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[TODAY IT BEGINS]

TODAY IT BEGINS

4 years of waiting are through! Vamos Espana!

It's a big business. Nobody said otherwise.

That's nothig compared to the sums spent in the US (NBA and such).

It just seems a silly opinion to me. Do the tens of thousands who visit a football match take part in major brawls after leaving the field? No, they quietly go home. True, there are hooligans. But these are not real football fans - they are just stupid pricks who are searching for a reason to fight. But if most football fans were violent you would here about violence much, much more often.

but the majority of football supporters are far too violent in my opion.

I'll bite of your ear and feed it to your dog if you call me violent again.


Seriously, the violent fans are only a small minority. Or do you suggest that most people in the world (as football is after all the most popular sport) are violent?

France vs England - 4:0Ã, 

At the very least...

What a lovely metaphor of life.

Panda, mate, as I said...

http://www.euro2004.com/tournament/index.html


Vel, Bulgaria needs a star to do as well as the team of 1994. And Berbatov is hardly a Stoichkov.

With the help of the referee anyone can do it... 

is there a website where I can check scores? I love international footy

Like a... million? The official website will offer you the most comfortable updates.

does Khan still play for Germany?

Yeah. After all, Lehman, the second choice, is an even bigger clown.

Oh, I forgot Portugal. Well, they are just not good enough. They will lose to France in the quarter.

Three days to go. When the Portugal-Greece match will kick-off the whole sports world will avert its eyes to the poorest member of the EU. So, isn't that a good reason to gather the few of you who are not wusses football aficionados in this lovely little thread.
Personally, I think France are the clear favourites, despite the World Cup 2002 fiasco. Not only do they have the best team, their squad also has the most depth. Spain will finally rise up to the expectations, and I belive they will only stop in the final. They have a surprisingly even squad now, with the Baraja-Albelda double pivot in midfield guaranteeing contol of the midfield area. They also have endless possibilites on the bench. Italy are as strong as always, and as long as they can keep their minds off conspiracy theories they will prove a serious contender for the title they almost won the last time. England are going to quite naturally fuck-up. Their attack is quite ridiculous. That, plus the fact that the primitive English have never seen a player using short passes and technique, should send them home early. Not before getting easily beaten by France on the opening game, that is. Out of group D, I think all the 'top' teams will flop. The Dutch need a shrink very quickly. Germany seems rather pathetic, but if Ballack raises his level then the whole team would do so as well. The Czech have discipline and a few star players, but their squad is lacking at some points. I can't see any of them go beyond the quarter-final. The pleasent surprise of the tournament will be either Denmark or Sweden, both are exceptional hard-working sides which work well as a team.
What do you think?

Well, provided the murder is done by a twisting of the 3 laws, it's alright, but otherwise...

As it seems, it begins pretty much like the Caves of Steel, with a robot being the main suspect of a murder. But from there onwards, it seems to freak out, with robots going crazy etc.

[on a side note, the Oxford English Dictionary cites Asimov as the creator of the word Robotics, much to his surprise].

About what he later wrote:

"As time went by, I made other discoveries that delighted me. I found for instance, that when I used the word 'robotics' to describe the study of robots, I was not using a word that already existed but had invented a word that had never been used before.
The word has now come into general use. There are journals and books with the word in the title and it is generally known in the field that I invented the term. Don't think I'm not proud of that. There are not many people who have coined a useful scientific term, and although I did it unknowingly, I have no intention of letting anyone in the world forget it."

He's a funny guy when writing about himself.

It's not merely a change. It is utterly against the essence of I, Robot. Imagine they put hardcore porn in The Lord of the Rings. 

I've just come back from The Day After Tomorrow, and I get a look at the theatrical trailer of I, Robot. Horrible! Tying Asimov's name to this project is an insult! He must be rolling in his grave now. The plot of this movie, apperantly, involves robots becoming a menace to mankind, and battling it. This sort of stories Asimov himself defined as Robot-as-Menace. Asimov despised Robot-as-Menace stories. Almost all of his stories are what he described Robot-as-Pathos, with the exception of a few which didn't quite belong to the other category as well. Bloody Hollywood producers.

[I still deserve to have a roof over my head, to have medical insurance, and live a decent life.]

Try this on Barcik: Growing up in the Flint Michigan there was only one way to succedde. Work in the factory. I went to a very rough high school and saw every one of my freinds beaten up because of the color of their skin. I am a little guy and was harrased but, somehow managed to avoid getting hurt too bad. I dropped out of high school and later got my GED (a dumb man's diploma in America). I was told that a GED is useless. I didn't know what to do. I wanted to go to college but my parents wouldn't help me. I was stuck. Factories were closing so that option was running dry. I talked to an army recruiter for a while until I realized I just couldn't do that. So, I got a job at McDonald's. I worked my ass off, and got NOTHING for it. Finally, while at a bar one night I met a guy that offered for me to travel to Columbus, Ohio with him. He was going to medical school. I went along, having known the guy for about 3 weeks. I ended up in a new city without family or friends. The guy I moved to Columbus with got his girlfriend pregnant and ended up moving back to Flint (by the way he was in medical school and dropped out to work in a pizza shop). I stayed. Only through the generosity of a few people did I manage to pull it together. I spent some time homeless, got another job at McDonald's and lived in someones basement. Finally, I began to learn about student loans. People told me I could go to school for free! No advisors in school ever said anything about it, my parents never said anything about it, why hadn't anyone told me about school loans!? So, now, my life has slowly come back together over the past 7 or 8 years. I am in school and working at a cafe as a cook. I have tried many different ways to make enough money to buy a house, car and all that (truck driving being one big mistake). But, here I am, 29 years old and in college with a bunch of 18 year olds. It sucks. If something happens, like my girlfriend getting pregnant, I will have to leave school and work some shit job. I DO NOT have the opportunities that some people have. I did not grow up in a $300,000 dollar house. I have worked hard and struggled all of my life. I'm not the smartest guy in the world. But, guess what Barcik, I still deserve to have a roof over my head, to have medical insurance, and live a decent life.

In my naive little world, everybody has a chance. Personally, I believe there isn't one person in the world who just can't succeed (and by that, I mean the whole jackpot). However, without a doubt, for some people the conditions are more difficult. Your road to potential success is harder than mine. And yet, both you and I can be the next Bill Gates.
And, as I said, everybody deserves the basic needs of life.

Barcik: "buy a 300,000$+ house" ...WHAT!?!? And you are crying about WHAT!? Please tell me that the israeli dollar is worth an American penny or something. You cannot possibly be complaining about your way of life and live in a $300,000 home.

I am very much in rush here, so I'll reply to the rest later.

Will you be satisfied when you write a test worthy of an A+ and receive an A-? My parents are not poor, but hell, they deserve more.

[and more]

Basically, I feel that every human being is entitled to food, shelter, health care, and other necessities of modern life. I feel that unemployment should NEVER exist; there is a job for every human. I feel that hunger should NEVER exist; there is surplus food for every starving human. I feel that the government should provide these things and more to EVERY human. I feel that each human should be able to cast his or her individual vote and have it count toward the final vote (popular vote). I feel that nearly every government decision should be made by popular vote (we have the technology to do this).

I am against socialism. I am a firm believe that a person's quality of life should be a direct result of his effort in it. Of course, I too believe that every man should have the basic needs of life, but unlike you said, not an inch more (of course, I don't mean people who are disabled and cannot work etc.).
I live in Israel, a state that was founded in the 40s by Russian immigrants. So, naturally, Israel was constructed on socialist principles. MAPAI, the biggest political party in Israel until the end of the 70s (what later became the Labour) was a socialist party. And so, till this day, our economy has a socialist character. So, the welfare rates here are extremely high (despite the media's constant attempts to present it otherwise). And as if the ones who are really unemployed are not enough, this has lead to a massive exploitation of the system. Thus, My parents, nicely paid programmers with a cottage, 2 cars and a cute dog, give away 60% of their wages. 60 fucking percent! If you ask me, it is outrageous. The Israeli people have taken the Robin Hood view - all the rich are evil, all the poor are so because of the rich. Well, let me tell you a little secret. There is an excellent reason poor men are poor - they did not study hard enough, work hard enough and try hard enough. Why the fuck should they get something? And yet, my father who works 12 hours a day has not just to feed them, but to also buy them a DVD player.
Furthermore, people in Israel do not look on the rich as role models, but as hate symbols. They despise them. Sheri Arisson, the wealthiest person in Israel, moved to Miami because of disgraceful treatment by the press. People on the street blame the rich for their problems. This is wrong, educationally and morally.
Luckily, the current Minister of Economy is Benjamin Netanyahu, one of the few efficient men in the Knesset. He has come up with a new plan to fix the crumbling Israeli economy, and we already see some of its early effects. Hopefully, we are on the way to a better future.

Basically, everything was a lot better. In some ways. There was no hunger. Even if you didn't have any money, you were able to pick some empty bottles from street and give em away, and you got plenty of money to buy food, because it was so cheap.
Everyone had opportunity to have education. Even a dumbest guy could go to univesity if he wanted to. Luxuries like going to cinema, theatre, restaurant, vacation, eat well and so on were so cheap that everyone could afford them. And people could live well even if they worked as a janitor or some other low-payment job.

Allow me to give the second view from the former Soviet Union. I was born in Dnepropetrovsk, today's Ukraine. My parents, who worked just as much then as they do now, got along well. We had all the basic necessities. But we lived in a small apartment. We didn't have a car. Our furniture was old. Luxury? Nowhere in sight.
And then we moved to Israel, with 150$ in the pocket. In 10 years, my parents were able to buy a 300,000$+ house, despite the nature of the Israeli economy. Back there, such a thing is no more than an illusion.

Oh, and for those of you that keep on saying "this is war" REREAD this until you get it:

"The first gulf war ended very quickly after Iraqi media released images of a bombed Iraqi convoy. The US government has admitted that this dramatically sped up withdrawal from Iraq."

Is this perhaps the reason that nothing changed after the first Gulf War?