What are you talking about?
You hike up the short term capital gains tax (or those less than 30 days, or a week, or whatever) - this discourages speculation and encourages people to hold on to securities more. This doesn't eliminate the short term trading, but this millisecond short term trading becomes much less profitable, and everyone (besides these speculative traders) is better off.
It was common at the time for girls to marry around 13.
By your standard, then, we can all agree that he was a pedophile because
Muhammad is said to have asked her to arrange for him to marry both. Traditional sources dictate that Aisha was six or seven years old when betrothed to Muhammad but the marriage was not consummated until she was nine or ten years old.
Your pedophile reference really doesn't make sense - even a century ago it was common all across Asia for girls to marry right when they hit puberty.
You get to marry kids (if you're into that sort of thing), if anyone disagrees with you then it's probably because they're infidels and you may kill them and take their stuff, and you can beat your wife to keep her in line as long as you do it right.
Like any religion, there are people across the whole spectrum. Plenty of Muslims completely disagree with everything you just said. There is a big difference between the Koran, that essentially all Muslims believe is the word of God, and the Hadiths which is a much longer text written by some scholars 200-300 years later documenting Muhammad's life. Many Muslims think the latter is utter bullshit.
Granted, there are also those who follow the Hadiths completely without room for interpretation and believe the things you mentioned, but my point is Islam, like any religion, had a wide spectrum of followers. Look at the middle ages - Islam was seen as much more progressive than Christianity at the time.
No, liabilities will be paid with by the company's cash, which theoretically will be replaced by next year's operating revenue. However, If Novell were to stop all operations today, it would have to pay the liabilities it already owes (wages, rent, utilities, invoices, etc.) with it's own cash, BEFORE any money would be paid to shareholders. The same is true if they had any debt. Any liabilities listed are for services or products (employee wages, office supplies) that Novell has already received but not paid for.
Correct that liabilities are different from debt, but you still "owe" either one. My point was that saying "one billion cash with no debt" is misleading. If you're talking about cash the company has in terms of its financial health, you have to mention its liabilities as well.
I'm not sure whether or not you meant that shareholder's equity is a liability, but the two are completely different. You don't pay back shareholder's equity, but you DO have to pay back liabilities.
Holy crap! they offered 2 billion to buy us out? We're not even worth half that!
They most definitely do have debt. http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bs?s=NOVL
They don't have "long term debt" but over $800 million in liabilities, $600 million of which has to be paid within a year. So yes, a billion in cash, but plenty of debt as well.
It's true that Microsoft offered $31/share and Yahoo is now ~$14. However, keep in mind a lot of Yahoo's decline has to do with the economy and market as a whole. The S&P 500 is down 30% since the time of Microsoft's offer. Assuming they took the offer and invested elsewhere, Yahoo investors would have had around $20/share right now. That's still a lot better than $14, but certainly not as good as $31.
Point taken. I did not mean to suggest that Arab rule of Jews was somehow a better situation, only that both sides can and do coexistence peacefully in some places.
You have no intelligent response so resort to calling me "willfully blind." I'm not an idiot, any solution seems next to impossible. I stated what I think is the most likely outcome, and made the point that two states is not a viable solution.
I've spent months in the area and am well informed on the topic. Not everyone is as pessimistic and arrogant as you are. I'm done.
A point I was trying to make is it's not so mixed as you think. 20% of Israel's population is of Arab origin. They've been living there for 50 years. There are cities where Jews and Arabs (both Israelis) live together just fine. Israel has 200,000 Jewish citizens in the West Bank. East Jerusalem is primarily Palestinian, but essentially surrounded by Israelis. If you look at a map of the West Bank, while the Israelis and Palestinians live in distinct areas, the whole of it is very mixed.
Not sure where you get the 15 million number for Palestinians - including refugees most likely? In any outcome, they will likely have to be recompensated and settled in a variety of areas. I don't know the exact numbers, but having 8 million people come back into Israel/occupied territories is extremely unrealistic in any potential outcome.
I think you were just exaggerating, but the Jewish/WW2 example is much farther off than the analogies I gave. That was Nazi Germany with the purpose of exterminating Jews. Despite the rhetoric, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is about land, not religion/ideology. Hamas does not represent the whole of Palestine despite what you might think. A sizable Jewish population (~10%) lived in the area for decades (centuries?) alongside the Arabs with no problems.
I don't see any more viable solution. To have two *viable* states, you need a contiguous Palestinian state, and that requires massive relocation of Jewish settlers.
Maybe it won't happen all at once, but the way things are going now, the Palestinians, especially those in the West Bank, are likely to be absorbed into Israel. This is already happening with East Jerusalem where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians live and are more connected to Israel than the rest of the West Bank.
Agreed. Unfortunately, it's a desperate situation. It's easy for you to sit there from your computer and think about the best possible action, but when you harassed daily by soldiers when you walk to school, your aunt was killed in "collateral damage", etc, you get desperate.
Of course firing rockets into random pockets of Israel is wrong/useless. Israel's daily harassment of the Palestinians through this 40 year occupation does take its toll and is responsible for the frustration of the Palestinians. There was a time, for years, when the Palestinian protests were essentially non-violent. Israel and her interests have been very adept at controlling and countering any goodwill that comes out of those protests, and has continued occupying/colonizing Palestinian land for decades.
Again, I am not justifying firing random rockets. Both sides are wrong, Hamas just as much as Israel.
I only meant Israel/occupied Palestine rather than the whole Middle East. Certainly enough people would be shocked at the idea of the former, and probably laugh in my face if I mentioned the latter.
Try everyday in small villages no one gives a shit about. Read Palestinian media and Arab news and you'll see plenty of non-violent protests (one sided reporting of course).
What happens at these non-violent protests, such as demonstrations against the construction of the "security wall" in the West Bank? The protesters get stoned by right wing Israeli settlers, or are dispersed by tear gas and rubber bullets from the Israeli army.
Why not? I didn't say it was easy or simple. What about South Africa? They certainly didn't get along and people might have looked at you crazy had you suggested it way back win. I've been to Israel and the West Bank.
What about slavery here in the US? Racism is still a problem, but certainly much improved from 100 years ago.
Obviously there are going to be on both sides that don't like it, but with the way the populations are so interconnected, I don't see any other situation that will be stable in the long term.
Despite what you might think, there are people there on both sides who don't give a shit who is right and just want to live out their lives. There are plenty of areas where the two sides live peacefully.
A company is known by the men it keeps.
