As I said in that thread, I don't see an incentive for the US to intervene. This isn't the Cold War battle over spheres of influence, neither does oil have the same geopolitical relevance. Despite the conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Libya, none has led to a spike in oil prices? Instead it's fallen precipitously. Why, because the US being the swing shale oil producer has capped world prices.

Meanwhile I listed the reasons for Russia to intervene, none of which you have challenged or refuted. TOWs have by all accounts been supplied by the Saudis. I don't think Russia is attempting to destabilize Syria, but they do wish to prop up Assad. Bombing has conveniently been primarily of non-ISIS rebels since they challenge the regime more directly than ISIS which is being bombed already.

Syria includes a litany of rebel groups some as radical as ISIS. From what I have read it is suspected that both the Syrian army and al-Nusra/ISIS used various chemical weapons. The Syrian army has undoubtedly dropped barrel bombs, weapons designed to create indiscriminate collateral damage to civilians just like chemical weapons, it is entirely consistent that they would have also tried using chemical weapons which is practical terms are no less likely to be deadly to civilians or likely to incite terror. There are by all accounts >5,000 different rebel groups in Syria. That you would ascribe them all as wanting chaos would suggest you've been fed a narrative.

A Cold War MAD mindset makes little sense today. Russian bombing of western Europe in some kind of hypothetical retaliation against the US makes no sense in this day and age. In any case it was scrapped because of Putin's paranoia.

Absolutely! If you haven't seen his stuff you are missing out on some of the greatest anime ever!
Tokyo Godfathers, Paranoia Agent, Paprika, Memories.

He acted like a tool, fishing for a reaction in order to make a non toolish point. I think the real take away from this is that we are making unrealistic demands of police officers.

Since 9/11 cops have been at the forefront of institutional paranoia. They're asked to look into people filming public places. And that is what he did. Initially in the most reasonable and civil way anyone could expect. The guy chose to be rude and escalate the situation. Sure it's within his rights, but it's obviously just trolling. Furthermore he's got his hand in his pocket playing with something while wearing an empty holster. I'm not sure when they realized he was wearing the holster, but it begs the question: what has he trying to get them to do?

Either way the right call was made in the end. I'm hoping the officers aren't seriously reprimanded for this, but rather the absurd combination of instituation paranoia, trolling, and gun culture are kept far apart.

Analogies of filming children and the cops attacking him are unnecessarily inflammatory and not really relevant.

And then what? They're gonna take your guns away?
Always this silly paranoia about jade helmets and black helicopters. They don't send armed troops for you, they just sell you to Walmart. What good are heavily armed cops when they're owned by OCP?

Yahweh has NEVER given evidence of his existence. No more so than any other god anyhow. They all answer prayer equally and randomly well. They all claim to have made the universe/world, they all claim to be the true one... Near death experiences differ by culture expectations of that culture and don't all conform to the supposed Christian expectation... he has done nothing to make himself stand out from the rest of the gods that Christians dismiss. Heck, I've never seen a Frost Giant or evidence they ever existed, so clearly Odin has one up on Yahweh.

In the 4,000 years or so from Adam and Eve's time in the Garden to Jesus, Yahweh couldn't or wouldn't make himself known to the other races. He didn't reveal himself to those in Africa, Asia, the Americas or Europe, just to one tiny specific group of people in the Middle East. If couldn't then he's not the omnipotent, omnipresent god he claims, if he wouldn't that makes him a racist ass not worthy of following by picking one people to be his chosen people.

The only reason Europe became Christian was forced conversion when the Christian armies of Rome forced them to, which setup a tradition of most Europeans and later Americans being born into a faith. Were the exact same people born in Saudi Arabia they "would know that they know" that Islam is the true religion, or same in India but applying to Hinduism.

And saying that atheists have had supernatural experiences and can change to theism when talking about it, ignores the whole point of the video, especially the part when he talks about the linked Darren Brown video, which demonstrates that it is easy to make a spiritual experience happen that has no basis on any real god.

By way of example: I used to be a heavy evangelical Christian, I watched TBN and Fox News religiously (pun intended, see this old post of mine here on the sift from an old account that I couldn't recover http://videosift.com/usercomments/Charon... heck see my Revelations from the Word posts on my blog, http://www.brianathomas.com/archives/category/religion/revelations-from-the-word/ or more embarrassing my older political posts http://www.brianathomas.com/archives/category/politics/ which while progressive now, go to page 4 or so around June 2008 and back and you see a Libertarian and further back Republican with some crazy anti-vaccine paranoia , climate change denialism, science denaillism and other things I'm deeply ashamed of now)... I've had deep and meaningful spiritual experiences with god. After Republicans ruined Christianity for me (as the Republican party is clearly 100% against every teaching of Jesus... and yeah we can tick that off as being humans, but god does nothing to correct them, he may have spoke to my heart or whatever one wants to say to have more empathy, but over half the Christians in this nation still vote for a party 100% devoid of the teachings of the Jesus of the Bible while claiming to do it for Christian reasons) and I eventually lost faith (while Republicans are the reason I initially lost faith, they aren't the reason I stayed away, god is a dick is why I stayed away). After I lost faith in the Christian god, I gave paganism a try, and I've had just a meaningful spiritual experiences while worshiping at a Druid rite as I have at any Christian church. This is why people pick a religion, first by accident of birth (most people are Christian in the US because their parents were, and back to Europe where going back further they were forced to convert by invading Christian armies), second by choosing one that connects more personally with them... for many they see the hypocrisy of Christianity (and its general lack of empathy) but do connect with some form of paganism, and pagans generally have a patron god they serve above most others, and that god is the one they have a deep connection to, the same deep connection that Christians claim to have with Jesus/Yahweh... One doesn't drive a plane into a building killing 3,000 plus people without a deep and meaningful relationship with their god, and to dismiss t hat relationship as being deceived is naive and demonstrates a lack of empathy.

Now, I will allow the possibility that god does exist, but not in the form Christians propose, but perhaps closer to what the US Founding Fathers believed, but perhaps expanded a bit with more modern knowledge. A Deist like view. That this god somehow this god, created the energy and set into motion the laws of this physical universe that spun out from the big bang, but he's had nothing to do with anything since then. Perhaps all religions actually worship the same god but with their own culture's expectations and interpretations. However this would mean that all religions and lack there of are equally valid, which most faiths (aside from most modern paganism) doesn't allow for as their claim rests on being the true one.

I've rambled on far too long already so I'll leave it at that.

Are you lonely? I'm just wondering because all you seem to do here lately is argue with anyone who even remotely disagrees with you and it seems sort of desperate. You're constantly on everyone's profile trying to make your point. Huge dissertations of bullshit arguing into thin air.

I understand loneliness man, been there. If randomly arguing helps you connect then ok.

But, if you think all police are out to get you, all the time, every time:

newtboy said:

"the questioner's only motivation is to find a 'problem' he can 'solve' by charging you with a crime"

You might want to look into some paranoia issues. Sorry. There are good police out there. Most of the time in fact.

Yes, but you have repeatedly claimed your distain, disrespect, hatred, fear, and paranoia about the state. I just assumed you would walk the walk too. Could it be you're a closet statist, supporting the evil beast with your taxes and licenses even though you tell others not to?!

Sorry, I don't get my science from zealous political blog sites. I think that's your problem, you ONLY trust the political bloggers that tell you what you like, and no one else.

You fellas defending the cops need to think again.

You DO NOT SHOOT except to SAVE LIFE. I don't care if its Charlie Manson - if he's unarmed and surrendering in broad daylight YOU DO NOT SHOOT HIM.

Failure to respect this code leads to paranoia, violence, rage, hatred and TOTAL SOCIAL APOCALYPSE.

Ferguson will get back from the brink but only because of people who understand that.

Btw Norway has the most liberal, kindest, most forgiving judicial system in the world (AFAIK) and also the LOWEST REOFFENDNG AND CRIME RATES.

USA reoffending rate 85%. Incarceration rate highest outside of Somalia. So if the moral spiritual ethical stance is too lefty for you try BASIC FUCKING STRATEGY.

Actually, I didn't.

You'll not that I only quoted part of your post. You asked for an explanation of a specific article. I provided one. That's it.

Meanwhile, you say that we need to do something about AGW, then call into question its validity. I'm glad you're willing to do something about it, but you're not helping anyone by bringing incredibly spurious data points and engaging in anti-government paranoia.

Congratulations on making your point incredibly poorly.

Yeah, couldn't stand it. Poorly produced, inadequately rendered and 6 'gay' women who don't care to give their names in the production credits (paranoia?).

Guess I could go check out their gay women channel and see if they have any actual talent for making videos, like many lesbians (and people in general), there's an inordinate amount of gay folks that are hard to stand to be around for too long, and it has nothing to do with their sexuality or any phobias. More to do with their character and strength of will. A mixed-bag of personality disorders tend to remind me how fucked-up the world is becoming and I'm not a mental health professional. My empathy and sympathy stores go part and parcel with the energy allotment for my own well-being and sanity.

Me, too....Talked to her last about 3 years ago-Busy with the world. Shout out to the old guard

( we patched-up after the cocaine-frenzied paranoia trip, F All's I)

goto fail

Here's a part of what I wrote about it back then:

So my paranoia-driven brain tries to work out the scenario:
- did the NSA know about it?
- did the NSA exploit it?
- did the NSA plant it through a mole?
- did Apple add it themselves, at the NSA's request?

"Owing to secrecy and obfuscation, it is hard to know how much of the NSA’s relationship with the Valley is based on voluntary cooperation, how much is legal compulsion through FISA warrants and how much is a matter of the NSA surreptitiously breaking into technology companies’ systems."

Did you read about the latest massive bug in Apple's SSL implementation? It's a particularly stupid mistake that would have been found instantly if they had adhered to programming standards. It's also easily explained by a botched code-merger or a simple copy-paste misshap.

Yet when I looked into the details that some folks found out, I couldn't help but think that it's odd how this particular bug was introduced in late September of 2012.

Remember, Snowden's files showed us that Apple became part of PRISM in October of 2012.

So my paranoia-driven brain tries to work out the scenario:
- did the NSA know about it?
- did the NSA exploit it?
- did the NSA plant it through a mole?
- did Apple add it themselves, at the NSA's request?

Pre-Snowden, I'd have said somebody fucked up and that's the end of it. Nowadays however, Hanlon's razor doesn't fly anymore, so I wouldn't rule out malicious intent.

That and most robberies happen during the day, not at night . . . when people are home. That's just stupid. Why would you wait until you KNOW someone is home to break in? No, you do it during the day.

Second, you don't even have the make a gun sound. Just yell. Done. Most robbers aren't there to kill and rape you. Matter of fact, I'd wager about 99% are not. They want easy money, that's it.

Third, as @kir_mokum said, if they have a gun you'd be dead before you can fire off a shot anyway. Assuming, of course, they were there to kill and rape you like this woman thinks they are.

Fourth, a robbery where no one gets hurt equals you get away with it. A robbery where you kill someone with a gun means they'll hunt your sorry ass down. So again, the robber wants nothing to do with other people.

These arguments just breed fear and paranoia into people. Just ask the guy in Florida who killed a door to door salesman selling crabs. Or the boy who was gunned down because he knocked on the wrong door (literally, GPS put him one house away), or the drunk college kid in my town who tried to open what he thought was his door but instead was met with a shotgun blast to the head.

So no, this is not a valid argument. Try again.

Well I'm humbled enough to admit that I know as much about nuclear energy production as a primary schoolboy. Extant history of large-scale operations leaves a foul taste for everyone, or should. How many European countries ditched the idea of ever using nuclear energy? How many phaseouts planned?

Out with the old if it's not a potential ELE (extinction level enterprise).

LD just made the scariest prediction considered all morning and begs the question, "Does the planet really need China playing around with tinker-toy nuke power plants considering their track-record for building ginormous engineering disasters?" They may have a 1000-year-plan for empire but their characteristic program of increase as their world economic status grows seems a, 'many trials, many errors' approach.

That their success in economic influence has been accomplished through producing sub-standard plastic bullshit consumer products, sub-standard textiles, etc. with indigenous slave-labor to sell the bullshit to robotic consumers like U.S., Mexico, (insert non-Asian nations here) while cornering the market on raw materials for their machine should be of preeminent concern beyond that of how humans will get the power they need to continue turning the planet into something ugly.

Look at what they accomplished in space just the other day with their launching of that satellite-grabber. Here's another new level of paranoia I can agree with;
"In March 2013, a new law that "prohibits anyone from China setting foot in a NASA building" was passed."(wiki)

China in space
What a frightening concept.