rzhang87

I also like Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers. A lot of people have a misconception about what the theme of the book is, which is civic responsibility and sacrifice, due to the film of the same title. The theme of the film is more of what 16 year olds would do if they were unsupervised with weapons in a coed camp. They should not have made that horrible movie, although I enjoyed the film for the high sexual content, it has few similarities to the book. <br/

Profits is why the US has a propensity for violence. And the public has become somewhat numb to it. Conflict is very profitable for a lot of people. yeah, the U.S. is the only place where the common working person actually believes the idea that "war is good for the economy." no, war is good for the rich. it only kills off breadwinners among the lower classes, depletes resources, and leaves a major part of

I do vote and it does count thank you sir! I m sorry you can t seem to see that. nope I don t live lavishly but I want to! One of these days I will most likely get there. Ahhh America! Its a land where I don t have to make lots of money to have lots of money! That's basically true in any country... probably even more so in China atm since the economy there is exploding.

Chavez just shut down one of the only two television and radio stations that dares protest against him. What next? Well he's already threatening closure of a second TV station as we speak (or rather type). Hopefully Evo Morales and Rafael Correa don't follow in his footsteps. But I really think that the most dangerous person alive is the President of the United States... a person is gauged "dangerous" by

Well maybe people could work towards something they could all agree on, like reassessing how farms are subsidized. The reason why so many of the poor are actually obese is because food stamps basically force them to go for the cheapest foods with the most "filling" (carbohydrates) as possible. Very unhealthy. In the Middle Ages vegetables were considered "peasants' food" that was unfit for consumption by the nobility. Maybe they had something going for them... But other than th

I've always admired Babylon 5 for its vast, season-spanning story arcs. It's interesting to see how the final product turned out as compared to this promotion brochure: http://www.zteamproductions.com/protob5.html Still can't get over G'Kar originally being spelt "Jakarr"... hehe

It looks like he's only concerned with his legacy anymore rather than the interests of the United States. "Apres moi, le deluge"... He makes his friends call him "Mr. President": http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=1672006&page=3 The Bush Plan - Stay in Iraq for 50 years: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N30416213.htm http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-geyer_31edi.ART.State.Edition1.4

Yes, the late Jerry Falwell was one of those so-called "Christians". BeliefNet/NBC did a poll, and they found that about 85% of Christians in the US believe that persons of other religions can go to heaven if they perform good deeds, including 96% of Catholics, 90% of non-evangelicals, and 68% of conservative evangelicals. But that still leaves the other 15%, who I assume took the literal meaning of John 3:16 - " For God so loved the world that he gave his

The Snathi. They remind me of the evil squirrels here at UCLA.

Actually this has happened repeatedly; there are numerous bonus tiles on the homeworld as well as the homeworlds of all the other major races, but almost none anywhere else. Could it be because I'm playing on Gigantic? Also I've noticed that anomalies less frequent on larger maps as well (although not to the same degree). Is there a connection?

actually, the word "fascism" is a link to Mussolini. Hitler coined his variation Nazism (which is an abbreviation of Nationalsozialist, whereas fascism comes from the Italian word fascio, the literal meaning of which is bundle). Yeah, "Islamofacism" is just a favorite term of Michael Savage (whom I sadly listen to for the comedy factor), Limbaugh and other right-wing radio hosts, who just want to inject the Hitler factor somewhere without under

That's the problem with racial profiling; focusing on one ethnic group automatically means less of a focus on all others. Al Qaeda is smart and will look for people who dont fit the profile. Zacharias Moussaoui is a black man. Richard Reid is Jamaican. And of course John Walker Lindh is white. Not to mention that white supremacists like the KKK are IN this country right now; thus one skinhead is probably one hundred to one thousand times as likely to cause terrorism than an Islamic extr

you're very well-spoken (well-written as it were). Believe me, if I were that well spoken, I'd be in politics instead of research So how exactly is anything in the Koran worse than in Deuteronomy? If not, I dont see how your argument holds any water. To

This might be deviating from whats currently being discussed right now, but do you think that poverty should be measured more as a function of income or standard of living? Because taking one or the other into account would yield significantly different rates in the United States vs. Canada and the EU As for alleviating poverty... As an American, I strongly believe that a system of universal healthcare would do wonders in terms of helping those on the lower and middle rungs of

I usually go for class 1/2 planets if I have a sizeable budget surplus and have at least researched soil enhancement. Through rush-buying they can become relatively productive class 7s within several turns, and it gets even better with the two other land reclamation researches. Eventually you can get a superior class planet than, say, one that started out class 6, or 12 for that matter.

Is it just me, or does the AI Krynn, benefiting from massive bonuses, basically dominate every game if left unchecked?

I think Hugo Chevez is a real dictator. Hugo Chavez is a great leader, a man of the people and for the people. He uses the same strong armed tactics that the Capitalist pigs which run our country use, but since 'he' does it this makes him a 'bad' man. What's wrong with forcibly taking back some of the wealth that was generated by the people and giving it back to them? In my eyes, nothing at all. Anyone who

It's been a while since I've played this game (and without the recent updates or DA), and I noticed that basically only the home planets have tile bonuses anymore. Does anyone remember the rationale for this?

More on debunking the myth that Islam is inherently more violent and regressive than other religions. Myth? hmmm forgive my ignorance but at the moment i am unfamiliar with how many religions other than Islam have 'honour killings'. I am also not up to date with how many other religions have recently blown up ancient monuments of other religions or ban women from school? How many other religions have been g

George Bush? Is weak imho. A halfhearted attack on iraq creating more misery than joy. Should think that the white house would be able to plan better. I also think people who are not prepared to use any means to remove a dictator like Saddam are dangerous. Why should we not care about people in other countries, just because its another country, goes beyond my understanding. Especially since US is about just that, freedom for all.

More on debunking the myth that Islam is inherently more violent and regressive than other religions. You might be asking... well why does Hamas/Al Qaeda, etc target civilians with suicide bombings, under the justification of religion! That alone shows that there's something wrong with Islam! Wrong again. You could say that the Japanese performed suicide bombings against American military personnel during WWII for religious reasons (the Kamikaze; dying for the immortal E

Wrong. I can't believe so many people have overlooked this, but hopefully it will put to rest the true source of Islamic extremism. It's not Islam persay, but the socio-political situation endemic in many Middle Eastern countries. Lets look at the 5 countries with the most Muslims: Indonesia: A secular, multiparty democracy that does not recognize any religion as the state religion, despite being overwhelmingly Muslim. It is worthy to note that it was a dictatorship under Suharto, howe

Actually battleship and dreadnought are sort of interchangeable terms; Dreadnoughts are usually battleships built before WWI, and predreadnoughts are refer to battleships built during the 1900s and 1890s that dont have the centralized large caliber guns of HMS Dreadnought. But eventually battleships grew from ~20,000 tons from the WWI era to well over 40,000 tons in WWII. So for all intents and purposes, Battleship > Dreadnought

Debug Message: Version v1.6 beta 5 Dark Avatar last updated on: Wed May 23 12:40:53 2007 Debug Message: Checking DX Version. Debug Message: *********DXDiag info follows.********* System Info Time: 5/28/2007, 21:34:19 DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904) Machine Name: DENEVE_D326 Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 2 (2600.xpsp_sp2_qfe.070227-2300) Languages: English (Regional Setting: English) System Manufactur

I usually give large morale bonuses to my civs at the setup phase of the game. That way you can tax the crap out of your lower population colonies without them even going below 100%. This has the dual bonus of getting you more income with those currently unprofitable colonies as well as have them grow at an exponential rate (since population growth correlates to morale). The added growth ofc results in a larger tax base, so its sort of like a vicious cycle (in your favor <img src="http://images.