Re: History of bulk electronic components suppliers

[Eeyore]

Got a few counter-cases? The opposite, non-democracies starting wars,
is so common in history...

Contrary to popular US opinion, pre-war Germany was a democracy. That's about as
good an example as you could get. As were the countries it initially went to war
with.

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

the Alienware thing turned out to be junk.)

In what way ?

Graham

 

[John Larkin]

Contrary to popular US opinion, pre-war Germany was a democracy.

You mean, before the brownshirts beat up all the political opposition?
Before Hitler became the Fuhrer? By the time they invaded Poland, it
wasn't anything like a functional democracy.

John

 

[John Larkin]

In what way ?

Graham

To start, all sorts of things were loose when it arrived, including
the clamping of the CPU heatsink.

I tried to get their support people to answer some questions about
RAID management, and it was obvious nobody knew anything.

After a couple days of installing apps and such, when everything was
right, I shut it down for the day, and it wouldn't power up next
morning. Grounding the green wire on the power supply wouldn't start
it up, so we guessed bad power supply. Alienware offered to ship us
another supply overnight; 2 weeks later, it still hasn't arrived.

We did get another supply elsewhere and it fixed things, but only for
a few power cycles. None of the power connectors wanted to mate or
unmate, incidentally... looks like the wrong size crimp pins. Then it
did the same thing, wouldn't power up. So there must be a bad switcher
on the mobo or something. We sent it all back.

Besides, the water cooling think looked dicey, with a junky looking
aquarium pump, and it made the already-ghastly wiring that much worse.

The HP is huge and very clean inside. It's actually a server and not
supposed to run XP, but it looks like XP works using the Win2K RAID
controller drivers downloadable from HP. It has hot-plug raid drives,
redundant 1KW power supplies (with separate AC power inputs!),
redundant fans, even a redundant bios.

All I want is a pc that's reliable.

John

 

[Charlie Edmondson]

On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 15:16:23 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 21:12:41 GMT, Richard The Dreaded Libertarian


Do you mean afraid:in denial? ;-)

Denial? No, exactly the opposite: neurotic fear that's statistically
and factually unjustified.


Conservatives, and especially religious conservatives, tend strongly to be
generous, civil, social, and civic-minded (those are statistical facts)
and less driven by fear (my opinion.)

Oh, yes! They have Faith! (which is really just belief without evidence.)

And hope. And charity. Look it up.

It's easy to be charitable when you're awash in cash. The rest of us
realize, you can't give from an empty vessel.

But Da Gubmint takes it away anyway. >:-[

You are a liberal, aren't you Rich!

No, I'm a Libertarian. We believe in Liberty, not socialism.

You evidently haven't met many poor
or lower middle/ upper lower folks, have you?

How is this "Evident"? Just FYI, I happen to be one of those poor/
lower/middle "upper lower" folks that you seem to hold in such
disdain.

Have you ever experienced any hardship? Like, you don't know where
your next meal is coming from so you pound the pavement until you
either find some income or collapse in exhaustion?

Or maybe you have always
been in cities or something...

Boy, you sure are self-righteous.

I have found that most folks are extremely generous,

Yeah, but I really get rankled by the ones on their self-righteous high
horse, in their multi-million dollar ivory tower, laying a guilt trip
on me because I "don't give enough".

Jesus said, "Love your neighbor as yourself," not "Love your neighbor
better than yourself" or "love your neighbor to the detriment of yourself."
Ever been on an airplane, when they give the briefing on the O2 masks for
when they lose cabin pressure? It's "Put your own on first - you can't
help anybody if you're dead".

You might or might not get my point - depends on if it can penetrate
your smug, self-satisfied, safe, secure, coddled, protected little
psyche.

Thanks,
Rich

Actually, I am a Libertarian, I believe in less government. And, yes, I
have been poor. I spent several times either unemployed, or as a poor
student will little income. I remember buying lots of macaroni and
cheese (with cheap hotdogs! not bad...) and there have been times like
now when I have extra to save and use to help others. My observation is
that people help each other, and rejoice in the opportunites to do so.

I have also seen a lot of 'liberals' that seem to be of the opinion that
it is 'Somebody Else's Problem' to deal with all the evils of the world,
but they know how 'they' should do it. They like to be on committees or
in government, where they can tell others what to do, without having to
lift a finger themselves.

Charlie

 

[Eeyore]

You mean, before the brownshirts beat up all the political opposition?
Before Hitler became the Fuhrer? By the time they invaded Poland, it
wasn't anything like a functional democracy.

It started off as a democracy though. Hey, the USA decided it wanted to go to
war with Iraq for no good reason !

Graham

 

[Richard The Dreaded Libertarian]

You mean, before the brownshirts beat up all the political opposition?
Before Hitler became the Fuhrer? By the time they invaded Poland, it
wasn't anything like a functional democracy.

Too true, but then again, he _was_ elected - he just seized power for
himself, much as the Bush/Cheney gang are trying to do as we speak.

Thanks,
Rich

 

[John Larkin]

It started off as a democracy though. Hey, the USA decided it wanted to go to
war with Iraq for no good reason !

Which is why I qualified my statement "with each other." We certainly
wouldn't be there if it had been a democracy. I think the idea was to
*make* it a democracy.

Well, it worked in Germany and Austria and Italy and Japan.

John

 

[Homer J Simpson]

I have also seen a lot of 'liberals' that seem to be of the opinion that
it is 'Somebody Else's Problem' to deal with all the evils of the world,
but they know how 'they' should do it. They like to be on committees or
in government, where they can tell others what to do, without having to
lift a finger themselves.

I've seen a lot of this. It's always been the reactionaries, not the
liberals who do this - the rich guy who thinks he did it all himself, the
bureaucrat who is convinced of his own magnificence, the preacher who hates
all the 'wrong' sorts of people -- and their wives who are often the worst
of the lot.


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[Richard The Dreaded Libertarian]

It started off as a democracy though. Hey, the USA decided it wanted to go to
war with Iraq for no good reason !

They ass-u-me-d that it was going to be the same kind of cake walk as
the Kuwait thing.

Silly them!

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Richard The Dreaded Libertarian]

Which is why I qualified my statement "with each other." We certainly
wouldn't be there if it had been a democracy. I think the idea was to
*make* it a democracy.

It is a democracy. Problem is, they keep voting 'Yankee Go Home'.

Thanks,
Rich

 

[John Larkin]

I've seen a lot of this. It's always been the reactionaries, not the
liberals who do this - the rich guy who thinks he did it all himself, the
bureaucrat who is convinced of his own magnificence, the preacher who hates
all the 'wrong' sorts of people -- and their wives who are often the worst
of the lot.

No. The rich guys, and the preachers, are statistically likely to be
among the most generous part of the population. The most selfish
people are young secular liberals.

I'd cite, but you'd just not believe any of it. We know that you
donate nothing to charitable causes.

John

 

[James Arthur]

They've had THREE elections, and the invaders (Bush et al) don't like
the outcome, because it's always "Yankee Go Home".

AIUI, their results are the same as here: "We want you guys to
leave, but PLEASE don't leave us NOW!"

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

And your idea to stop the killing is to go in and do some more killing?
That's either insane or evil.

Those are false choices. Many times doing something is a lot better
than doing nothing at all.

Take Darfur, for example.

Best wishes,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

Bullshit. Nothing good has ever come but with the support of liberals.

Of course liberals have done good things, it's
"Liberals" (socialists: people who demonize honest laborers, take
their goods, and distribute them to others) I spoke of. "Equity" is
their rationale.

Promoting class warfare--the notion that people can/should be
divided into classes and that one class deserves another's goods--
isn't liberal, at least not to me. My theory is not that the rich
have stolen, but that, by and large, the poor haven't risen to their
potential.

Thus, and for reasons of inefficiency, ineffectiveness, and more, I
don't agree with the redistribution programs. I listed several--care
to defend any of them?

Best wishes,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

Of course liberals have done good things, it's
"Liberals" (socialists: people who demonize honest laborers, take

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Sorry, I meant that description of false liberals to read:
"Liberals" (socialists who demonize honest laborers, take

Best,
James Arthur

 

[Homer J Simpson]

Those are false choices. Many times doing something is a lot better
than doing nothing at all.

It's usually better to do something sane rather than insane.

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[John Larkin]

Of course liberals have done good things, it's
"Liberals" (socialists: people who demonize honest laborers, take
their goods, and distribute them to others) I spoke of. "Equity" is
their rationale.

Promoting class warfare--the notion that people can/should be
divided into classes and that one class deserves another's goods--
isn't liberal, at least not to me. My theory is not that the rich
have stolen, but that, by and large, the poor haven't risen to their
potential.

The rich have two major functions:

1. To be productive, to build things on a large scale.

2. To divert a portion of society's resources (read "money" if you
will) from consumption to investment. Somebody's got to do it.

and one minor one

3. To be an example.

John

 

[James Arthur]

On 21 Feb 2007 16:37:12 -0800, "James Arthur"
[snip]
My theory is not that the rich

have stolen, but that, by and large, the poor haven't risen to their
potential.

The rich have two major functions:

1. To be productive, to build things on a large scale.

2. To divert a portion of society's resources (read "money" if you
will) from consumption to investment. Somebody's got to do it.

and one minor one

3. To be an example.

John

I'd counter & propose ideally that rich people became so by virtue
of their being productive, and by virtue of carefully saving and
applying the proceeds. That description covers the majority of my
acquaintence, with a minority who owe theirs to luck, looks, or
mischief.

I'll grant you the save and invest function, but note that everyone
can save and invest, not just tycoons. Scores of tiny capital caches
could add up to significant and great power nationally, if only they
existed. Witness the benefit of micro-cap loans in Africa and Asia.

And being an example, to me, means to teach others the road to
freedom, to help them realize their potential, which is very important
indeed.

It's not all that hard: Go to school. Work. Get married before
having kids. Save, don't waste. Invest.

With regards,
James Arthur

 

[Robert Latest]

Being nice is strange.

No. Gratuitously dragging the sexual orientation of someone into a
discussion as a (fortunately futile) effort to attract stupid jokes is
strange.

robert