Huge study about safety can be misinterpreted by SUV drivers

Great thing... competition. All gone with a government monopoly.

 

I am not suggesting that the government institutionalize discrimination. Marriage
is a union between a man and a woman. It is not a same sex union. If there are
particular laws related to the term "marriage" that make "marriages" beneficial
and same sex unions feel they deserve these benefits, then change the law, or
have the law ruled unconstitutional. Don't try to circumvent the process by
redefining the word.

Ed

 

This confuses me greatly. If two men or two women want to be joined
as a family in a marriage, how does it detract from your marriage?
--
Brandon Sommerville
remove ".gov" to e-mail

Definition of "Lottery":
Millions of stupid people contributing
to make one stupid person look smart.

 

Enron was dollar driven as well.

Give me a break. American companies were perfectly happy to sell to
Saddam as well and as far as "accepting despotism" who do you think
put him there in the first place and kept him there for years?
--
Brandon Sommerville
remove ".gov" to e-mail

Definition of "Lottery":
Millions of stupid people contributing
to make one stupid person look smart.

 

Not at all. It's just not the business of the feds. There's multiple
jurisdiction below federal. State, county, city. The juridiction arguments
among these entities for rights reserved to them is up to them individually.

The arguments for and against Sodomy laws and Adultery laws each have merit.
Government intrusion in personal matters is a matter of great concern to be
sure. Yet, the effect of adultery on families, children, cost to society is
huge. Should local governments be able to prohibit it? The sexual
revolution in the 60's made it "quaint" to expect intact families with
mothers AND fathers; to expect fidelity, which is tightly tied to religious
values, is "old fashioned". Without religious values, we can behave as the
animals and it's "okay".... individually. But that's where we got the
"single mom" phenomenon. It's effect on the black community has been tragic
with 70% of babies born to unwed mothers.

Child poverty is a direct result of this. Even worse than the poverty is
children with teeny bopper mothers more concerned with partying on Friday
night and finding someone... anyone... to watch their kids while they to it.
They give no structure or limits to their children's lives and end up
producing more adults with no clue how to be productive members of society.

Personal choices? Hmph.

 

It is not a marriage. I am not opposed to people of the same sex entering into a
commited relationship, but that is not the same thing as a traditional marriage. If
there are benefits related to a traditional marriage that same sex couple feel they
are entitled to, then they should petition their representatives to pass laws to
extend these benefits to them and not try to duck the process by redefining an
establishment that has long been in place.

Ed

 

On Wed, 3 Dec 2003, C. E. White wrote:

4> no religion should be required to perform or recognize a marriage not
4> in keeping with its creed (doesn't the catholic church not recognize
4> marriages by divorced people?), but why should government discriminate?


3> Marriage is a union between a man and a woman.

2> If two men or two women want to be joined as a family in a marriage,
2> how does it detract from your marriage?

So, let's summarize. The question is "Why should marriage be restricted to
opposite-sex couples?" and the very best, most cogent response you can
come up with is "Because marriage is restricted to opposite-sex couples."


DS

 

Does it matter? The divorce rate is sky-high in states with and without
no-fault divorce, in states with conservative and with liberal governors
and legislatures, in states with high and with low church attendance.

Disregarding for the moment your ignorance of the fact that correlation
does not imply causation, do you *really* think some law is going to cause
some shiftless idiot to stick around and be a father?

Much better when the religious values you tout so highly held such sway
that pregnant teens -- of whom there were just as many as there are now --
were shipped off to live with a remote aunt or simply disowned...eh?

DS

 

You've picked a wrong example. GSM has been the leadership MA for many
years. How do I know this? I did mechanical design and development of
GSM handsets for 6 years. CDMA was always behind the curve on new features.

And the reason was simple, european customers were willing to pay for those
features. In recent years CDMA has done alot of catchup, TDMA seems to be
dying out these days with AT&T and cingular heading towards GSM. (for
instance, motorola's never mass-marketed watch phone is/was GSM)

Now then there is all the politics around a 3G standard, etc etc, but
there is nothing wrong with GSM nor has it failed to provide growth
of new handset technology. I cannot think of anything significant and one
minor item that appeared on CDMA product before it appeared on a GSM
product. This recent push-to-talk feature that simulates the propritary
NEXTEL system that verizon wanted is about it.

Come to think of it, alot of the big wiz-bang handset stuff comes on
phones made in japan to system they have there.... I forget what it's
called but it is a japan only MA.

 

You don't have to. The government already does.

That is exactly the process that's underway now.

DS

 

Exactly. Very good. It's trying to *prevent* same-sex couples from getting
married that is discrimination.

DS

 

Out here in Ahnold's Kalifonia, we have a "domestic partners" registry that
allows partners OF THE SAME SEX to register their relationship. In most
"progressive" companies, mine included, registered domestic partners are
eligible for the same benefits that married couples enjoy.

The problem I have with the situation is that OPPOSITE sex partners do not
get the same consideration! My wife and I lived together for five years
before getting married. We were denied the ability to register as domestic
partners, with the cited reason being "you are eligible to be legally
married". Hmmph.

Larry

 

Why are trees called tress, dogs called dogs, etc. If I call a cat a dog, does
that make it a dog? The laws related to the institution of marriage were set
in place with the understanding that a marriage was a union between a man and
a woman. Trying to extend those laws to cover same sex unions is not the right
way to fix a perceived injustice. It may be the "liberal" way, but that
doesn't make it right.

Ed

 

Brent,

For your info ....

Electrically and from a Radio Frequency (RF) spectrum standpoint, the GSM
(Global System for Mobile communications) standard is a form of (the older
and less spectrally efficient) TDMA (Time Division Multiple Access)
technology. Yes, you are indeed correct that US national carriers, AT&T and
Cingular, have announced plans to slowly convert their North American TDMA
systems to the GSM standard. This really does not buy them any improvement
from a quality of service or call capacity/bandwidth standpoint since they
are replacing North American TDMA with GSM TDMA. They are doing this purely
from a cost control perspective so that they can take advantage of the
global sales (and maintenance) volume for GSM and also due to the fact that
most North American TDMA system manufacturers had announced plans to cap out
new development/features, etc. due to a declining market.

That said, CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) technology is the future,
even for GSM!. While it is true that there are several different "flavors"
of CDMA, including CDMA-2000 and W-CDMA, these all share the same basic
"spread spectrum" CDMA technology which came out of research in the defense
industry and provides technological superiority. The simple fact of the
matter is that GSM is now on a CDMA evolututionary path with the planned
move to 3rd Generation (3G) high speed data networking in the form of UMTS
(Universal Mobile Telecommunications System). The major issue in wireless
infrastructure is not so much about new features as it is about getting more
higher quality calls and higher data bandwidths in the limited RF spectrum
for the fewest dollars.

I know none of this is relevant to the discussion, but I wanted to make sure
that you understood this since your comments/opinions on "CDMA" are not
consistent with what is actually happening in the global wireless
telecommunication market.

Bob Shuman

 

On Wed, 3 Dec 2003, C. E. White wrote:

5> Marriage is a union between a man and a woman.

4> If two men or two women want to be joined as a family in a marriage,
4> how does it detract from your marriage?

3> It is not a marriage.

2> So, let's summarize. The question is "Why should marriage be restricted
2> to opposite-sex couples?" and the very best, most cogent response you
2> can come up with is "Because marriage is restricted to opposite-sex
2> couples."

We're not considering cats, dogs or trees. We're considering two people
who wish to affirm their relationship to each other, thereby taking on the
social and financial responsibilities and attaining the social and
financial privileges accorded by society to two people in such a
relationship.

You have yet to explain why the sex of the two partners is at all relevant
other than to make circular parrot noises ("Rawk! Man and woman! Reehoo!
Redefining! Rawk! Not a marriage").

You seem very convinced of your rightness on this matter. Surely, then,
you can articulate the basis for your belief in a persuasive and logical
manner, rather than simply repeating a dogmatic statement...?

Fifty years ago, your type was saying "The laws related to the institution
of marriage were set in place with the understanding that a marriage was a
union between members of the same race."

While I'd be interested to learn what you think *is* the right way, I
hardly think you have much basis to be making pronouncements on the
matter. You're not on the receiving end of the injustice.

DS

 

Tell me something I don't know.

Nothing I don't know.

I referenced 3G in my previous post.

My comments were with regards to the handset development and adding the
additional features and so forth. The very pushing of the technology that
was claimed to be absent from the European market. GSM has been in the
lead posistion in that regard for a good length of time. That makes it
the wrong example to pick for the point he was trying to make.

Europeans were more willing to pay for various wiz-bang features and
was a more mature wireless market than that of the USA. The US market
has come a long way, but it wasn't the innovation of companies or
anything like that, it was the demands of the customers. Europeans
demanded better and got better, US buyers didn't want much more than
a phone-for-emergencies for many years. Now they want more.
Same can be said for the market for automobiles. US gets alot more the
plain A-to-B toastermobile with cup holders while europeans get something
that can actually turn and brake.

Ignoring this dynamic makes his choice of using a cellular MAs for
his example a poor one.

The European digital cellular market developed earlier, and companies
there are no more or less resistant to change than one's in the USA.
Analog ruled the USA when europe went to GSM. One might as well take
his example and roll it back a decade and then it's got the europeans
as the leaders and the US as the laggards. If europe didn't advance
they would have sticked with their analog MA... Can't remember now
what it was called, it was nearly dead when I started working in that
industry, ETACS? AMPS though is still alive and well in the USA. Of
course it's the backup mode, but it's still there.

It's a bad example to use and I stand by that assesment.

 

Marriage started out as a property rite of ancient societies. It was then
co-opted by the church(es). Then governments got into the act when the
church was no longer one in the same as the government.

Sticking to a dogmatic ritual that had its roots in protection of property
and bloodlines when the involved had little say or choice in the matter and
then foist that definition on everyone at large in today's society is most
medieval ...

VLJ
--

 

And you cross posted this bull shit all over the place because???

Mike
86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00
88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

<bullshit snipped>

 

Brent,

If you go back far enough in history, I think you will find that the U.S.
AMPS standard was the model that was used as the driver for the GSM standard
in Europe. At the time each European country had its own wireless
technology "standard" rendering it impossible to use the same phone or even
think about roaming across system/country borders. The European community
looked at the US model and saw the distinct advantage of having a single
standard defined and implemented. IIRC., this was at about roughly the same
time as the ECC was getting off the ground. It was later that Ericsson and
other GSM proponents really pushed to get the standard adopted in Asia
pacific (and unsuccessfully until most recently in the US and South America)

Interestingly enough, in the US where the original AMPS standard was born,
two completely different and competing digital standards were emerging (TDMA
and sometime later, CDMA) and there were even some different flavors within
vanilla TDMA (remember the incompatible Motorola Narrow band TDMA?) The FCC
and the industry never really tried to pull these together and instead
allowed the market to determine the winner/loser. The difference between
the incompatibility mess in Europe in the late 1980's and the US today is
due to the continuing evolution of the intelligent hand set which supports
multiple technologies, RF spectrum, etc.

Oh well, in any event, thanks for the clarification. Yes, its always
interesting to look back at history and wonder what would have or could have
happened if ....

Bob