weakens" society, economically, by suppressing aggregate demand.
> The more wealth you accumulate, the less of it, as a percentage, translates
> into demand."

I see. So, by this logic, any making of money is, in itself, a "weakening" of society. Unless I'm a socialist, like David Simon, then I cannot make money without also "weakening" society.

> "But since you apparently share the views of Hollenbeck, all of that was
> probably hogwash to you."

Yes, at best hogwash. Alas, I've no interest in going into this with you, especially since you've no have interest in actually looking at it. Had you any interest at all -- or studied the subject beyond deferring to the "authority" method of epistemology -- you could at least provide me with a concise explanation as to why you think the Austrian/Misean economic position falters. Rather than thinking for yourself, however, you dismiss it as "wrong," "right-wing," or "pointless" to debate or go into. "Here Be Monsters, period."

The Keynes/Hayek debates have the similar tones, with Keynes simply ignoring all of Hayek's points, evasions, and going off into something else. You clearly agree with the Keynesian approach/theory, which likely means you cannot really explain anything except through unfounded claims, that are "pointless" to argue, debate, or rationally defend.

As I have said before, one cannot have this sort of intellectual relationship with those either unwilling or unable to grasp basic economic principles, like for example those clearly explained by Hazlitt's "Economics in One Lesson." There's simply no common language through which to communicate. Confronted with these kinds of beliefs, one can either try to educate (but only those who ask for it, since attempting to educate those who do not want to be educated will likely fail, as any public school teacher can tell you) or one can pull out the snake oil and the cash register. The third option involves ignoring such ignorance altogether, and use what one knows for one's own financial and life benefit in ways that don't involve such people in the first place.

There are so many errors in the Keynesian 'demand' theory of economics (you can find much on that if you want to read up on it), but Keynesians tend to avoid any real debates. You're coming from the Keynesian fallacy of saving money as being bad for the economy (because spending it all/consumerism is supposedly what gets the economy going). And the even more absurd fallacy which presupposes (with no proof of it at all) that rich people keep most of their wealth stored somewhere outside of circulation. When in reality, rich people only save some and the richer they are the more they spend/invest. Of course, when the economy seem fragile, due to central banks meddling, bubbles, etc., investors get nervous and don't invest as much a they otherwise would. When they don't invest, it shrinks supply of things people would want to spend on. Demand does nothing, it doesn't exist, if there is nothing to supply that people want to buy.

In fact, I am starting to think that central bankers are not really Keynesian at all, in the sense that they don't really believe their own bullshit. They know better but also know how to exploit their positions as central bankers, making folks like @radx buy into it, the snake oil. For example, he may not care for gold, but bankers do. Whatever they say against it, folks will still buy it, both for themselves and the banks they run. And as @radx rightly says, he's a human. And apparently he can sell his 'charm' if push comes to shove.

And here I thought the claims around his four laptops were put to rest in July of last year or, at the very latest, after his meeting with Ray MacGovern, Jesselyn Radack and Thomas Drake in October.

There was nothing of substance on those laptops and to suggest otherwise with any credibility demands extraordinary proof.

Why?

Because of two primary reasons, as far as I am concerned:

- Any of Snowden's claims has yet to proven false. The entire apparatus is trying and they failed miserably so far. Probably because Snowden actually knows what he's talking about, unlike such cranks as Rep. Peter King.

- Snowden spent years working within the intelligence industry (CIA, NSA, private contractors) and he has proven to be careful and meticulous. Unlike the public (or the British MoD), he'd know better than to transport any sensitive information on a device like a laptop or a smartphone. Or an external harddrive. Or a disk. He'd use flash memory, possibly a thumb drive, probably an SD card -- the less embedded controllers a device has, the better. Heavily encrypted, of course, and if anyone doesn't believe that crypto works... tough luck, I'm done trying to convince people otherwise.

So, the only people who received data from him are Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras. American journalists reporting on American issues, just like he said.

As for the the revelation of "tons of national secrets and techniques": he has revealed nothing. Let me say that again: Snowden has revealed nothing.

He has empowered members of the press, the fourth estate, to do their bloody jobs and fullfil their role as watchdog over the government, something they failed at miserably in this particular regard. All revelations happen at the discretion of those journalists who are now the sole proprietors of the Snowden-documents.

If, however, you don't subscribe to the notion of a free press as a line of defence against government abuse, then I can't change your mind.

By the way, "putting American lives at risk" should have received a trademark by now, the way it has been waved around to kill uncomfortable conversations. I vividly remember how desperate they were to find proof that the Afghan/Iraqi War Logs and the Gitmo Files were endangering lives. As far as I know, they never found any. And as far as I know, all releases based on Snowden-documents were carefully chosen and redacted where neccessary to protect the identity of human assets. All claims to the contrary need to provide evidence.

But I'm glad to see that the "American industry" has found its way into the argument. At least we don't have to pretend that this is solely about terrorism anymore. Industrial espionage, diplomatic advantages and... keeping your own population in check.

Yay! It's just like the old days.

Oh wait, I forgot. My country has been under full scale surveillance by the US, the British and the French since the late '40s, so it's actually business as usual.

Actually yes, I was.

Kinda got away from the subject though. I should know better than to get Chingy started...

This bugs the heck out of me. It's a mob bullying mentality and adults, even though young, should know better. The terrible tag is well deserved.

I've been watching a lot about the knockout game as of late. It really does seem to be a hate crime (It's also called Polar Bearing, because it's victims tend to be white). It's caused quite a stir in the black community, as those who know better seem to be cringing and distancing themselves from the attacks as well as possible.

Ultimately, it's the fault of a few individuals who feel powerless enough in their own lives to try to take it out on others. I see a connection between this feeling of powerlessness and the "stop and frisk" laws passed in many of the cities where the knockout game first became popular.

I think the solution to this kind of violence is improving police relations with the affected communities. The first step is getting rid of "stop and frisk", the second removal of police arrest quotas, the third would be reducing the black prison population's non-violent offenders.

So sad to see that the people who you'd think, given their history, should know better are becoming like this.

This is a prime example of the fallacy of "dog guilt". According to people who know better than I dog's aren't believed to understand contextual responsibility like humans i.e. they don't get the idea that they did something wrong but simply that something IS wrong.

So for instance if there is poop in the room they understand from experience that the owner will go ape shit when they find it. They do not however understand that because THEY did a poo the owner will go ape shit.

That guilty look/walk/hiding in the corner is because the Dog knows the human is likely about to behave irrationally. Every time there has been poop in the room or the owner has walked in on them in a particular place etc. the owner has hit them or shouted or whatever so they know bad things are coming.

The crucial difference is they don't understand the idea that its their fault, only the set of circumstances leading up to it.
This may mean you get some very limited positive effect from punishment as the Dog will realise that not going to a particular place etc. seems to avoid the bad thing happening but as far as understanding that they have behaved badly it wont get you anywhere.

Rewards for desirable behaviour are orders of magnitude more effective than trying to discourage the bad because of this. Dogs don't have morals they just want to please you and trying to appeal to their sense of decency is a waste of both your time, all you will get is a dog that's been scared into inactivity.

If you don't want them to poop on the carpet then you should simply reward them for pooping where you do want them to go. It wont take long before they only poop in the places you rewarded them because deep down all that little doggie wants in life is for you to be happy with them and give them attention.

This dog is basically just cowering and submitting because he's either had, about to have or has previously had an unpleasant experience relating to recent circumstances. It dose'nt know it did wrong but it does understand that the owner is mad/behaving crazy so it assumes a submissive posture and hopes the whole thing will eventually blow over.

Dogs aren't people, their dogs! :-D

The fact that you had to add that caveat shows that you are smart enough to know better than to quote that rag as a reputable source.

Really a self link? @G-bar you should know better. *wags finger in your general direction*.... however that's an adorable kitty.

@Bruti79
right on.
thanks for replying.

neuroscience is your answer in regards to consciousness eh?
how...unsatisfying.
the answer is no answer at all man.

let me try for you:
we dont know.
BUT we are making great strides in neuro transmitters and neuroscience and microbiology that it is possible that one day we WILL know.
but as of today?
we dont know,and what we dont know is a LOT.

see? better.

and your response concerning love!
breath-taking!
"We fall in love, or hate, or feel "meh" about something because of the stuff in our brain that makes our personalities"

how romantic!
ok..its not.im just being a huge ass.
in fact i am being a wicked smart-ass period.
thanks for putting up with me.

it irks me when people talk in regards to consciousness or love with a conviction that i know is not warranted.
but thanks for being a good sport about it.

in regards to type 1 diabetes.yeah...no diet is going to reverse that.sorry timmy.

maybe you thought i was trying to sell ya a bill of goods.i wasnt.
check that video out.
its a lecture by a doctor whose field is in disease and microbiology.
HE is the guy who proved that a plant based diet can reverse type 2 diabetes (not in all,but many)AND how a plant based diet can help prevent cancer and sometimes cure it.

he is entertaining,witty and its super informative.

if i didnt love double bacon cheeseburgers so much i would go vegan,but whenever i know i am eating too far on the crappy scale i watch that video and it pulls me back to reality,or the meat lovers pizza.
whatever..dont confuse me with details!

i know better than to try to get you guys to listen to my fluffernutter philosophies.
you guys are all about your religion..i mean science..yes.science!

it is all pretty exciting to me as well.
thanks man.stay awesome.

yall should know better than to attempt a reasoned discussion with yogi