Posts by laird cummings 588 publicly visible posts • joined 22 Aug 2007
Shatner $old his Priceline $tock during the Dot-Com bust, and lost out - BIG time.
If he'd kept his shares, their current price (even including the recent reverse 6-for-1 split) would have been valued at US$5.5M. Not that huge a lump. But still, more than he has now.
(Shared anelevator with him once, for about 15 floors - He's a funny guy, in person)
Actually, you're wrong. An 'Officer of the Law' is whomever the law says it is, niceties of oaths and such not withstanding. Rough-up a police dog (or police horse, for that matter) and depending on which jurisdiction you're in, you're committing anywhere from a first-class misdemeanor to a felony.
And Teh Fuzz..? They don't take kindly to folks what mess with their non-human co-workers. Nor do Prosecutors.
Mind you, NASA also launched a LOT more people overall, too... re-evaluate on terms of fatalities per flight, eh?
Depending on how you define it, there have been between 523 and 532 individuals sent into space - of which roughtly 2/3 are/were American. Roughly 20% were/are Russian (or Soviet). 842 total individual American flights, versus 226 individual Russian/Soviet flights. Hmmm.... Puts kind of different spin on things, eh?
Not to say that the Russkies/soviets are pikers - they're not: They've got 1/3 more TOTAL hours in space than America, despite the paucity in numbers of flights - that means those hardy cosmonauts are really sticking around for the long haul.
Without the full transcript, the appelate court cannot rule on the fairness (or lack thereof) of teh original trial. Without that record, any appeal is a game of judicial 'spin the bottle.' The most fair, shortest route forward is a do-over. Not to say that it's *absolutely* fair, or just, but nothing involving humans ever is - this is just the least bad of a number of bad choices.
Go on telling yourself that line. Sing yourself to sleep with it, maybe - that's the only benefit you're going to get from it.
So long as the rest of the world's nations keep refusing to deal with their own messes, you're going to have us (or US, if you prefer). Yes, that's right - Saudi Arabia wants us involved. And Korea wants us involved. And Tiawan wants us involved. And the UAE wants us involved. And what about that late bit of nastiness in Balkans..? Wait.. Didn't *that* require a US presence too, before Euorpe would show up to help clean up it's own back yard..? Why yes, yes it did.
So... Since much of the rest of the world is highly unlikely to man-up and deal with their own messes any time soon, I guess it *is* Team America time. And for that, best we have some options along... Or, we can do it your way, and go back to just killing them all and let their diety of choice sort things out.
Actually, you've kinda mis-quoted the conventions. It's only *perminant* harm that's outlawed, and even then, only if it's the *intent* to perminantly blind. Tricksy folks, them diplomats - very carefully made sure to leave *everyone* an out to do what they want. The US is just more inventive at it, these days (Past thought-leaders include Germany, France, the USSR, the UK, and others).
And it's hardly like we're the only nation out there with a bad attitude about people we don't like... Look around, open your eyes.
But make sure you're wearing your mirror shades when you do.
@Vehlin; I was a saber man, myself - while I could still be bothered to stay in shape and practice. Now, I'm more of a large slow target. :p My sister's man, however, is an epee-punk. Elegant stuff, the epee - yard-long straight-razors, and one hell of a mental game. You *need* a punk's mental attitude to excel with epee!
@Tom 13; Well, there are a *few* attacks in TPB - Just weakly executed without any aggression or elan.
To give the man full credit; even when dressed up in full fencing gear, holding a lightweight weapon with an electronic scoring system, facing another person over blades is an intimidating proposition. Force of will, the drive to dominate is every bit as important as athleticism and well-drilled reflexes. Fencing is for *aggressive* folks - far more so than most other forms of athletic competition.
On a small scale, anyway. Had to close the club and call out the dog handlers, too. But no one got a beating, and no one went to jail, and no one had anything other than an inconvenience (having to leave and go find somewhere else to be stupid).
Standards must be upheld. When you're The Law, or the representative of The Law, you need to be above reproach, or The Law is subject to reproach. And THAT is why the higher standard.
Once the US Federal Government decided to stop *assured* loan guarantees and killed tax credits to windfarms, NRG Bluewater got dropped like a crazy girlfriend by every investment source out there. Mind you, the Feds didn't say they *wouldn't* offer a loan guarantee - Only said that such a guarantee was not assured. Plus, they weren't going to subsidize it via tax credits (read: wealth re-distribution). That was more than enough to effectively kill the project.
This should tell you pretty much all you need to know about the economics and productivity of offshore windfarms in the US. If the mere uncertainty of a guaranteed loan and a lack of subsidies is enough to make an energy project uneconomical, you can be assured that the financiers don't believe the project is going to produce anything useful on its own.
Delaware just bought into a complete scam of a fuel-cell business, happily dumping the costs of subsidizing *that* pointless boondoggle by directly billing electricity users, so you know the State itself isn't shy of subsidizing dodgy projects. But even the gullible state legislators think offshore windfarms are too dodgy to back.
So tell me, Gordon - At what point did I say I was on either side of the political fence? Oh, that's right - simply observing the phenomenon must clearly make me a partisan. Not.
Sad.
But then again, you've very neatly illustrated the problem - NEITHER side seems willing to honestly observe, report, and develop policy on the subject. Not you, who are clearly a partisan 'for,' nor either JohnMurray's 'watermelons' (I do so dearly love the demonizing and dismissive perjorative - *such* an honest way to discuss any public policy issue!).
And THAT, folks makes my point entirely clear - When there's this much controversy, when folks on either side are so deeply entrenched - the industry WILL get a bad name. It can't help it. Bad Names *always* lead to tougher regulatory environments and thus to higher costs, no matter how deserved they are - or are not.
Me? I live right in the middle of the problem - And by that, I don't mean the actual fuel source (though I live on the edges of that, too) - No, I mean the flaming idiocy and well-poisoning by various partisans. Nice goin' folks.
Cheap shale gas isn't going to remain all that cheap for much longer - 'Fracking,' and rules around same, are extraordinarliy controversial right now, and a more skeptical climate is emerging. Without fracking, the volume of extractable gas is quite sharply limited, and fracking has a *very* bad name right now.
New environmental controls on gas extration by fracking are certain to drive costs up sharply.
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