That's interesting. I haven't noticed that Northern Ireland belongs to the knights who say NI.

gogul: I think they influenced the British royals to invade.

Interesting though.. if the NI troubles were a civil war and that it's normal for foreign influence to be beholded in such wars and those who bombed the UK mainland were not terrorists.

.... what is the definition of a terrorist and as such the whole idea of 'enemy combatants' and holding them in G' Bay is rather moot.

Any way.. I gotta confront a pet shop owner about my Norwegian Blue parrot tomorrow

(V): I was only once in NI, and quite often on that island. Friends used to think about politics there, I left it to the bubbles of the beer.

(V): Why? (parrot)

Does he hang with his beak on the aviary?

gogul: Quite often that was all from visits by my parents, just bubbles in the beer. As one instance where they couldn't drink in a pub due to a meeting, but the Landlord just said for them to go to the pub across the road, tell the landlord there he'd sent them... and they'd get a nice drink for their trouble.

... Why??? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npjOSLCR2hE

(V): Well I could celebrate a political victory in NI. I got in a backroom after 11 pm. Or 10.30 I don't remember that.

gogul: Good lock in?

(V): No. Seemed like a formality. Plus the lady with the broom was frightening. The party was overwhelming, the smugglers funny and the bubbles many. The whole thing ended at a beach somewhere in the fresh of the day, lady's broom was dangerous. I never found out why she hadn't fun that night.

I've just been listening to an interview with the few left alive who fought in WWI.

As one said, to him the war was for nothing, the lessons had not been learnt (re WWII, etc) and why should it be the young that die. Why not if the leaders of our countries want a war, let them pick up a rifle and fight it out.

How many wars do you think there would be if that was the case. Long gone are the days when the 'King' fought in a war.

I find it especially pertinent when the UK government is um'ing over needed resources for our brave soldiers who fight at their request.

(V):

The "war to end all wars" was fought twice. WW I was not enough to make Europeans hate war long enough to stop hating each other. So they fought WW II and when they saw the destruction they brought on themselves they became sick enough of war to at least stop fighting for 64 years.

At least some of the lesson was learned, and now we have the European Union. It is not a perfect union, but at least the superpowers are not at each other throats any more. The fact that they are willing to welcome Slavs into the Union means that some of the old prejudices are slowly dying, and people still feel shame in the killing of Jews and Gypsies.

Still, we as human beings are slow to learn our lessons. Unfortunately, we have lost some perspective on what war does to countries and people. We saw this in Iraq. More fire power was rained down on Iraq in the first 80 hours of the war than all the combined firepower used by all participants in WW II. It seems unreal, and yet it is true.

I think that war will be there for as long as there is capitalism , because war is business. I don't see how the big superpowers can survive economically without war. Can you imagine the massive unemployment and profit losses if suddenly everyone stopped buying weapons? Entire cities in industrialized countries would end up unemployed. The biggest and most powerful corporation in the world would go bankrupt. Boeing, Lockeed-Martin, Ford, GM, Daimler, Microsoft, General Dynamics, General Electric, Siemens, Basf, Dow, and many others. All the big names in capitalism would be hit hard because everyone is got its fingers stuck in the war pie.

Übergeek 바둑이: You have good points, but war was here thousands of years before capitalism. Humans will always compete against each other in some form, just like tribes of chimpanzees

GTCharlie:
Yes, human history is a history of war, and all along somebody always became wealth producing weapons. Our capitalist system has perpetuated war and solidified it as one of the main driving forces of the world economy. We still manage to convince ourselves that we fight wars in the name of higher principles (like freedom, democracy, peace, etc.); however, the true driving force behind war has always been and will always the acquisiton of wealth and power. Higher principles and ideology are in the end just excuses.

Übergeek 바둑이: At least some of the lesson was learned, and now we have the European Union. It is not a perfect union, but at least the superpowers are not at each other throats any more. The fact that they are willing to welcome Slavs into the Union means that some of the old prejudices are slowly dying, and people still feel shame in the killing of Jews and Gypsies.

The creation and existence of the European Union has never had anything to do with war endeavors and war lust of the superpowers. You are absolutely off-base there.

Plus, the EU was never meant to be a "perfect" union and nobody wants it to be. I would like people from the North America to stop comparing the US union and the EU. There is nothing they have in common. Nothing.

The fact that they are willing to welcome Slavs into the Union means that some of the old prejudices are slowly dying, and people still feel shame in the killing of Jews and Gypsies.

What old prejudices? And what has the admission of the Slavic countries to the EU to do with the holocaust???

Pedro Martínez:
Just to clarify, I never compared the EU to the US. By perfect I mean that people do not necessarily want the same currency or political system, and for that reason some aspect of the EU are still being worked on.

I didn't say that Europeans formed the Union to stop war, but rather that Europeans stopped fighting and formed the Union. The EU has its origins in political, economic and idelogical principles that go back to the 19th century. It took two world wars to show European people that working together was better than fighting, and the motivation for the formation of the EU was there even before those wars.

> What old prejudices? And what has the admission of the Slavic countries to the
> EU to do with the holocaust???

Adolf Hitler and the Nazis had a deep hatred of Slavic peoples. There was a time when it would have been impossible to suggest people in Germany that they would share the same currency and even some of the same laws with Czech or Polish people. We also have to remember that the Holocaust went beyond Jews. Gypsies, Slavs, Communists, and other peoples were targetted by the Nazis. Millions of Slavs died in and out of concentration camps.

Some of the prejudice is still remnant in terms like "Bohemian", a term used to describe "the untraditional lifestyles of marginalized and impoverished artists, writers, musicians, and actors in major European cities". This was "a common term for the Romani people of France, who had reached Western Europe via Bohemia". Of course, the Kingdom of Bohemia was located in waht today is the Czech Republic. It was that kind of prejudice that the Nazis used against Gypsies and Slavs. The EU has made a lot of progress in moving against that prejudice and discrimination.

Übergeek 바둑이: Just to clarify, you keep comparing the EU to the US, viewing the EU system with the same "eyes" that got accustomed to the American type of union. The EU is perfect as it is - having the same currency or same political system within the whole EU has never been the primary (or even secondary) goal of the makers of the EU. The essence of the EU rests in uniform market and the Four Freedoms. For military affairs, there is the NATO.

Europeans stopped fighting and formed the Union
The EU was established in 1993.

Are you saying that the Nazi view of the world has an impact on what the European Union officials consider in deciding what countries should be admitted to the EU?

The term "Bohemia" was derived from "Boiohaemum," i.e. the land of the Boii (a Celtic tribe), therefore whoever wants to base any prejudice on your interpretation of the word must be nuts. If you say that such prejudice is slowly dying in Europe, I'm telling you that you don't know what you are talking about. It's the same as if I wanted to claim that there is a prejudice against the Canadians in the Czech Republic, because "kanada" means a heavy boot in Czech.

Pedro Martínez:
> The EU was established in 1993.

I recommend that you look at the Wikipedia entry:

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

The EU was offically established in 1993, but the impetus to form it goes back to the end of WW II and the Paris Treaty of 1951. The legal framework on which the EU was formed took decades of negotiation.

> Are you saying that the Nazi view of the world has an impact on what the
> European Union officials consider in deciding what countries should be admitted
> to the EU?

No, I said that Europeans put aside some of the old prejudices that were emobdied in the Nazi racist view of the world. I never said that Nazi views influenced the decision of which countries should join, but rather that countries like Germany moved forward and put aside their old prejudices.

As a Czech, you must know very well the views of Nazis with respect to Slavs. I recommend that you look at this Holocaust entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust#Slavs

Please read carefully what was posted. I am not reflecting prejudice against Slavs, but rather pointing to the fact that during the war Nazis were putting Slavs in concentration camps.

I was also pointing to the fact that the word "bohemian" was used as a derogatory term against poor people, and it reflected prejudice against Gypsies coming from Bohemia.

The development of the European idea, you can start it with the repatriation under Charlemagne, 1200 years back from here. The problem of the past 50 years is the philosophical back up, not the philosophical back up by itself, but because the complicated structures of the European institution as a whole reflects the struggle of a permanent search of a (maybe) future unification of a European spirit, in its daily practice. The given structure and struggle make it to a moloch without chance to pay attention on the richness of mentalities allready in friendship since the tiredness of the wars, in which the history of the former Yugoslavia falls appart. What does it say? If I talk about the mentalities in friendship, I'm not talking about national identities. We might as well face wars again over Europe, which is wars against our so called nations. Philosophy our days, it's like the problem in between the chair and the computer. It has lost its nimbus on we look up to, same as we lost the the respect toward our nations, because we are sick of the machines the nations represent, because we don't believe anymore in people with cravats financed by the states who spend their lifes in libraries to back up their paycheck. Authority today are the regions who know how to handle them self, because we see today, in contrary to 10, 20 years back, the cheat nations represent. We see the theft of the strange high society, coupled with the obligation to ridiculously enough compensate the theft out of our own pockets. The richness of Europe is overwhelming. Give it back down, or the people will stand up against you soon enough. Be it by renouncing in your participation, or by fighting you.

If you say that such prejudice is slowly dying in Europe, I'm telling you that you don't know what you are talking about.

Übergeek 바둑이: Even with the best formation, soon as the economy toddles you get a 'kanada' if you tried something elsewhere, even if it means that it leaves a desert behind

Übergeek 바둑이: Capitalism ... I feel that is a myth of sorts. Instead of Kings, Lords and dukes, we have CEO's, chairmans and partners. The names have changed. But have we dropped the kingdom, etc.

As back then before business became the new realm, power and money are still the coin that many base their success by.

Territory!!

GTCharlie: Chimps behave like they do as they as being animals they have no choice in the wild. The ol' fight or flee rules them. But we branched down a different evolutionary ladder. There is nothing wrong with being competitive, but we can choose how if we use the ol' grey matter... even though we live (to use a phrase) in the concrete jungle.

We've let the 'kings' in the past tell us who we should fight, by whatever name they choose to crown themselves by. But the old definition of Lord still is remembered, and when that rules... they do not.

Übergeek 바둑이: You forget that we in Europe can distinguish between being a German, being a 'nazi', and being a Nazi.

We had our war trials, Israel has helped hunt down the remainder. We know why Germany became as it was under the Nazi's. We know the causes and as such we cannot blame Germany becoming as it did, or the German people.

It was those who sought the repayment of war damages from WWI that had more to do with the rise of the Nazi party. Especially after the fact that the decision to make Germany repay was questioned.

Why do you think the allies helped in the rebuilding of the former axis powers... to stop the breeding ground.

gogul: There is always protest as such... Gandhi style. A stand has more power than a war!!

right lmao

(V): Territory. Like in your video game civilisation

(V): You should elaborate the difference between 'chimps' and Chimps or what is useless and what nonsense in your posts.

gogul: Gone off that one.. Command & Conquer now Fun seeing the likes of Tim Curry and the others narrating the action.

As to nonsense? What part of my posts don't you agree with? It'd be easier if you said then a generalised personification of your disagreement.

Capitalism doesnt cause wars. People do. And the factors are many and cannot be reduced to a single factor. As long as there are people there would be war. If capitalism didnt exist, we'd still have wars.

Artful Dodger: The setting of direction does. I post a text originally german, by an autor who publishes only with his forename. I hope the translation is worth the reading.

The investment volume of the OECD-industrial countries in ratio of armament to own agriculture is 3:1 according the Food and Agriculture Organisation FAO. If food had the infrastructure of weapons there wouldn't be famine. In the industrial countries 4 of 100 persons produce enough corn for the respective populations. In the developing countries it's 80 of 100. In vue of this disproportion arises the question. Why not catapult these 80 persons though agriculture aids to the production level of OECD-states?

The at the beginning mentioned balance of power of 3:1 impedes this development and reflects political realities. From the industrial nations point of vue, independent developing countries with working agriculture jeopardize not only own agriculture exports, they don't need interest bearing standby credits and don't offer plattform for our helping industry. Further more, hungry persons are easier to manipulate, ensure cheap costs of globalisation, hence cheap imports, what again keeps domestic production costs low. 

The consequence of these economical think cramps are long since established and make the number of poor-working grow. This trend leads forseeable to social tensions with historical best known passing, the bullet producers again profitate.

The political redesign of this deconstruction vehicle to a constructive is asking for a change o circumstances. Our politelite is probably not able and willing to move to a concern building trigonal splits in between bulletproducers, industrial fodder producers and the third world farmers. The consument can make or brake it though. Return to regionality, seasonality and a little of sacrifice. Not only this minimizes the worldwide transport slapstick comedy, but reduces also global over-exploitation at human, animal and environment with involved wars.

Economists will call this consume sacrifice a century recession. But please: What do we have today? Only a consume change changes the circumstances in favor of all, because our over weight stresses the global balance, finds cynic manifestations in neocolonial doctrines of globaly acting profiteer, who in vue of permanently growing numbers of hungry people gets confirmed in their enemy stereotype pleas to grow the numbers of bullets to continue to eat corn in quiet and as long polit sponsored Wall Street gladiators continue to fund potential of destruction, nothing will change.

Our potential of aggression (ratio of 3:1) needs blood since ever. So it's questionable if it's a opulence of corn that makes the change. But at least you could strike yourself dead with bread.

The biggest and most powerful corporation in the world would go bankrupt. Boeing, Lockeed-Martin, Ford, GM, Daimler, Microsoft, General Dynamics, General Electric, Siemens, Basf, Dow, and many others. All the big names in capitalism would be hit hard because everyone is got its fingers stuck in the war pie.

Übergeek 바둑이: So what?

Artful Dodger: The fear of not having enough, or what you have being taken away causes many wars. The fear of being wrong can cause wars. As one old gezzer said, not often we fight for the right reasons. Religion, ethics, morality, creed, land, resources, life, freedom, fear, love, greed, etc, etc....

Within them all lurks the ability to become a war. It's all a matter of perception and as often the case.. how good a day someone is having.

(V): yawn. Point one and two. How? Point three. Why? The geezer well leting it be good.

Second paragraph. Perception. Whose? ...how good a day someone is having. What?

gogul: Look at why WWI started. Over an Arch Duke!! Oh they were just waiting for a reason.. bottled up anger and the like. And suppose some one is having a bad day and then goes to a meeting over foreign policy.. are our leaders void of emotions?

Para'd ..... Hey guys. Arch Duke Fernie has been killed.. he was my brother!!
Why did America join WWI.. a ship.
Why did Stalin kill so many people.. he was insecure.
McCarthy'ism?
The Witch Hunts?
.... Do you get my drift now?

(V): Yes. Our days in Europe war is at most riot like in Iran. It's not social jumpiness that made the Islamic Iran and it's revolution fall. It's the repression of the regime. So, I don't see black for the future. It's even funny to scare statesman and -woman. Radioaktivity or fundraising at Dagobert Ducks door is their problem.

gogul:

> So what?

The point I was trying to make is that the world financiers are making huge fortunes by promoting war, then war will not end under capitalism. As long as war is business and profit, then we will have it and millions will go on dying. Industrialized nations would never accept a change in the economical system. Capitalism is here to stay, and by extension, war is here to stay too. Without war there would be massive unemployment and an economic contraction that would leave capitalism bankrupt.

Artful Dodger:

> Capitalism doesn't cause wars. People do.

First, what causes capitalism? People do. Wars are fought due to the greed for wealth and power. Everything else is just an excuse. You can quote ideology, but once you see who is making money, the causes of war are obvious. There isn't a single war that was not fought to acquire territory, or natural resources, or subjugate a people. Ideology (or religion) were always just excuses.

Greed and selfishness are the cause of war. Capitalism is a system that glorifies greed and selfishness as "free enterprise" and Adam Smith's "invisible hand". Then capitlism perpetuates war, and the capitalists of the world have little interesting in ending the arms trade and the wars that make them rich.

It is true, war has existed since cavemen could pick up sticks and whack each other on the head. Capitalism has caused many wars too, like all systems preceding it. Contemporary capitalism is guilty not just of creating wars and profitting from them, but also of failing to make any progress to end war. There is a reason why the countries with the biggest weapons manufacturers in the world have refused to sign and ratify treaties to end the small arms trade, the manufacture of land mines, the use of cluster bombs, etc. Those are all "best sellers"!

Tuesday:

> Aren't Gore and B. Clinton just the studliest of all stud muffins?

I am sure Monica L. agrees that B. Clinton is better than a lemon-poppy seed muffin.

I thought Barack Obama was considered quite the SM too, in fact, he might be right up there, in the range of a buttered crumpet with strawberry marmalade on top.

The question is, are there any Republican stud muffins?

Übergeek 바둑이: I got what you were saying. With "so what?" I was asking what is the problem with the big warmongers and their helpers like Monsanto go down? Are you in one of those businesses who lost contact to the real world? Then let me tell you strait, I wouldnt care about you. Justice today is a farce, this is not only what informed people know. You know even more about if you work in the managments of war profeteers, banks, etc. Justice is to see those people weed on our fields.

The answer of what I expect from Obama to change, read below. And then again the question. Why should we care to see those big companies go down? Intelligent people is not the rich profeteering from those companies, not media, politicians, think thanks supporting them. Don't care don't mind. Of course it's a moral corrupt thing to work for Monsanta.

The alternative to the world today, it's a better one without the warmongers. Simple choice in my eyes. My gun is loaded and aims in direction of spin doctors. You can stop the nonsense about huge unemployment, this only happens if the warmongers are not cooperative.

Aren't Gore and B. Clinton just the studliest of all stud muffins?

Tuesday: Or how about if Obama would shoot the joke Eric Prince from Blackwater. Just to show that he means what he is saying.

Übergeek 바둑이: I suggest some former pages may have an opinion on Foley

People who were thinking for the Bush-administration respectively to fill their maps with meaningless papers were reacting on what happened here in 2007. A f/s made the proof and attentive members could nothing else than notice. So what will WE get. Justice or games, Barak Obama?

These govts , those who indeed possess ove spaces of this earth, they are drowned in it. Take the Chinese as extreme: They have over a too long period of time not shown any will to find any kind of identification to climate change, human rights, labor conditions and ANY burning problem of our earth. All just alien things for them. They are DROWNED in incredible richness, and all you can buy with money. The Chinese do nothing else but fighting the KP. They fight on daily basis against a corrupt ugly monster exporting toys who get classified as dangerous. Exporting jevelry which kills the polisher. Exporting systematic fake and phony bogus products. Polluate the Chinese waters to oppress the Chinese. The bogus exporting nation exports bogus, this is what traders have to deal with when it comes to a Chinese to talk with, you are confronted with bogus to keep you alien.

The company Siemens is drowned enough to sell Russian nuclear power plants in the west btw. The Russian argue toward Siemens managers that all other energy sources have substantial drawbacks. Like wind turbines: infrasonic, causing depressions. Solar panels: Do localy cool down the air. Well thanks for the information.

Siemens made a good deal in march, didn't day. The permanent grave drawbacks and the fatal doom in process of this industry, have Siemens managers ever heard about? No? But Angela Merkel has, something we can be sure about. It's her problem anyway.

gogul: Did you hear about the sofas from China? Some kinda little bag that was used to stop them developing mould etc while in transit was causing allergic reactions in people in the UK who sat on them.

China has come some way since it's pure 'communist' regime. It's got a way to go yet, but as with much of the wars (internal and external) the us and them needs dropping.

The old adage "his name is legion" comes to mind... which also relates to how the war mongers and the big war machine stay in business.

Speaking of stuf muffins, Count Vlad Putin should be counted among them! I guess there are stud muffins not just outside the Democrat ranks, but also outside the US:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090806/world/eu_russia_putin_celebrity_1

I find V's comments interesting. China is very different today from what it was 40 years ago. From the Cultural Revolution to capitalist superpower. China might be ruled by the Communist Party, but China is one of the most "free enterprise" countries in the world. Compared to most western nations, China has very lax laws for opening and operating a business. For this reason China seems to have a more liberal policy towards business than many western nations and in China you can literally buy and sell anything.

In comparison, many western nations have complex laws, and opening and operating businesses is relatively complicated and expensive. We have a lot more laws for protecting workers, the environment, etc. In that sense most western industrialized countries (including the US) are a lot more "socialist" than China is. We also have much more powerful centralized banking systems and economic controls in place.

China's change was the product of Deng Xiaoping's policies when he became head of the Communist party after Mao's death. Deng Xiaoping was educated in France. It was in France that he was exposed to Marxism, but I imagine that his stay there also gave him a sense of the potential in industrialized capitalism. He brought western ideology, both Marxist and capitalist, to China.

Of course, the lack of regulations has caused a lot of problems with the environment and public health. Quality control is good in China, but there are also big lapses and dishonesty. In fairness, I don't think China is worse than any other country. I have seen some really poor quality products made in North America and Europe. We pollute a lot more than China does, and we have had serious issues of public health and quality control.

Übergeek 바둑이: Just reminds me of something I learnt re new televisions....

6 years is the expected lifetime till major parts break and it becomes to costly to fix. If your TV lasts longer.. think yourself lucky.
I see windows built with plastic parts that are designed to have a short lifetime.. the metal version lasts longer but some just use the plastic.

In the end companies are in the business of selling items. So nothing today as such is built to last like back in the days of the industrial revolution era.

(V):

Consumer capitalism has fallen into a system of discardable items that are meant to last for a few years. In that way consumers must constantly keep replacing what they buy every few years.

If we go back a few years, say the 1970s, people would have thought it was stupid to buy a piece of electronics (like a calculator) only to replace it or throw it away in two or three years. Now we routinely buy cell phones, MP3 players, etc., and we know that after two or three years they will be "obsolete".

There was a time when people would reuse everything. My grandmother would wash plastic bags and reuse them over and over until they were in tatters and could not be used any more.

15 years ago a computer would cost $3000-4000 (at least 2000 pounds in the UK). If you had told those consumers that their computer would be obsolete in six months, they would have refused to buy them. Now computers are cheap and there are so many old computers that we don't know what to do with all that plastic.

Plastic windows became popular (at least here in Canada) because they are more energy efficient. Plastic is a poor transmitter of heat compared to metal, so in our cold weather plastic windows make sense. However, they last less. It used to be that brick and mortar was the preferred way to build homes. Here in Canada the construction industry shifted to plywood and particle board. It is more energy efficient, but after 30 or 40 years homes literally fall apart. Brick lasts centuries. Companies like Home Depot have made billions by convincing home owners to replace or renovate homes with materials that will need to be replaced in a few years.

I think it is environmentally unsustainable. The more garbage we make, the more pressure there will be to find a place to put that garbage. Shipping it to India might be OK for industrialized nations trying to sweep the problem under the carpet, but sooner or later all that garbage will come back to haunt everyone, just like Radon gas in homes built over covered landfills.