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Strangelove

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  1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_textbooks_controversy -This wiki covers the changes in the way Japanese textbooks have dealt with history in pretty good detail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_Soci...Textbook_Reform -This one on some of the questionable content in the most recent controversial history textbook.
  2. Post-War Japan is a very odd place sometimes. The Japanese were very quick in the aftermath of World War Two to accept General Douglas MacArthur's rule of Japan in the time between occupation and independence. During that time, the Japanese Emperor reounced his divinity (making much of the "legitimacy" for their activity during and before World War Two moot) and the Japanese people embraced their new constitution. It is the world's only "pacifist" consitution, with a clause that forbids Japan from having an army or taking offensive military action. They held their Tokyo war crimes trials, and as far as they were concerned, they had made ammends and could now join the community of civilized nations. (legal tangent, the modern day Japanese "Self Defense Force" is officially regarded as a branch of the Police department and so in legalese, is not an "army") Despite Japanese atrocities during and before the war (Nanking, Burma Railroad, etc) the Japanese as a people have not as overtly apologetic as the Germans. To give an example for comparison, in light of recent UN discussions about sending a UN force to Lebannon, several German newspapers were against the idea because they felt it would not be right to put German troops in a position where they might need to confront Jewish soldiers from Israel. In Japan by contrast, there is a slight bitter nostalgia for Japanese action during the war. For most Japanese, there is no malevolent intent, its more that it is seen as part of the history. As the generation who fought and lived during the war are now dead or dying, most of the current youth simply don't feel its their duty to appologise when their ancestors did not. Its rare to hear any Japanese person make public condemnation about the comfort women brought over from Korea because the Japanese just dont think they are important. This means that when China or (South) Korea have protests directed at the Japanese for not being appologetic enough, the avergae Japanese person really has nothing to say because they dont see themselves as a part of this. Now this is runs parallel to the more serious problem of Extreme Japanese Nationalism. Though it has waxed and wanned in recent decades, There are vocal Japanese Nationalists who want the Emperor Re-Instated, the Americans pushed out, and the Koreans Re-Occupied. They tend to get in the news a lot, confounding the situation. For example, a far right wing group recently published a Revisionist History textbook which glosses over events like Naking and makes Japan in World War Two out to be a "misunderstood" nation. In Japan, the public schools select which textbook to use and in the entire system, only about 1% selected the new textbook. This however, was blown up by the Chinese and the Koreans to make it seem as if the Japanese were re-discovering aggression. And in the context of Japan's (legitimate) reactions to both North Korea and Chinese attempt to grab oil and gas in the South China Sea, the average Korean or Chinese thinks that Japan has become like it was in World War Two, while the average Japanese person is confused as to why the Chinese and Koreans are screaming and shouting at them. (Tangetial point, the irony is that it used to be that public schools used to have no choice in which textbooks they could have, and so the right to select a revisionist textbook is an expression of the desire for schools to have less centralized control in their operations) Finally, you have the Politicians like Abe and Koizumi who seem to stuck between the appathetic Japanese attitude and the far right wing attitude. Yasakuni Shrine shows this well. Japanese Shintoism has it that all the warrior spirits become gods after they die, including Class-A war criminals from the Tokyo Tribunals. The shrine where ALL spirits of ALL Japanese who die in war go to, is Yasukuni Shrine. (It was established around the 17th/18th century). The Shrine is now a private institution (which runs a revisionist museum next door) and so if you want to pay your respects to, say, the Japanese sailors who fought the Russians in 1905, you have to go to Yasakuni shrine where the Class-A war criminals are side by side. China and Korea percieve this as being ignorant of the evils of the Class A war criminals who are held in the shrine. The solution to this would be for the Japanese government to set up a state run shrine (shintoism is a very ad-hoc religion) where all the Japanese soldiers except the Class A war criminals could be held. The problem is, that the more conservative branches of Governement (who are not as right wing as the people who want to see the God-Emperor reinstated) feel that such action would against the spirit of the Japanese people, and that it is really the duty of the Koreans and the Chinese to be more understanding of why they go to Yasakuni in the first place. I personally feel it is a bit silly to expect the Koreans and Chinese to respect and understand the idea of going to a shrine where the equivalents of Hitlers and Goebbels are kept and respected. So Post-War Japan has many different forces acting out of concert with each other. There are those who would like to see Japan restart what it began in 1939, but they are a minority. Its neighbors do not think they are a minority so they antagonize Japan, forcing the nation to modernize its military and become a genuine military power. Will Japan ever try to re-occupy Korea or begin exapanding territorially? No. Will they improve their military capacity? Yes, and that will be seen as trying to re-live world war two by the Koreans and the Chinese.
  3. To clarify, we currently have written legislation where we promise Taiwan's survival so Beijing does not provoke us there (unless they feel somehow that we would not uphold that commitement) changing our nuclear posture to an offensive, rather then currently a defensive one, would signal to the world that our intent to use nuclear weapons to remove enemies is now policy, which will provide greater incentive for the Chinese to hit the US before they themselves get hit.
  4. We didnt use nukes in Serbia, and both powers had no interests in that region. Russia was far to concerned about recovering from their time as Communists to be able to seriously contemplate stopping NATO, and Beijing can have diplomatic protests, but really don't care about that mess in the Balkans enough to go to war over it. For a government that routinely kills its own people for political purposes, a few lost diplomats is hardly a matter of concern for Beijing. Using nuclear weapons on the Asian mainland however, scares the hell out of Beijing, using them enmass to guarantee that every unit hiding under a hill and mountain is killed, will raise serious concerns in Moscow and Beijing. Do you think that the Chinese people (who these days are more nationalistic and are becoming more fascist then communists) are just going to want their government to sit idle as America rains down hell fire? Do you think that the PLA's generals, who are already itching for a war with America, will be able to tolerate just standing by? Russia would have less incentive then China, but Mr. Putin is no friend of ours and he has a slight stake in this issue. With America showing a new lack of restraint with regards to their nuclear arsenal, Moscow will have a very strong incentive to react and do something about it. If anything, fighiting any sort of conventional war with North Korea is less likely to get Beijing involved then the pounding the penninsula with weapons. (which is what we would need to do if we want to destroy the army with missiles for reasons about North Korea's defensive strategies which have been brought up already) Beijing would lack the pretext to be able to use nuclear weapons against us, and though I expect that they will try and take North Korean territory as well, which is a problem, they certainly wont extend the war further then necessary on that front. They try and do something about Taiwan, but we have an American fleet there to force them to declare a full war on us, something they do not want to do because they know that will bring a full response. We have to remove North Korea's existance. This is a given. Its important how we do it. How long have you been involved in Objectivism? Recent discovery, or for a longer period of time? (I wont hold either against you, just curious)
  5. Not for North Korea. The fact that America would have displayed its willigness to use nuclear weapons enmass to ensure total and complete vicotory, would mean that the leadership in Moscow and Beijing will realize that the US has had a fundemental policy change. They would reach the conlclusion that since they know that they are not on the US's list of allies, they their very survival is threatened. And so will feel that they have no choice but to stop Washington with maximum force before more harm is done to them. The day we get an operational anti-ballistic shield is a day I look forward to. While thinking about this issue today, I came the conclusion that its ridiculous to write off Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan the way that you do. I am enriched by those countries in so many ways, economically, socially, personally. I would argue that almost every American is as well. It is desierable to maintain them. The US economy would be unecessarily harmed by their loss, and Americans would be wrongfully deprived. This is not the same as a museum in Baghdad with cultural artifacts which unfortuantely may have to fall victim to our artillery, that is unavoidable. I know that we can avoid having to subject Japan and South Korea to unecessary fallout, and unecessary nuclear weapons from the DPRK. The day that those nations also get an anti-ballistic missile shield will also be a very good day, the sooner the better.
  6. Well, on the whole, the US is never really in line with the policies of the ARI. I personally just find it enjoyable to discuss current affairs and world events. Well message boards can only do so much in any situation, its not as if The Pentagon goes to them for advice or anything. Its still worth discussing in my opinion.
  7. It is worth considering the possible effectiveness of a limited nuclear attack in the style of Hiroshima, .
  8. Despite my objections to turning North Korea into a nuclear wasteland tomorrow morning, I have to say that the Hiroshima bombing was actually one of the better ways to go. Operation Downfall (the invasions of Kyushu and Honshu) would have resulted in many more casualties then D-Day, and since there would also be an assault launched near Tokyo, the civilian casualties would probably have been on the rather high range of civilian estimates. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not the be all end all of the war. We were fortunate that the military coup against The Emperor failed, and that the Soviets entered the war, since doing so gave The Emperor the option of surrendering on better terms to the Americans as opposed to terms which they knew would be much worse from the Soviets (the Russians never really forgave them for 1905, and General Zhukov had fought the Japanese before and did very well against them). It was something of a gamble, but it payed off all for the better. With regards to civilian casualties, there were more people killed by the Tokyo firebombing then from either atomic bomb. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Top Five Moments in the history of mankind as of 2006 (dont know enough American History to make judgements for that country alone) -The Berlin Wall falls down allowing for the Cold War to end. -1215 the Magna Carta is written, the first document that restricts the powers of rulers and allows for most of the modern democracy to begin. -Adam Smith publishes the Wealth of Nations, laying down one of the earliest, if not the first, argument for the Free Market. -The American Revolution, beginning the first nation founded on an idea, and not defined by nationality, clearly making it the most well poised to lead the world into the future. -The invention of the Internet. While the exact date is up for grabs and many people would like to claim responsibility for it, the power to share information on a scale never before imagined will be an integral component for how the future of mankind progresses. Bottom Five Moments. -A guy called Jesus comes along, replacing Judaism's great respect for learning and justice, with a sissy of a God who only demands obedience and being "nice". -Emperor Constantine then making Christianity a favored religion in the Empire, laying the foundations for the Church on earth to usher in the Dark Ages. -Kaiser Wilhelm's idiotic diplomacy plunges Europe into World War One. If Germany had someone who even remotely resembled Bismarck during that era, the next big problem could be averted. -Lenin leads and intellectualist coup of the Provisional Government, Russia's first chance of Freedom is crushed and the resources of the largest country in the world come under control of Communists. -Iranian Revolution of 1979 in conjunction with misguided American Foreign Policy in the Middle East. It all goes downhill from there. -Honorary Runner Up-Mao leads the Cultural Revolution and Chinese society then erases it from memory. While this event does not have as many negative international effects as the past one, the fact that Mao has been absolved for the murder of his own people, by his own people, ranks as one of the lowest levels of mankind. The revisionism of the events of Tiananmen Square of course follows from this. Top Five "Coolest Moments". Events that do not change the world as much, but were certainly quite amazing and of personal worth to me. -Bismarck unifies Germany and engages in some of the best diplomacy that has ever been known, possibly surpassing the only other great diplomat before his time, Matternich. -Apollo 11. The fact this happened just three weeks after the last episode of the original Star Trek was aired, was a great way of confirming our desire to go into space. -Enrico Fermi starts the first self sustaining nuclear reaction on the grounds of the University of Chicago. -Apple Computer gets founded, Think Different. -Ronald D. Moore restarts the Battlestar Galactica franchise, creating a TV series that surpassed the best of Star Trek and Babylon 5 in just one season.
  9. The failures of US intelligence was not because of something inherent in US intelligence, it was due to choices that were made at points in time about the way that the CIA would operate, which weakened the agencies. Those choices can be reversed. Michael Baer in "See No Evil" discusses much of this. Though his focus is on the middle east and not Asia, his progression of the history of the CIA in recent years shows that the agency used to be doing its job, then it lagged, and now 9/11 has jump-started it again. I doubt George Bush thinks its evil to work for his own benefit. The reliance on satelites as the only way to determine where our threats our was one of the greatest mistakes of the CIA. There is only so much a satelite can show you. It can not show you whats inside a bunker, or a warehouse, or a subway. There are uses, but its not the be all end all to the situation. Unless you want to level every mountain where who knows what might be hiding, you are bound to miss assets. I am not sure about the physics involved, but I wonder using our nuclear war heads for the explicit purpose of simply flatening the country to a sheet of paper would require such a large percentage of our stockpile that may very well give a deterent advantage to China or Russia. Leonard Peikoff is not entirely wrong, but I have yet to see the ARI produce a press release regarding America current corruption filled relationship with Saudi Arabia, and would like to see him talk about that at some point. Otherwise he gives only a very limited and very constrained view of the Middle East.
  10. Points about the issue of nuclear fallout affecting South Korea and Japan have already been raised. The PLA these is hardly "glacial". They have been modernizing and I would prefer not to give them the benefit of being closer to South Korea as well as remove the DPRK from the map. According to my dictionary, altruism is, "the belief in or practice of disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others : some may choose to work with vulnerable elderly people out of altruism." You assume the US does not want to remove North Korea because they are concerned about the North Koreans. I attest that they are concerned because it will not be an easy situation to follow through. You are unfairly leveling charges against the US government and its employees. In my opinion, targeting and working to remove the leadership apparatus of North Korea is a prefered tactic since I believe the army is not in a state to continue fighting after it looses people to give it orders. I am also interested in working to find out where they keep their nuclear missiles so that they can be targeted beforehand to prevent them from retaliating against either us, the RoK, or Japan. Should the DPRK develop an effective ICBM to hit NYC, then the realities of the situation will force a more forceful response. As it is, I don't believe we need to start using the nuclear arsenal. Removing our enemies is moral. Imposing capitalism from a gun, less so. There are US citizens living the South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan. I also tend to prefer the idea of keeping the South Korean and Japanese economies around.
  11. That is all just slightly ridiculous. Part one. While the North Korean army is starving it is still large. North Korea also represents the single largest failure of US intelligence in the world so we do not know where all thier military is. Part of this problem is that the DPRK has several underground bunkers that are intergrated into their subway network. This system is designed to resist a nuclear explosion so we certainly do not have the firepower to hit every target in the country in one fell swoop. It would be a challenge. The entire country has been preparing for a major defensive war for fifty years. Considering the current strain that the US military faces by having troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and having to rotate in the National Guard occasionally, we may very well not have the troops to properly hold the territory, let along keep the Chinese from taking advantage of the situation. This leads to Part Two. China is not supportive of North Korea, they are interested in removing that regime as well and an American attack would do a good job of prompting the PLA to get involved and move in. We have a very limited deterent ability with the Chinese at the moment, with certain members of the Politburo very interested in destroying Los Angeles with a nuclear warhead. Though it would be possible to deter China, and there are strategies to do that, its not a given that Beijing will sit idle and just let it happen. Ahh yes, because the American government is filled with Marxists who are concerned about solidarity with the working class of all nations and so refuse to attack North Korea on the basis that they want to help Kim Jong Il survive! The American armed forces and political apparatus would like nothing better then to end North Korea and fight a war to do it. There are however, genuine concerns about the ultimate success of the attempt, and whether there are going to be ways to orchestrate more opportune moments to occur to spur its collapse. Well we are certainly going into a rather extreme version into the land of the Alternate History. First of all, if this policy had been adopted in 1949 (which is your first date you provide for it to be used) then we would have to be slugging it out with the Russians across their continent. We would not have had the luxury to of multiple nuclear warheads to make the job easier. Such an adventure would have made us weaker in the far east resulting in some rather nasty actions being taken by the Chinese which would have made fighting in Korea or Vietnam much more difficult on our part. Whether we could hold Japan is debatable as well. Whether it would be in America's best interest to maintain a war economy after having finished with Germany is also something questionable. It would hardly be the best way to promote capitalism in America. (Hayek, The Road to Serfdom) [qoute]Capitalism, individual achievement and rational self-interest would have flourished throughout the world for the past half century and man’s mind and wealth would have been unleashed to conquer the farthest reaches of the solar system Your faith in humanitys willingness to adapt a full Laissez faire system when forced onto it by Americans with 1949 level technology is slightly hyperbolic.
  12. Well these missiles seem to have failed in their intention to go beyond the Sea of Japan, so if this was meant to be Kim's big show of strength on the 4th of July (it would have been the 5th in that part of the world) it did not work out so well for him. The problem with this is South Korea which has become Chaberlin esque in a way that is actually quite startling. Though the military of the RoK does hate the DPRK, the people and the government currently lack the will to let war be the "political solution by other means."
  13. This is largely irrelevent, the damage of depriving someone of their profit has been done no matter how much you have stolen. Make a list of everything you have pirated and prepare to purchase copies of that work some point down the line when you are able to. Its not as if you really have a choice in this matter, from what you have said here, it sounds like you depend on that software. If you have a job on the side, I would recomend that you start saving money to eventually legally purchase that software. Eh, someone is still distributing his music and is entitled to profit from it. No, thats like asking "can I download music since I can hear them on the radio at any time?" There are legal ways to download tv show shows (iTunes music store being the #1 way at the moment in my opinion) but what about a show like "The Soprano's" which is on HBO? Or something like The Office from BBC? In your case it sounds like it would be more practical, the correct thing to do would be to delet everything that was pirated but as you have already stated, its not within your means to do that since your school work depends on it. If making ammends for your past misdeeds is important to you, then some process of deleting the pirated goods needs to be started. You could probably get away with this, its not as if there is a Satan waiting to stick hot pokers into you when you die because of this. Whats important is whether you want to fix the damage you have done.
  14. I always thought it was less that he wanted to be a low life, and more that he needed something that no one would suspect could be the real Superman. I do like Stepehn Colbert's twist, "He wants his secret identity to be the most despicable and least trustworthy image available, the furthest from a Superman, so he choose a journalist." (part of his larger segment about the New York Times)
  15. Red China is less commie these days and more of a Fascist power. They allow for a greater degree of mobility to be able to keep the economy moving, while still keeping tabs on the population. Beijing watched the events of 1989 with great interest and does not want the same to happen to them. They are willing to allow their people to get a degree of luxury and "freedom" to keep them content, but will of course keep the monopoly on power and the press. So if you are a regular Chinese person, I would expect you to have slightly (but not significantly) more mobility then you would have had in the Warsaw Pact. If you are Tibetan, or another minority, well, then you are stuck. Its also my understanding that freely traveling to Macao and Hong Kong is easier said then done.
  16. Note, MANY spoilers below, you have been warned. The film was impressive, the CGI, the opening credits, the mix of a 50's look with the modern (plaid shirts seem to be all the rage in Metropolis), even all the acting, Lois, Luthor, Lex, Superman, it was all top notch. The story was not, and that is what made me leave the movie with a very bad taste in my mouth. -The Jor-El sequences were meant to establish a theme for this movie being something about "Fathers and Sons", how Superman is supposed to help humanity realize its capacity for good. Unfortunately, none of that seems realized. None of the actions of Superman in the film help humanity realize its goodness or really seem to do anything other then, well, end the crisis of the moment. The fact that the movie then supposedly ties up with Superman learning about his new son, only makes this attempt at a point seem more contrived. What has Superman honestly learnt and applied from his father? What can he hope to provide for his son? This was a poorly developed theme and was one of several weaknesses. -The editorial "Why the world does not need a Superman", which is supposedly Pulitzer Prize winning material, ultimately does not get nearly the attention it deserves. There is a genuine debate here, does the presence of Superman make mankind unwilling to try and work for its own survival? Does Superman bring villains like Lex Luthor into existance? These are all good questions to ask but in the end it turns into "I wrote the editorial because I was pissed he left". Big whoop. -Superman using his powers to spy on Lois's house?! I know Uncle Ben is in the Marvelverse but the maxim "With great power comes great responsibility" should apply in that case. -Lex was well played, but was portrated in a rather 2D manner, but this was not my largest gripe.. -Kitty, she repents, which was a weak way out of the problem, she is the Deus Ex Machina for getting rid of the six crystals, which is silly since Superman should have solved that problem, and Lex doesn't kill her for her moral weakness? The man who was willing to kill "Billions!" cant punish an inept minion? Its not as if a special attachment to those he cares about is a characteristic for him. -The "death" montage was not done well. It was shown and portrayed well, but for Superman, there needs to be a greater precedent to make you seriously concerned he will not make it. At the end of the day for me, Batman Begins, Spiderman, or even the most recent X-Men movie, was on the whole, more enjoyable then Superman Returns.
  17. If you buy a Chinese product, that cash goes back to China which gets taxed, sent to Beijing, and used to purchase new military equipment. These days it would probably go into their Navy since that is what they need to counter the US blue water navy and take Taiwan. Or it might just go into their larger modernization program which is being directed at their air force and army as well. Reinforcing the current regime in Beijing is not in anyone's interest.
  18. You are not abandoning reason if you say "I know the events of this movie do not happen in real life, but I can appreciate it anyway", you are afterall, acknowledging the fiction involved. It was not as if, in your pre-Objectivism phase, you enjoyed the movies specifically because you thought the events they depicted (in the horror films) might be possible. You always (I suspect) knew they could not. In theory, you should still be able to enjoy the film for the same reason you did before, unless you have suddenly decided that you do not actually enjoy them for whatever reason you did before.
  19. "Call of Cthulhu" is regarded as standard Lovecraft, I remeber thinking it was ok. I have not read all his stuff, but I do remember "The Dunwich Horror" being a good one.
  20. As I understand, horror films have found ways to be "political" in ways that people would not expect them to. The original Dawn of the Dead had the zombies make it into the mall where the heroes were hiding, and the zombies move around the mall and up and down the escalators looking. The effect was that the zombies were not acting differently in that environment then how humans would be expected to act (aimless wandering in the mall, looking dumbfounded at it all, etc) a critique of sorts against consumerist culture. A similar technique is used at the beginning of the hillarious "Shaun of the Dead". Your particular example though, seems more intent on beating you over the head with the message, somewhat without creativity as well.
  21. There has long been a close and messy relationship between government politics and the oil world in general. The idea that Halliburton was whispering into the President's ear to go to war is silly and insane. There were many many other reasons driving the US to war. It is not too unrealistic to assume that Halliburton was able to keep close tabs on events in Iraq so that it would be able to profit the most from the venture. Are they abusing the conflict to make a profit, or trying to make a profit in a land where there is currently conflict? Israel has no oil anyway (though there are some Christian Fundementalist actively looking for some: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0510/p20s01-lire.html) now that that misconception is out of the way... The process of actually getting the oil from those dictatoships is an interesting topic. Robert Baer in "Sleeping With the Devil" discusses this issue, citing an early government research paper that investigated that very problem (done under the shadows of the OPEC emabrgo). At the end of the day, what is needed is something on the level of "sixty thousand" US troops with several more civilians being drafted to run the facilities. Major problems involved would be terrorism spikes across the globe, and against the facilities. That being said, in the words of Mr. Baer "If the Bush-Cheney administration knows anything well, it ought to be how to rebuild and run an oil field".
  22. I think this forum has had several "which media outlet is the lesser of all the evils" discussions. For myself, I find Fox News to be the most patronizing to the audience's intelect, its weather maps are simplistic in a way I never thought possible, it gives far more credence to flash and flaire then substance, and they play into the religious wing of the Republican Party like drones. The other networks have a lefty tilt, but at least they are not devoting as large a percentage to unecessary flashy lights. If all else fails, I go for the BBC. It has flawed politics, but the likelyhood it will bring up stories not in the American media is high. Didnt the Discovery, TLC, and History Channels used to be good? Before Discovery went low brow, TLC turned into an interior design channel, and the History Channel started recycling the same World War Two documentaries?
  23. How old are you jeppo? And how did you find this forum anyway? I would imagine Ayn Rand is unheard of in all of Sweeden.
  24. Its also just due to the stupidity and poor taste of the average joe which keeps the system running by playing into the hands of people who have no moral objection of keeping garbage like Fox News on the air. Rubert Murdoch is the modern day Gail Wynard in so many ways as it was in The Fountainhead.
  25. I don't disagree, I was just being pedantic about the way you were displaying the history of the situation.
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