Oh no!!!

If you haven’t noticed, I’m not Bob. I decide my positions on my own, and while I’m socially liberal, that doesn’t mean I agree with the “liberal” positions at all times. I’m not insulted at my position being called “conservative”….I’m not tribalistic that way.

EG-I’m pro gun….but very pro regulation.

I’m actually a fiscal conservative, but unlike the right I know that doesn’t really mean the government should only pay for the military and nothing more. I agree with any spending that saves billions or trillions overall, even when it means some people get a free ride.
I think police are a good idea, although I believe they need serious reforms because they have lost their mission completely.
I think public roads are a good thing, as are public water and power systems.
I think national health care is a no brainer that works well in almost every country and saves trillions per year.
I think a safety net is a good idea...give people something to lose so they don’t turn to crime because they have nothing to lose.

Edit: I’ve said most of my adult life that I would be a Republican if only they would. Today’s Con has no resemblance to the Republican party I thought I grew up with (my entire family was hard core R).
Fiscal sanity, gone. Caring about the environment, gone. Supporting facts and science, gone. Supporting small government, gone (except with lip service). Strong and enforced gun regulations to protect gun ownership rights, gone. Strict supporters of law and order, not anymore. Government out of private life, so incredibly gone. Separation of church and state, gone. Fans of democracy, gone. Honesty, not even a memory.
I’m only a “blue liberal” by default. I might be libertarian if they weren’t crazed anti government extremists and almost MAGA.
Dems are the only ones left that really believe in democratic government.


I agree that 40 years+ without parole is cruel, but certainly not unusual or excessive. I never understand why excessively long prison sentences are considered less than the death penalty…I’m claustrophobic, to me it would be 40+ years of panic. I would give myself the death penalty fairly quickly because I’m not brave enough to face that. Swallow my tongue or bite it off, either works just fine and can’t be stopped. I’m really shocked that’s not the norm, but I’ve (clearly) never had to face it.

Bullshit....they were asked and they answered honestly that they'll save millions per year, said repeatedly and clearly it helps the rich, and they're rich.
Trump and Republicans just flatly lied about the bill.
He just lied, blatantly, daily, about tax law that affects us all....lied about who it benefits (him) and who it hurts (anyone making under $150k, and every American citizen because it bankrupts the nation) and you ignore it? Be assured I'll bring this up the next 3 dozen times you complain about liberals being less than perfectly truthful.

Damn straight members would have voted against it....because it's a horrific swindle that will bankrupt us quickly....I know that makes you happy, Dimitri, but Americans are pretty pissed.

He wouldn't be damned if he had signed the law he claimed it was, he's damned because he's a consummate, pathological liar. You are damned because you support that no matter what the lie is.

My holiday was tarnished by a big orange baby and his cadre of anti American idiots destroying my country's finances and likely starting a class war. It will only be great again when we eat the rich (or force feed them to their families)....I don't think that will take 3 years at this point if things continue on this road to bankruptcy. $1.5 TRILLION to the DEFICIT...that's $15 TRILLION in 10 years for one person's gain (anyone else that gains is coincidental, this was written specifically to benefit Trump and his family.). You can't ever complain that liberals or democrats are financially irresponsible again....never. You support lying to the country so your guy can bankrupt the country for personal gain. No patriotic American would do that. If you aren't Russian trying to harm America, you're almost certainly a traitorous moron. I see no other possibility.

I use slightly less than that myself on average, but we have solar water heating (supplemented with gas), so that's a good savings (especially since it also heats the hot tub), and we replaced all our light bulbs with led bulbs when they became feasible last year. Now, we usually read between 400 and 1000 watts during the day (depending on how many lights I have on, and if the refrigerator is cycled on or not.) That's running a big screen TV, computer, and often ps4 almost all day, every day. We also have electric stove and oven...and I weld, adding somewhat to our total.

Yes, my battery bank is only useful for power outages. It's enough to keep the lights on and the fridge from thawing, but not much else. We get about 3-4 hours out of it if I don't notice the power went out, but can make it all night if we conserve. Our system is grid tied, and first powers the home, then tops off the batteries, then sells any excess to PG&E. To date, I've never drawn the batteries down to zero...but we do have a small generator to supplement it when the power's out for days. The average home would certainly need more, but a 10kwh battery should be plenty to make it through an average night without AC (we don't have AC here).

My current system could not produce that much, but close. I live in N California, one of the foggiest areas in the US. Because we have a renter, an electric hot tub, dishwasher, and electric washer and drier, we use slightly more than we generate at this point, but my system is upgradeable to 6500 watts of generation (I have less than 1/3 of that now) when panels get cheaper...and when I can find space for more.

My system is not flat to my roof, and I have 2 strings of 8 panels. With the solar water tubes, it takes up most of the south 1/2 of my roof (1200 sq ft home). I could maybe fit 4 more panels up there and still be able to walk around them to clean them, but any more and I'll need some mounting structure. I really want to add a small wind turbine to generate at night or when there's a storm...solar doesn't work in the dark.

In America, we still have some rebates for people adding solar to their homes, but they are drying up fast. 15-20 years ago, you could almost do it for free if you got every rebate available.

We used to have about 1-2 weeks of power outage where I live per year, and that was part of why we did they system. We hated having no power and losing food every year, and also hated paying the ever rising cost of electricity. Before adding our system, we had $4-500 a month electric bills, now we have <$100 in winter and sometimes a negative bill in summer...we pay our bill once a year now, lump sum at the end of 12 months.
On to your second post....
I often think...electric cars were popular and the norm in cities before Ford came along. It's still astonishing to me that it was basically dropped for a century as a technology (with minor exceptions). I'm glad someone had finally gone back to it and is trying to fix it's issues. If I could afford a Tesla, I would have one.

I also agree, people won't adopt the technology as long as they have to sacrifice lifestyle for it. I said the same thing, but I found that I don't change my lifestyle at all with my solar system, I just pay lower bills. I determined that buying a system would pay for itself in under 10 years, with the lifespan of a system being about 20 years, that's 10 years of free electricity! That all assumes electric rates didn't go up, and they certainly have gone up...but not for me. You just need to be sure you install enough panels to supply all your power, and you're there.

The battery thing is really mostly for non-grid tied systems, or emergencies. Most people don't use batteries at night, it's simpler and cheaper to just sell power to the grid during the day and buy it back at night if you can, using them as your battery. Perhaps this battery will change that, but with lead acid, it's hard to make them worth the cost.

Panels aren't that expensive, really. In many areas, with rebates, they can be near free. (some companies will even give them to you and split the power generated off your roof). It's a myth that solar is expensive...when compared to non-solar. Mine are paid for by bill savings already (8 years + in) so I'm saving money with them now, and my lifestyle has not suffered in the least. I have lights on if its dark, I watch TV all day, and use the computer all day, have tons of electric devices I use, and soon will power a pond, etc. I often think that my life is a much better example of how you can be 'green' without much change than Gore's. He really doesn't seem to walk the walk, but he can sure talk the talk.

Unfortunatly, it's not just Merkel and her cabinet. It's the press, it's the economics departments at universities, it's politicians at all levels. Call it an economic nationalism, hell-bent to defend what they know to be the moral way of doing business. Everything left of this special flavour of market fundamentalism has been systematically attacked and suppressed for at least 30 years.

For instance, our socialist party, still referred to as the fringe of what is acceptable, runs on what is basically a carbon-copy of social-democrat programmes from the '70s. Similar to the British Green Party and Labour. Krugman, Stiglitz, Baker, Wolff, DeLong -- they'd all be on the fringe in Germany. Even the likes of Simon Johnson (IMF) or Willem Buiters (City Group).

If you speak out in favour of higher inflation (wage growth) to ease the pressure on our brothers and sisters in southern Europe, you'll be charged with waging a war against German saver. "You want to devalue what little savings a nurse can accrue? Don't you support blue collar workers?"

The same blue collar workers have been stripped of their savings by 15 years of wage suppression, the same blue collar workers are looking at poverty when they retire, because the PAYGO pension system was turned into a capital-based system that only works to your benefit if you never lose your job, always pay your dues and reach at least age 95. The previous system survived two world wars without a problem, yet was deemed flawed when they realized how much money could be channeled into the financial system – only to disappear at the first sight of a crisis, eg every five to ten years.

Similarly, you could point out that a focus on trade surpluses might not be the greatest of ideas, given the dependence it creates on foreign demand, a weak currency and restricted wage growth domestically. But they'll call you a looney. "The trade surplus is a result of just how industrious our workers, how creative our scientists and how skilled our engineers are. It's all innovation, mate! Are you saying we force the others to buy our stuff? That's madness."

You simply cannot have an open discussion about macroeconomics in Germany. Do I have to mention how schizophrenic it makes me feel to read contradictory descriptions of reality every day? It's bonkers and everyone's better off NOT reading both German and international sources on these matters.


Any compromise would have to work with this in mind. They'd have to package in a way that doesn't smell like debt relief of any kind. People know that stretching the payment out over 100 years equals debt relief, but it might just be enough of a lie to get beyond the level of self-deception that is simply part of politics. If they manage to paint Varoufakis' idea of growth-based levels of payment as the best way to get German funds back, people might go for it. Not sure if our government would, but you could sell it to the public. And with enough pressure from Greece, Spain, Italy, and France most of all, maybe Merkel could be "persuaded" to agree to a deal.

As for Syriza's domestic problems: it's a one-way ticket to hell. Undoing decades of nepotism under external pressure, with insolvency knocking on your door? Best of luck.

Italy is hard on Greece's heels in terms of institutional corruption. Southern Italy, in particular, is an absolute mess. Given the size of the Italian economy, Syriza better succeed, so their work can be used as a blueprint. Otherwise we're going to need a whole lot of popcorn in the next decade...


Edit: Case in point, German position paper, as described by Reuters. As if the elections in Greece never took place.

Why is this interesting? If you'd poke around the settings of Google maps you'd know its had offline map saving ability for years, which allowed me to do the same thing in 2011 without having the radio enabled.
meh video is meh

Again, any problems that I do have, will not be solved with the addition of more religion. Less religion? Might help things on a global scale, but on a personal level, I have removed it's (negative) influence from my life.

I agree, you don't need religion. You need to be born again and have a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

I much more interested in living a good life. I wish to lead an ethical life, be happy and be a good friend and husband.

Admirable, but when you say good, you're talking about relative terms. Are you good in comparison to Hitler? Sure. In comparison to God? No, not at all. If you only sin 5 times a day, by the time you're 70 you'll have committed over 100k sins. Is that good? Rejecting God and sinning every day is not good, it is evil.

Also I support that which is good and oppose that which is evil. Kinda like Jesus, or more awesomely, Batman.

If you supported what was good then you wouldn't resist God, but by opposing Him you support what is evil. So you have them backwards. You're also borrowing from His moral standards when you're using the terms "good" and "evil". Under darwinism, there isn't really any such thing.

If I had a friend who had a serious problem, but wouldn't acknowledge it, I wouldn't wait for them to come to me. I'd try to help. I think most people would. So that leaves the following possibilities in order of probability (starting at the most likely)

And if you're like this person, you would keep refusing help over and over again:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/30/health/conditions/crystal-hiv-aids-atlanta/index.html?iref=allsearch

1. Jesus (the man) is dead, if he ever really existed in the first place. Jesus (the "son of god") is a fairy tale.

2. Jesus/God/Allah/Buddah is perfectly happy with the way I'm living my life, and chooses to let me get on with it.

3. Jesus knows I'm screwing my life up(!?), but is such a collossal dick that he can't even be bothered to intervene. And again, don't give me that bullshit of "he has intervened, through the church. blah blah blah". Back to my hypothetical friend with a problem. Let's say he's a heroin addict for the sake of argument. Would I be morally ok with just sending an email to the local addiction centre suggesting they look into this?

4. Jesus knows you're screwing your life up, but is allowing you to explore the consequences of your choice to walk away. He will keep reminding you that you are headed for a fall, but until that happens, you will probably be too proud to turn to him.

Take it from me. If I had taken the opportunity when it was offered instead of when I had no choice to admit it, I could have saved myself 2 years worth of calamity. You should do the same and put down your stubborn pride.

>> ^ChaosEngine:
>> ^shinyblurry:
?

This could have saved me 3 years of wasted Latin class at highschool.

@solecist you completely missed the point of my post. YMMV when it comes to saving change. I was just saying that it's worth saving money in a jar instead of throwing them out into the trash (which, btw, is illegal, but not enforced). Obviously all examples in this thread will be completely anecdotal, but it doesn't take away from the fact that my teacher did this and saved $1000 a year, while your friend only got $100, while @mgittle saved ~$300 2-3 times a year.

I agree with the man in the video by saying pennies and nickels are useless(therefor my upvote of the video), but I disagree with the poster who said it's better to just throw them away, citing my example as a reason why you shouldn't.

600 square feet of panels is two 6'x5' panels on a rooftop--that isn't very big.

Elementary geometry says you need TWENTY 6'x5' panels to get 600 sq feet. Regardless, the issue is not the surface area per se but the COST to cover that much surface area. Photovolt panels are expensive, highly inefficient, and use toxic elements. They need maintainance, replacing, repair, and have a lifecycle. Same with the VERY expensive batteries you need to buy.

And it doesn't cost $50,000 per household.

Many estimates put the installation of a fully functional solar powered home at well over $50K. 660 sq ft costs $10,853 just for the panels using the cheapest product I could find. Then there is wiring, connectors, inverters, batteries, mounts, control panels, and monitors... The backhills of Alberta may be different, but in the U.S. it is highly illegal to install your own electrical system... You're looking at thousands in licensing, regulatory, and labor. $10K? Not on this planet.

But let's say you're super lucky and manage to get the whole shebang installed for only $25K somehow. That's about $150 a year in savings over 20 years versus fossil, or $13 a month. Is that worth it? Well, no. There's a reason people don't buy 20 years of food at once in order to save a few pennies a day. Same goes here.

Imagine you install your cool new solar system and 5 years later you lose your job. Unless you make up the cost in the sale of your house, you just lost $15K pal. Good luck selling your house when you're charging $15K more than the guy down the street... And get ready to pay ANOTHER $20K to install your new system in your next house... Oh nos! You need to move again in 3 years...? (Sad trombone...)

Solar is OK for heating water. It sucks for general purpose electrical needs. It is a pipe dream, because it can't be done in a way that makes sense because the technology is still too expensive. Yeah - people are 'doing' it... People are also 'doing' hydrogen fuel cells for cars but 99.99% of the population can't afford the $100,000 price tag.

Why do you have such a blind allegiance to the republican ideals?

I'm not a Republican, so I'm not even sure what you mean by this. This has nothing to do with politics. This is about common sense and what is actually possible with real-world physics and economics. I realize such things are problematic obstacles to people who are blinded by political blinders - but they still matter on planet Earth.

>> ^demon_ix:
We disagree completely then. The point of what he made wasn't to make a cool animation "to fully show an understanding of the advantages that stop motion animation offers"... The point was to make a video of 80's video games using nothing but Lego blocks. He achieved it superbly.

Yes, he did achieve that. But like I said, he wasted his time (not all of it) since he could have done that AND have done something more suitable for the medium with the same amount of time spent. Again you're missing the point.

What you're suggesting, is using a computer software to replicate Lego blocks and use those virtual blocks to make an identical animation in less time, and while that's more pragmatic, saves time and effort, it's completely losing the actual point of making a video with Lego blocks..... Why still make a video of Lego blocks moving around, when you can make a 3D animation of the actual game characters?

Because then it wouldn't look like Lego blocks. The whole point of CG was that it can replicate the effects. Using actual characters would not produce the same effect. Isn't that obvious? Do I really have to explain that?

And while you're at it, why not program the original games, making a version of Pong, Pac-Man, Super Mario etc? And why not go beyond that and make a better game, and market it? He could make lots of money that way, no?

Ok You've missed the point by a mile now. How did you get from animation to making games? Did you even read what I wrote?


I actually think my Usain Bolt car analogy is very good, since he could save years and years of rigorous physical training and sacrifice, and go do something useful with his time, since he can get from the start to the finish with ease and more speed in a car.

No, you see, his career as a athlete revolves around racing on foot, not to get from start to finish by any means necessary. Therefore, using a car would not achieve the same effect. Now if the effect he was going for was to get to the convenience store faster, and he spent thousands of hours to train for that and never raced, then that would be a waste of time since he could have done it with a car. Your analogy fails in every way.

We disagree completely then. The point of what he made wasn't to make a cool animation "to fully show an understanding of the advantages that stop motion animation offers"... The point was to make a video of 80's video games using nothing but Lego blocks. He achieved it superbly.

What you're suggesting, is using a computer software to replicate Lego blocks and use those virtual blocks to make an identical animation in less time, and while that's more pragmatic, saves time and effort, it's completely losing the actual point of making a video with Lego blocks..... Why still make a video of Lego blocks moving around, when you can make a 3D animation of the actual game characters? And while you're at it, why not program the original games, making a version of Pong, Pac-Man, Super Mario etc? And why not go beyond that and make a better game, and market it? He could make lots of money that way, no?

I actually think my Usain Bolt car analogy is very good, since he could save years and years of rigorous physical training and sacrifice, and go do something useful with his time, since he can get from the start to the finish with ease and more speed in a car. Never mind that the whole point was to do it without a car...

But if you look at it in a "he got a world record, and thus accomplished something" perspective, consider the guy who came in last in that race. He technically accomplished nothing, and I doubt very much he even expected to win vs Usain Bolt. Why race at all then? Why not just give up and lie down? Why spend as much time uselessly training, keeping a diet and so on, when you won't break a world record or win the race?

In reply to this comment by mentality:
Look, I'm not saying what he achieved isn't art, or it's not cool. I'm saying it's a colossal waste of time because he didn't do anything unique to stop motion animation, and didn't make best use of his time.

Usain Bolt did something unique that you can't replicate with a car: break the record for human running speed. Terrible analogy. It looks like you're the one who's missing the point here.

Again: He could have designed his animation better, to fully show an understanding of the advantages that stop motion animation offers, and in the process do everything you said he accomplished: having fun with a hobby AND produce something truly cool and unique with it.

Sure he had fun making it, but by not achieving something more it's pointless masturbation.

We disagree completely then. The point of what he made wasn't to make a cool animation "to fully show an understanding of the advantages that stop motion animation offers"... The point was to make a video of 80's video games using nothing but Lego blocks. He achieved it superbly.

What you're suggesting, is using a computer software to replicate Lego blocks and use those virtual blocks to make an identical animation in less time, and while that's more pragmatic, saves time and effort, it's completely losing the actual point of making a video with Lego blocks..... Why still make a video of Lego blocks moving around, when you can make a 3D animation of the actual game characters? And while you're at it, why not program the original games, making a version of Pong, Pac-Man, Super Mario etc? And why not go beyond that and make a better game, and market it? He could make lots of money that way, no?

I actually think my Usain Bolt car analogy is very good, since he could save years and years of rigorous physical training and sacrifice, and go do something useful with his time, since he can get from the start to the finish with ease and more speed in a car. Never mind that the whole point was to do it without a car...

But if you look at it in a "he got a world record, and thus accomplished something" perspective, consider the guy who came in last in that race. He technically accomplished nothing, and I doubt very much he even expected to win vs Usain Bolt. Why race at all then? Why not just give up and lie down? Why spend as much time uselessly training, keeping a diet and so on, when you won't break a world record or win the race?

In reply to this comment by mentality:
Look, I'm not saying what he achieved isn't art, or it's not cool. I'm saying it's a colossal waste of time because he didn't do anything unique to stop motion animation, and didn't make best use of his time.

Usain Bolt did something unique that you can't replicate with a car: break the record for human running speed. Terrible analogy. It looks like you're the one who's missing the point here.

Again: He could have designed his animation better, to fully show an understanding of the advantages that stop motion animation offers, and in the process do everything you said he accomplished: having fun with a hobby AND produce something truly cool and unique with it.

Sure he had fun making it, but by not achieving something more it's pointless masturbation.

There is no objective value to life. It is purely subjective, and up to everyone to determine for themselves. I say that conscious life is the most valuable thing in the universe, but honestly that's not saying very much. Even if you believe as I do, you must then have the discussion of when "consciousness" is present or not. When does a fetus become conscious? Are animals conscious? Which animals? Why is it ok to eat some animals, but not others?

Even among the conscious life, we all subconsciously put life on a value scale. In a burning building, do you save the five year old, or the eight-five year old first? Do you legislate safety regulations so much that people can't leave their houses? Life is dangerous, where do you draw the line of "life vs. freedom"?

Should criminal behavior be subject to the death penalty? Who is to say that a person behind bars can't still contribute to society? It is often cheaper to keep a person in prison for life rather than prosecute for the death penalty. Can we justify spending more money to kill somebody? Very strange to hear that argument from the so-called religious people. I guess some people's reality is more subjective than others.

And don't get me started on those crazy fundamentalists who support war...

You (QM) lie on a routine basis.

Yeah, lying with the truth, supported by facts and logic.

You represent all that is filthy, lazy, and ugly in mankind.

But only compared to the socialist utopia dreamed up by frauds, thieves and charlatans. And of the three adjectives above, I'll agree with 'lazy' but that's it.

Thousands of years ago, the shaman stood on a little dirt mound, waved a bone and proclaimed the tribe was in danger of being killed by evil spirits; therefore give the shaman a portion of your harvest and he'll save you.

Thirty years ago, some poindexters in white labcoats stood at a podium with fraudulent computer models, trying to frighten people into believing the world would be destroyed by WARM WEATHER; therefore shut down all progress and give us half your income in taxes and we will save you.

There is no scientific evidence for man-made global warming, only govt-sponsored scientists trying to lick the hand that feeds them (with OUR tax dollars).

When it comes to the man-made global warming religion, I'm an atheist.

Hamas is not a splinter group, it has a political mandate and the people put Hamas in power. It is more than an analogy I use, there are Palestinian flags flying in the streets of Belfast right now. The Irish republican parties do not recognise Northern Ireland as being British, that is a political position with democratic support.

Whether or not you agree with Hamas' political mandate this is the Palestinian people's democratic right, and they elected Hamas to power based on that mandate. Oppressed nations always vote in the hard liners, this is how it has always been, this is why Northern Ireland now has the two extremist political parties sharing power.

It is not the moderates who have to be negotiated with, no political struggle has ever been resolved by moderates, it is the extremists who need to negotiate.

There will never be peace with borders and checkpoints, boundary dissolution *is* the route to peace.

Hamas recognising Isreal's right to exist would loose the support of the people who put them in power and is political suicide, no government of Palestine, not Hamas nor anyone else put there by those people can ever do that. If it were not for Hamas Palestine would have been wiped off the map, Isreali troops have been beaten back time and time again by Palestinian forces.

There is peace in Northern Ireland even though one of the sharing parties refuses to recognise the North of Ireland as British. This is a stable, tenable, peaceful political position with democratic support. Just as the British forces pulled out of the North of Ireland when this was achieved, so should Isreal have pulled out of Palestine when Hamas was elected- but they did not, and they continue to invade that country.

Many political charters around the world use strong extremist language, this is the way of the world, this is how democracy works, this is what political stability is all about.

Whatever the historical context, it is the will of the people today that is paramount, this is the very essence of democracy and it is the only way all of these conflict historically have been resolved. The Isreali and Palestinian people are sick of the bloodshed, but only the Palestinians have taken the political steps. This is exactly how it happened in Ireland.


In reply to this comment by bcglorf:
The problem with your analogy is that Hamas IS the rogue splinter group. Here are some quotes from it's own founding charter:
"Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors."
"Israel, by virtue of its being Jewish and of having a Jewish population, defies Islam and the Muslims."
"Leaving the circle of conflict with Israel is a major act of treason and it will bring curse on its perpetrators."

Once again, if you want to go back to Israel's declaration of independence I don't think it's needed to go find any quotes from Arab nations about wiping anyone off the map. The formerly Iraq,Syria,Lebanon,Jordan and Exgypt sent nazi trained armies against Israel to destroy it, urging the Palestinian people to flee and return a few days later after the presumed victory. When Israel managed to win, the mess we see today began in full. The Arab nations failed to provide for the Palestinian people they'd encouraged to flee, and Israel was stuck with serious security problems with letting everyone simply return. The constant run of wars since has shown those security concerns to be undeniably valid.

A political solution would be great, and your right in spirit about negotiating with moderates to remove borders. The 2 problems are that Hamas is not the moderate group to negotiate with until it recognizes Israel's right to exist, and that surrounding Arab nations like Iran and Syria keep encouraging the rogue extremists with funding, training and weapons.

In reply to this comment by Irishman:
The attacks are in response to Isreali oppression just as Irish Republican attacks in the 70s were in response to British oppression.

The longer the oppression exists, the less grip Hamas will have over splinter groups just as the political wing of the Irish Republican Army has no control over rogue elements and splinter groups.

Arab nations did not say they wanted to wipe Isreal off the map, they refused to recognise its sovereignty and there are political and historical reasons for this. This is a quote also attributed to Ahmadinejad as well, it is incorrect and is bandied around in American media all the time. Neither Iran nor any Arab nation has claimed to want to attack Isreal or wipe it off the map.

Removing borders will not stop splinter groups attacking Isreal, but doing it in conjunction with a political process with Hamas WILL, just as it has in Ireland.


In reply to this comment by bcglorf:
If you want to go back to 1948 then you need to blame the Arab nations for abandoning the Palestinian people when they bid to wipe Israel out upon declaring it's independence.

The settlement policy of territory outside the '68 borders is criminal. But so are Syrian and Iranian rockets being launched by Hamas against Isreali civilians. Comparing atrocities though doesn't fix anything.

Despite knowing that removing the borders and checkpoints would create much good will, Israel can't ignore that Hamas agents would also take advantage of that to launch rockets into Jerusalem. When an Israeli checkpoint keeps a suicide bomber out, and saves a 14 year-old life, it is doing something good.