*chime* *chime* *chime*
aaahhhemmm...that was the school bell.
Class. Class! Quite please...thank you.
Finish your snipping and put down your cutters.
Would someone please help Tank...thank you andy.
Everyone toast and light up so we can get on with this.
*tapping finger on podium*
MACS, remove that damn label please, embargo and all, hello?...thank you.
Ok, class, any other comments on Tuck's original suggestions or those appended?
Anyone?
Anyone?
Ferris?
Well, let me say, then, that they are good ideas and thanks all who participated. I particularily like the key one, it's brilliant, absolutely brilliant.
Now, on to less useful information. Someone has brought up the fact that Europe has fallen, and it appears to some to be debatable. Although that's possible, I believe, as do most other leading experts in Kyocera Mita CS-2050 network installation and setup with recent experience, that it isn't really debatable, it is more an occurance of, well, differing definitions of what is meant by Europe has fallen.
In the strict military sense, as exampled by Jericho, of course that's not the case.
In an invasion sense, as exampled by either the Borg or the Replicators, of course that's not the case.
If you take it in light of the Ori, sorry, no pun intended, it is, well, fairly similar, but only in as far as the onset goes. The general premise is the same, and the original actions are the same, but again, the terminus with an actual Borg-type or Replicatorish invasion has not yet started.
As you study the history of Europe, note the rich, deeply rooted traditions that are related to, and in
fact, even define, each geographic region which we have come to know as countries over the centuries.
As peoples peacefully move around, they bring their traditions with them and continue to practice them, but they also partake of the local community. My grandmother, for example, spoke Polish and and read Polish papers and made pierogi and drank green tea with milk in it. However, when she was interacting with people who didn't understand Polish, she would speak English. She attended mass weekly at the local church, even though it wasn't in Latin. When people came to visit, she would make them coffee, even though she never drank it, unless of course, she was at someone's house and it was offered to her. It was polite to accept it, given there were no medical or religious reasons not to. If she did have reasons to not accept it, people would not have offered it, or wouldn't have invited her over in the first place. Although she didn't open an ethnic restaurant, many do. It provides a way for other people to experience other food and even traditons. She was called an immigrant.
Now, if you contrast that to what has been happening in Europe, and America of late as well, you see that
the immigrants are not assimilating into the local culture while maintaining their own, they are isolating themselves and then requiring the local community to not only allow them to exist, but to accept them and make allowances for their customs and their community, as well as support it. This is being promoted under various terms, such as politcal correctness, as well as the re-definition of the word tolerance to include acceptance and, in effect, promotion, of their culture. Tolerance was, and should be, exactly that, tolerance. Nothing more and nothing less. All tolerance means is that you have to, well, not beat the **** out of them when you cross paths. You can dislike them, disparage their mamas, make jokes about them, that doesn't matter. They have a right to exist and to be different, that's all you have to accept. You do not have to accept, and definately do not have to embrace, their customs or their culture.
The political correctness crowd also engages in the re-definition of many other words and, just as insiduosly, the re-classification of many so-called rights. In many discussions there are ludicrous
statements made such as health insurance is "a basic human right which can't be denied". Basic human
rights would include the right to not get the crap beat out of you for, say, having a certain color hair
(blue and the smurfs come to mind, but brown, red, black, etc also apply), dressing a certain way, or
behaving a certain way (perhaps one likes to skip rather than walk). Of course, those actions, or quirks or customs, whatever one wants to call them, may limit your employment opportunities and thusly affect your life. Other basic human rights are such things as to not be experimented on unless you agree, to not be tortured for no reason, to not be raped, to be able to possess things rightfully gained; that's about it.
Basic human rights do not include housing, food or health-care. Basic human rights allow you to possess a
hut, but they do not mean the government, or your employer, should provide one for you. If you want to
herd cats, you can. You may be ridiculed and called a no-good cat-herder, but if it provides for you and is
not illegal, you can be a cat-herder. It's also a basic human right to think, and say, what you want about cat-herders.
Tolerance is letting the cat-herder be a cat-herder. He may ride a nicer mule than you, but you don't have
to go to the cat-herder meetings and the government doesn't need to provide mandatory cat-herder
orientation classes. You don't need to accept or embrace cat-herders or their way of life, you simply need to let them exist. If the Chinese market for cats goes south (not geographically) then it is up to the cat-herder to diversify or retrain. Perhaps the alpaca market is better.
Now, as to how Europe has fallen, they have re-defined tolerance as acceptance, and in many cases actually
include support from a defective human rights standpoint. They have allowed other sub-cultures to
over-shadow their own rich historical culture and dilute their national heritage. As such, they have lost what is essential to human beings, the need to be part of a select group. Being a human doesn't do much
for you, but being an Austrian means something and it gives you not only a group to belong to, but
something to protect and to strive to improve, it's your heritage. It may be the family farm that's been
run for 5 generations. It may be the neighborhood that you live in and are proud of. But that
neighborhood is part of a city, and that city part of a state, and that state part of a country. The
country is the logical stopping point because that is usually where currencies and laws change wholesale,
as well as a barrier being put in place by language, but mostly culture. What Europe has done is to say
that Franciose is no different than Gregoire. You have the same money and the same constitution, you
needn't have any national pride, there is no nation for you to be proud of. There is nothing for you to
improve, protect or even continue. And even though your family has been here for generations and struggled to survive, we'll give Bubba a house and special teachers so he can be just like you, without even trying, because he's human, just like you.
Don't get me wrong, if the Banque Internationale d'Tasmanian Cat-Herders wants to fund the Bubba project, they are free to do that. Bubba's can get BITCH loans and carry on with life. That's one of the
cat-herders' human rights, to sustain Bubba through BITCH loans if they see fit to do so because they can
possess, or choose to give away, what they rightfully own, as long as those funds aren't enabling the
Bubba's to do anything illegal. However, BITCH is not a government entity, is not government supported and
is not government endorsed.
In closing, I'd like to remind everyone that the homework assignment has been waived by the Pope because of St Patty's day, he knew you wouldn't do it anyway, so why not give you special dispensation so you won't break any rules.
And remember to clean up your ashes.
With that noted, we still need one person to clean the blackboard and one to clap the erasers...
Hey!!!
Get back her you ungrateful little...
