Maziar Bahari appeared in a Daily Show segment 10 days before he was arrested. The footage was used against him while he was being interrogated and tortured. Jon Stewart had a personal stake in this particular story.

Also, no one is complaining about your feedback - it is the here-is-an-unrelated-topic-that-I-care-about bit that is cringe worthy.

Of possible interest...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_stop
and...
http://vimeo.com/4140910

The video title confused me initially, but apparently the band's name is "London Grammar" and the band members are named Hannah Reid, Dan Rothman and Dominic 'Dot' Major.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Grammar

You can also buy these same products from Crazy Aaron's Puttyworld: http://www.puttyworld.com/
The prices appear to be the same at either site, but Puttyworld has a larger selection.

FYI - the U.S. is still the largest manufacturer in the world. The U.S. makes 2 times the amount of stuff it did 20 years ago, with only 2/3 the workforce. As the jobs go away, the perception is that manufacturing is going away, but that is not entirely accurate.


>> ^wax66:

...To me, that's the fundamental problem with my country, the USA. We don't manufacture much any more, and when we do, it seems nobody wants it...

I like how he urges people to go out and investigate mainstream scientific beliefs for themselves, but doesn't do it himself. What "really solid evidence" has he found for his flat earth hypothesis? Shut the front door, dude.

You're right - this is all mostly speculation.

I believe that if the GM and Chrysler had failed, consumer confidence would have collapsed and Americans would have deferred their new vehicle purchases or bought used cars. As it was, auto sales were down 18% in 2008.

The failure of GM and Chrysler would have removed something like 33% of U.S. vehicle production, and 4% of all U.S. manufacturing. Everyone else would have maximized their production to make up for the loss, but it would have taken years to replace that amount of production.

Meanwhile, the 1 in 30 Americans residing in the State of Michigan start living in Mad Max times.

I think it is one of the functions of government to provide a buffer between the people and the wild throes of relentless progress inherent in free-market capitalism. The government bans things like slavery and child labor, not because it makes financial sense, but because it is the right thing to do. I think there is a similar justification for the automotive bailout. The bailout prevented human suffering on a massive scale. That is why we should care about saving those jobs.

IMHO

>> ^xxovercastxx:

>> ^NetRunner:
People also forget that it wasn't just people who work for GM and Chrysler whose jobs were saved. There's a whole supply chain to think about.
Do you believe that the demand for cars would have decreased if the big 3 went under? If so, please explain how and why....
... So the question I pose (and I know we can only speculate on the answer) is what effect have the bailouts had on Toyota, Honda, etc? Or do we not care because they don't employ as many Americans as the domestics?

You are out of date with your stereotypes - it has been a while since American cars have sucked. Quality has improved dramatically of late. And improved quality is a contributing factor in the slow-down of the industry. Americans replace their cars less frequently than in the past (a trend that predates 2008).

GM consistently outsells Ford, so your vote-with-our-wallets argument does not work.

Ford would have gone bankrupt in 2006 if it hadn't gotten a $23.5 billion government loan. Since it was a loan Ford now has more debt than its peers. Ford was not in a position financially to "grow to fill the gap".

The domestic automotive business accounts for nearly a million jobs, concentrated in just 3 states. Losing those jobs, even for a year or two while the economy adapted, would have sucked so so bad.


>> ^xxovercastxx:

...But I still would have preferred we let these companies fail, or they pick themselves up and turn things around like Ford did.
American cars have sucked for 20+ years now. They couldn't compete on a level playing field so we put tariffs on foreign cars to artificially raise their prices. On a slanted playing field, American cars still can't compete. Why? Because, overall, they're garbage; that's why.
We already voted to let them go out of business by not buying their cars...

I got more of a District 13 vibe, rather than Mirror's Edge...
http://youtu.be/suiYQLcrUoI

I think you've dismissed the tone too readily. And also the content.

The article tells us:
She is "obsessed" and "abandon[ed] [her] family" to "[cozy] up to some like-minded radicals". She is "otherwise 'occupied'" and "plans to stray awhile". She is "keeping herself warm at night with the help of a young waiter". In the morning "the pair... woke up... on their little patch of paving stone... and dashed off... to wash up." Her slogan is to "Make Love Not War".

I'm pretty sure there is some defamation of character in there somewhere.

>> ^marinara:

>> ^notarobot:
Is there any law that allows her to sue (faux/NYpost) for defamation of character for being misrepresented?

Besides the tone ofthe piece, How was she misrepresented?

Wikipedia has an article on that Bedford Canal experiment bit. Apparently there were a whole sequence of experiments conducted there giving contradictory results. With the right set of atmospheric conditions, the canal did appear perfectly level - and near the surface, with the right conditions, light really can curve downward at the same rate that the earth curves away. Of course they had the what-was-proving-what all backwards, but it is still an interesting phenomenon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedford_Level_experiment

It is true, but it is not just semantics.

Once the ball leaves the hand it will experience constant acceleration (ignoring drag). With just constant acceleration, the accelerometer can't tell us when the ball will reach apogee. Velocity and displacement are not being measured, so whether the ball is moving up or down won't register.

With only an accelerometer to work with, the only practical to way to predict when the ball will be at its highest point is to use the initial upward acceleration and a little bit of math.

>> ^ForgedReality:

>> ^messenger:
Nope. Once the ball leaves your hand, there is one significant acceleration force, which is gravity, downwards. There is no such force as "deceleration", just acceleration in a different direction. If by "deceleration" you mean gravity's acceleration downwards, it is constant enough for our purposes today: 9.8 m/s/s).>> ^ForgedReality:
>> ^blackoreb:
Your idea won't work. Once the ball leaves your hand, acceleration on the ball is essentially constant until it hits something. The only variable acceleration will be due to drag and "dependent on environmental influences such as air viscosity, temperature," etc.
The designer can account for your "never-let-go" scenario, as well as the more common "bouncing-around-in-the-back-seat" scenario, by requiring a minimum launch acceleration, followed by a minimum period of constant acceleration, before snapping a picture.
>> ^ForgedReality:
...Seems like it would make more sense to detect DEceleration, as that would facilitate either an upward OR a downward motion, and it wouldn't be reliant on possible bad guesses at when it would stop moving (dependent on environmental influences such as air viscosity, temperature, wind, obstacles in the path, etc)....

Once the ball leaves your hand, there IS no acceleration. In fact, it becomes inverted, as there are no longer any forces acting upon it to create acceleration, and it is now decelerating. Deceleration is not constant, as it reaches a point where it is essentially weightless. This is the point at which it currently seeks to snap the image. If It actually detected when the ball stopped moving, acceleration wouldn't be a factor.


Okay true enough, but now you're arguing semantics when you know full well what I meant.

Your idea won't work. Once the ball leaves your hand, acceleration on the ball is essentially constant until it hits something. The only variable acceleration will be due to drag and "dependent on environmental influences such as air viscosity, temperature," etc.

The designer can account for your "never-let-go" scenario, as well as the more common "bouncing-around-in-the-back-seat" scenario, by requiring a minimum launch acceleration, followed by a minimum period of constant acceleration, before snapping a picture.

>> ^ForgedReality:

...Seems like it would make more sense to detect DEceleration, as that would facilitate either an upward OR a downward motion, and it wouldn't be reliant on possible bad guesses at when it would stop moving (dependent on environmental influences such as air viscosity, temperature, wind, obstacles in the path, etc)....

Regarding the theater-going-experience: there are some movies are just better when viewed on the big screen - if you can catch a late-in-the-run matinee, you avoid many of the crowd-induced annoyances. On the other hand, there are some comedies that I find best viewed in a room full of laughing strangers - those I see opening weekend.

I still hope to see the stage version of Warhorse, but for now the movie will have to do.
http://maudlin.videosift.com/video/TED-Talks-The-genius-puppetry-behind-War-Horse

Assuming this motel is a giant den of iniquity, I get why the local government would want to shut it down. And I could see where the local community might be fine with that. But why wouldn't they just revoke their business license?

Even if the police get the property, they're just going to turn around and sell it. And there is nothing to stop the new owners from re-opening the motel, and operating it in the same way. In that case, there would be no benefit for the community at large - just a giant payday for the police.

This is nuts.