Obama Campaign Seeks LAMP Developers

kgamiel writes "The Obama campaign's CTO is hiring LAMP-biased geeks for the Boston office to help elect the Senator in the fall. This got me to wondering, what if he instead announced a SourceForge project toward the same end? What would such a project look like? Tools that both sides could use 'equally' would not achieve the desired end. And philosophically, could the Open Source community support one side in a competition such as this? What other issues does this raise?" Another reader notes that the Obama campaign is also searching for a security expert to plug the holes that allowed a hacker to redirect Obama's site (Linux/Apache hosted by GoDaddy) to Hillary Clinton's (Windows/IIS hosted by Rackspace).

Pornstarrish, anyone?

[consonant]

I *really* think Hilary Clinton's should've been advised against being a female candidate, and hosting her site via 'Rack'space.. :-D

Re:

[something_wicked_thi]

Ha! But I wonder at the whole redirect to her web site from Obama's... I'm surprised her site didn't get DOSed from the traffic increase. :-)

But it also wouldn't surprise me if that was done by some republicans rather than Hillary supporters (not that it's always easy to tell the difference sometimes...). Remember the Limbaugh thing? There are lots of people who are interested in helping Hillary. You could even wonder if it wasn't done by an Obama supporter (or the campaign itself) to make Hillary look bad

Re:

[certron]

Can someone point me to news of this redirect 'hack'? These holes seem to be something completely outside of the server-security arena and more in the realm of 'the English language'.

"Another reader notes that the Obama campaign is also searching for a security expert to plug the holes that allowed a hacker to redirect Obama's site (Linux/Apache hosted by GoDaddy) to Hillary Clinton's (Windows/IIS hosted by Rackspace)."

I am convinced that this is actually referring to the redirection of Hope.net (run by the

An Obama OSS project ??

[phoxix]

Jeebus, he wants to get things done, and not spend forever arguing about schematics, philosophy, languages, and what color the bikeshed is.

Re:

[something_wicked_thi]

No. He's just described what most politicians are best at, and what they should spend most of their time doing. It's better to have an ineffective government than an active, misguided one. I'd much prefer it if Bush suddenly got a lot more interested in bikeshed paint jobs, for example.

Re:An Obama OSS project ??

[h4rm0ny]

No. He's just described what most politicians are best at, and what they should spend most of their time doing. It's better to have an ineffective government than an active, misguided one.

Missing Option: Active, Representing Your Needs.

Re:An Obama OSS project ??

[CastrTroy]

$100 an hour for a LAMP developer? Developers are getting paid way too much these days. $100 an hour = 3500 a week for a 35 hour week. That's $182,000 a year. I don't know many developers who make that much money. I also don't know too many who only work 35 hours a week.

Re:An Obama OSS project ??

[tomhudson]

It's counted as a campaing contribution, and is chargeable at the same rates as a company would charge to do the same job on contract. The company would obviously charge more than they're paying the devs, to take care of slack time, non-billable hours, overhead (building, administration, compliance, etc), consumables (paper, laser toner, pcs, non-free software), employee benefits, and profit. $100/hr would be on the low side at that point.

Re:

[zeroduck]

Check out what his positions on the issue of transparency [barackobama.com] are. He's on a much better track than we're on right now.

Re:

[OMNIpotusCOM]

I think that falls under the Dilbert principle of becoming irreplaceable; if he were actually good at being a senator then we'd want to keep him there. Since he's not, he should be allowed to fail upward, just the same as anyone else =)

Re:

[sumdumass]

I hate to say it but in a way I hope you get your wish and then in a way, I think your fucking crazy to wish another of the likes of Cart on us. Sure, he was an honest president but he screwed up so many things that Reagan was able to look good by simply waking up in the morning because of what Carter did to the country.

If you were to hand Carter the country in the shape the economy and fuel problems are in today, and if Carter was to act like he did in '76, it would be worse then the great depression. I do

Sourceforge project would...

[croftj]

Lead to a project which is probably incomplete, no documentation, and maybe a tarball that won't build.

This seems to suggest....

[3seas]

... his running mate will be Al Gore.

Re:

[Daimanta]

Or John Edwards since he has a bigger support base from lower class white workers. Something Obama needs.

why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[Shivetya]

First off, I don't care who they partner him with, there are too many bigots in the Democratic Party to get this guy elected. Clinton is pulling a Wallace, distasteful as it seems, because it works. I have diehard Democrats in my family (Ohio, midwest) and they won't vote for him, worse they will vote against him. He didn't help himself getting caught making negative remarks about these people and his former Preacher lost him even more. Character doesn't change just because of an election, only its appea

Re:

[homer_s]

Both of them are the worst examples of politicians I can imagine. Both are hypocrites of the biggest order, living the large life and telling everyone else to do without.

Didn't Obama say the same thing at a commencement speech recently:

"...There's no community service requirement in the real world; no one forcing you to care. You can take your diploma, walk off this stage, and chase only after the big house and the nice suits and all the other things that our money culture says you should by. You can

Re:why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[TheoMurpse]

Did you forget that after he got his diploma he spent some years as a community organizer? That clearly jives with his speech.

What you quoted doesn't say "make no money, ever." It says "volunteer your time instead of focusing only on money."

I see no disconnect in anything but you and your failure to grasp simple logic.

Re:

[homer_s]

Did you forget that after he got his diploma he spent some years as a community organizer? That clearly jives with his speech.

I must've missed the part where he specified how long one should do community service and at what precise point one should cash in.

Re:why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[Score Whore]

Can you tell me what you think a community organizer is? You seem to think he was out there helping people out and generally being of service to the community. Which is wrong. Look at where he was and who he was working for: the Chicago political machine. His community organizing was all about getting people to show up and vote for the politician of the machine's choice. When he ran for office, his community organizing consisted of getting all his opponents removed from the ballot so that the community had exactly one person to vote for, him.

If you want to talk service, then go ahead and talk service but don't tell the world that pushing class, race and religious division in order to get votes is some kind of community service.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, a big part of it was community service through the Woods Foundation. He also organized voting drives and, yes, supported the candidates of his choice. But as a politically-involved person in Chicago, I can tell you that it's anything but a machine. He was a guy who was extraordinarily good at getting things done and his heart was in the right place.

Your post seems to be agenda-driven in that it assumes that he was "pushing class, race and religious division in order to get votes." But he broug

Re:

[Score Whore]

But as a politically-involved person in Chicago, I can tell you that it's anything but a machine.

Chicago is known for it's political machinations. You may call it "anything but a machine" but the slightest amount of research will expose that almost all politics in Chicago is driven by back room dealing.

But he brought people together then just as he seeks to do as president.

But he's not trying to bring people together now. He's trying to get elected and says pretty much anything that he thinks will get him e

Re:why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[amliebsch]

Wrong! [wikipedia.org]

Re:

[amliebsch]

"The pie chart below is the government view of the budget. This is a distortion of how our income tax dollars are spent because it includes Trust Funds (e.g., Social Security), and the expenses of past military spending are not distinguished from nonmilitary spending."

I have no idea what this is supposed to mean. If the metric is "government spending" then why is it a "distortion" to include money spent on Social Security and Medicare? The whole "trust fund" nonsense is nothing more than a transparent she

Re:why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[Score Whore]

I don't believe that once Obama graduated from law school, that he ever made less than $60,000 a year. And I'm curious as to which twenty years he spent as a "community organizer"? I'm curious because since 1993 he's worked variously as an associate lawyer or held a state or federal senate seat. None of which are going to be paying $30,000 a year. The twenty years before 1993 would have been 1973 - 1993. Given that he was born in 1961, I'm somewhat suspicious that he was community organizing when he was 12 years old.

Re:why would you want a partner from a failed bid?

[kestasjk]

Forget about that. We are the same, you and I. Hope.

This doesn't look like open source politics.

[the_hoser]

It looks like he wants to hire someone competent to run his web server. If I were running for a major political office, I'd certainly want someone competent runing my webserver.

If Obama does make a statement of support for open source software, then that'd give him kudos from me. Open source isn't the unstoppable freight train we'd like it to be, and could use all the friends in high places it can get.

Anything to piss in Microsoft's Cheereos makes me happy.

Re:This doesn't look like open source politics.

[TheoMurpse]

I don't know about a statement in support of XLOPQFLOSS, but I do know that he's a colleage and friend of Lawrence Lessig, and Obama sat down with Lessig before declaring his candidacy to discuss tech and internet policy.

Lessig endorses him wholeheartedly (you could cynically say it's because he wants a SCOTUS appointment), and from what I've read on Lessig's blog, Obama agrees with much of Lessig's tech/internet policy.

And as Lessig is my hero ("hero" is not the right word, but "role model" doesn't suffice), that's enough for me.

Re:This doesn't look like open source politics.

[tomhudson]

It looks like he wants to hire someone competent to run his web server. If I were running for a major political office, I'd certainly want someone competent runing my webserver.

Give it to Hans Reiser.

• 1. He has the free time ...
• 2. He can kill -9 anyone who fscks with it - what are they going to do, send him to jail?
• 3. Like any good politician, he knows where the bodies are buried and he's not telling ...

Re:This doesn't look like open source politics.

[Red Flayer]

If I were running for a major political office, I'd certainly want someone competent runing my webserver.

Ambiguous typo there -- do you want someone competent running your webserver or ruining your webserver?

Or did you actually mean runing? Perhaps you have "verbed" the noun "rune", in which case I expect that someone should explain to you that politics doesn't work like Diablo II, and you can't add runes to objects to make them more effective in real life.

Thanks in avdance for the clarification, it will help me understand your point much more clearly.

for any sponser in possible.sponsers, FOSS is FOSS

[Iamthecheese]

Why is this different from other competitions, like which company can have better software? Am I missing something?
With any FOSS the company to sponsor it gets to use it first because they made the specs and were expecting it, but if other users are forbidden it is no longer FOSS. I could, for instance, pay someone to write a new DB search class, add it ot the archives of other such classes, and there I made some FOSS. Even if I have a jump on anyone else stumbling on it.

I think the revision tree

[grizdog]

for any political campaign would be pretty hard to keep track of. Subversion, anybody?

McCain==Vista,Hillary==MacOSX,Obama==Linux

[NZheretic]

Which means Bush W.==Windows XP, Bill Clintion==Mac OS9, and Bush Snr==Win98/96.

Re:

[Darkn3ss]

Which means Bush W.==Windows XP, Bill Clintion==Mac OS9, and Bush Snr==Win98/96.

No no, W. 1st term was Windows XP. Second term was Vista. It got worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. Then a service pack came out, and it got worse. Then again, definitely a MS error here. Afganistan blows up our buildings. Clicks Go to War button. Clicks Afganistan. 100,000 troops are then deployed to Iraq.

Re:McCain==Vista,Hillary==MacOSX,Obama==Linux

[Sleepy]

Actually, the terrorist cell responsible for 9-11 came from Saudi Arabia. 7 years later we STILL can not question other Saudi suspects, including some with high placement in the Saudi government and the Saudi 'royal' family..

You still think it was an accident we invaded Iraq?? I don't.

Oh God

[MindlessAutomata]

Is slashdot going to turn into Obama propaganda like digg and other sites too? The Obama campaign is looking for people with server and programming experience. Big deal.

Re:Oh God

[gorbachev]

Can't seem to remember OSS being used by any other presidential candidate in the past, ever.

So, in a community championing OSS, yes, I would say that's kinda of a big deal.

If you take this to its logical conclusion, there's a good chance, if elected as President of the United States, he (or rather his technology people) might be advocating for more OSS within the Government. THAT would be a Very Big Deal (tm).

Re:Oh God

[Dausha]

IIRC, in 2000 Gore's site was taken down because it used Microsoft. So, he switched to Apache. So, OSS has been used in previous campaigns. I'll bet Apache has been used enough to invalidate your assumption that OSS is only now in the ascent in politics.

Re:Oh God

[yelvington]

"Can't seem to remember OSS being used by any other presidential candidate in the past, ever."

Here are several, then.

Howard Dean's 2004 campaign used Drupal [drupal.org] to build a website aimed at helping grassroots supporters self-organize. The resulting package was released as a fork called Civicspace, which eventually was reconciled back into the Drupal core and the CiviCRM [civicrm.org] constitutent relationship management toolkit.

Wesley Clark's 2004 campaign open-sourced an array of projects [clark04.com].

John Edwards has endorsed the concept of open-source software for voting machines and has blogged about open source. [lessig.org] Note that Redhat is based in his state.

This year, Christopher Dodd's website was built on Drupal 5, Bill Richardson's with Zope, and all of the Democratic candidates except Hillary Clinton ran Linux or BSD. (Clinton and most of the Republicans ran Windows servers.)

And I'm sure there are other examples.

Re:

[Epistax]

Is slashdot going to turn into Obama propaganda like digg and other sites too? The Obama campaign is looking for people with server and programming experience. Big deal.

Er.. what? I thought slashdot was a Ron Paul propaganda machine (or whoever is the most libertarian in any particular election). I chalk this one up to slow-news-day.

Re:

[Hankapobe]

It has been for a long, long time.

He said Obmama, not Ron Paul.

BTW, Ron Paul for President!

Sourceforge? - no.

[nurb432]

No, it doesn't need to be polluted with some politicians lies. ( i dont care which one, they are all the same )

No, not SourceForge

[hacker]

Please don't encourage the use of SourceForge for things like this. Not only is SourceForge a dead-end for time-limited projects, it is also full of dead, empty or completely abandoned projects.

A good 60% or more of the projects there have seen no activity at all (because people think creating a project there will automatically write itself), and many projects haven't been touched in 4, 5, 6 or more years.

They've consistently crippled the use of standard OSS tools like CVS, Subversion and Mailman just so they can try to retain control of projects by limiting the ability to use them effectively. They don't support other tools like git and proper MTA support for mailing commits to developers.

Also, quite a few projects have pulled the source to previous releases (a violation of the GPL that these projects were released under; gaim is one of them). Their management of projects and overall administration leaves MUCH to be desired.

Lastly, SourceForge was originally going to be called "Cold Storage", and it was supposed to partner with Freshmeat to permanently archive projects. I've seen many projects vanish from SourceForge, which completely negates the whole policy of its existance.

So while I respect and encourage the use of OSS tools, LAMP, retaining the mindshare of key developers who can help support a candidate they support, I don't think choosing SourceForge to host the project is a wise move.

Do you choose the type of hammer and nails you're going to use, before you draft the plans to build your new house? Do you choose the kind of vehicle you're going to drive before you know your destination and travel route? Of course you don't.

Why choose the hosting service before you've even chosen what kinds of components and requirements the project will need?

Re:

[hankwang]

quite a few projects have pulled the source to previous releases (a violation of the GPL that these projects were released under; gaim is one of them).

It's only a violation if they continue to provide compiled binaries for download. See the bottom of section 3 of GPL v2.

Re:

[hacker]

Incorrect. I am entitled to the source of the binaries they have already distributed. They've pulled all binaries and source from the site, which does not meet GPLv2 guidelines and requirements.

You skipped Section 3b of the GPLv2 verbage. They are not in compliance at this point due to that, and their removal of the source is a direct violation of the SourceForge TOS.

Re:

[hankwang]

You skipped Section 3b of the GPLv2 verbage.

Section 3b is about physical media (e.g., cd, dvd). Do you expect to be able to order a cd with the source code for every GPL program you download from the internet?

From the GPL FAQ:

How can I make sure each user who downloads the binaries also gets the source?

You don't have to make sure of this. As long as you make the source and binaries available so that the users can see what's available and take what they want, you have done what is required of you

Re:

[hacker]

Section 3b is about physical media (e.g., cd, dvd).

Not according to our FSF-appointed attorney (who incidentally, teacher IP and Copyright law). The traditional use of it is for vendor-supplied products which ship with GPL components, but this most-definitely is not limited to physical media distribution.

We've actually used 3b before to leverage a company to provide source for the binary copies of their project they were "beaming" and allowing downloads for, for their users and partners. None of this ha

Nothing here, move on..

[1 a bee]

I'm an Obama fan. Reading his book, and look to maybe contributing some time to his campaign. And I love to discuss politics. But this story is stupid. It's not even an ask /. entry.

No, it would be silly to put up a sourceforge project for a candidate. Better concentrate on how best to use existing tools.

--
Have USB will travel - http://www.faunos.com/ [faunos.com]

It is a feature, not a defect

[assertation]

Another reader notes that the Obama campaign is also searching for a security expert to plug the holes that allowed a hacker to redirect Obama's site (Linux/Apache hosted by GoDaddy) to Hillary Clinton's (Windows/IIS hosted by Rackspace).



If I was an Obama campaign manager I would actually be thankful that happened. People like me, who started off being fans of the Clintons, have gotten turned off to them because of the negative tactics they and their strong supporters have used.

I had a refrigerator magnet that read "Come Back Bill, All Is Forgiven". I just moved and decided not to put it back up. In one day Geraldine Ferraro's reputation was ruined for me.

Re:

[thetoadwarrior]

That's all it took? You'd think all the scum bag things they've done before would have been worse. What about the Peter Paul incident? She's going to court over it (mind you the media doesn't want to cover this). http://www.paulvclinton.com/ [paulvclinton.com]

Our generation is coming up

[unity100]

yea, our generation. this guy is practically 10 years older than me. and many years younger than many of you here.

despite im 33 years old and many of you are over 40, and many of you below 25 even, we belong to a single generation - information age generation. this super generation is people who got influenced with the advent of information technology, from 60s and on. at those decades, the impact was limited to whomever worked in the i.t. field. but with the spread of the ibm personal computer compatibles, it reached a broader segment of the society (and internationally too) and with the internet it reached the masses. however, up to this point, the world has been ruled by representatives who had little to do with those changes. either because they are too old, and information revolution did not affect them (because they werent in field of i.t. in 60s and on) or because they were much older, derelict of cold war era.

clinton is an example of the former - despite she was young at the onset of 60s and 70s, the real start of this information revolution, she had nothing to do with i.t., wasnt working in an i.t. field, and henceforth remained out of these changes.

im not even talking about mccain.

obama is different. he is young enough to have lived his youth at the time when information revolution was reaching masses, and he had enough exposure to i.t. (and very probably to open source ideals) during his time working in community service.

he is an example of how the future will be. as the older generation of (i say dinosaurs) phase out, this new generation - practically 'our' generation, because internet causing people to do everything together regardless of nation and location - is going to take over the world step by step. rightly so, because that is the nature of life.

and things will change. see this difference in approach in between those 2 candidates (one seeking lamp developer, not even asking a college degree, and hosting their stuff on lamp servers, the other is going all old big buck style, hosting their stuff on microsoft iis) signifies the difference in understanding in between them.

change will come faster in europe, because europe did not experience mccarthyism of america, that killed the potential change a few generations would be able to bring in 50s and 60s. therefore the transition there is smoother, because there didnt happen a lost generation that was not able to take positions of government, power due to scaremongering.

in u.s. it will be a bit harder. because mccarthyism scaremongering in between 50-60s caused that period to be one of stale progress up until the end of 60s. big corporations are going to fight back in u.s., whereas in europe they are already kept in check with Eu institutions.

im turkish, i live in turkey, irrelevant to many stuff that is happening in u.s., and im an obama supporter. that is because he is one of the spearheads of our broad information-age/new generation to bring change, regardless of where that change happens, we all should support each other.

Re:Our generation is coming up

[unity100]

The Democrats will remove your freedoms by forcing on you what they think is good for you, by taking away your means to protect you and your families, by forcing your diets and lifestyles. They will continue to push social spending (which is about 2/3 of our national budget).

what you term as 'removing your freedoms' have caused such a level of liberty and welfare in northern european countries is that, the biggest issue of danish youth is 'unfair decisions that soccer game referees hand out in national soccer league'. they have even caused a riot over it, last year.

please drop the mccarthyism shit that has plagued your nation for the last 50 years.

balance needs to be pursued in EVERYTHING in life. if you let big corporations go unchecked like you did in u.s. for the last 50 years, they go haywire like they are doing there. trying to scuttle internet like at&t and bell do, kill small businesses, sell tools and weapons to oppressive regimes, buy out senators, every kind of shit.

if balance is way distorted towards the government in cuban socialism, its way distorted towards megacorporation enslavement in america. you are on the other end of balance spectrum.

Re:

[unity100]

McCarthyism? This isn't a troll hunt for Communists, this is about how this country was founded.

excuse me, if you are blurting out that sentence, i have to be blunt - you dont know shit about history.

who founded your country were members of sons of liberty, which is actually a broad general public understanding of the principles that were invented in enlightenment france and refined in later 18th century. benjamin, paine, jefferson - the ideological leaders of that generation were totally into french enlightenment ideals. paine later went on to become a member of french parliament, after he was ho

Honestly....

[Darkness404]

Honestly neither McCain, Obama, or Clinton is going to be good for F/OSS. None of them are programmers, none of them know much about computers, Obama doesn't proclaim to use Linux, McCain isn't a Gnome (or KDE) fanatic and Clinton's favorite text editor is probably Notepad. Just because Obama wants to use some F/OSS guys in development of his website that doesn't mean that he is for F/OSS any more then any of the candidates are. And no, if Obama uses Linux in his servers and it runs on Apache that doesn't m

Re:

[Gogo0]

Theyre buddies?? Big deal!

As much as i like linux and open source, if i were president i wouldnt be thinking about it at all. there are more important things to work on than the presidency pushing products or philosophy.

I love LAMP

[rAiNsT0rm]

/that is all

Software is not political.

[xyourfacekillerx]

Why would *anyone* politicize software and platform preference? So now, I'm a liberal because I use Linux, or I'm a conservative because I use Windows? The last thing we need is more division and resentment among us. I like the software (programming) world because as computer nerds we are happily removed from the greater social issues that give everyone else so much consternation. Why would anyone want to ruin this?

Wanted: Crack Programmers with DIEBOLD experience

[Doofus]

$Candidate: So what kind of people do we need on the technology side?

$SeniorTechAdvisor: Open source, Windows, Mac OS/X, Linux, etc. We're platform neutral.

$Candidate: As long as we have someone on the team with DIEBOLD experience, I'm satisfied.

Oh boy

[soccerisgod]

Obama -> GoDaddy

Clinton - Rackspace

Am I the only one who's laughing his ass off at this?

Re:But they're anarchists! They can't have meeting

[FredThompson]

Uh, no. Christianity holds that murder is wrong. Kiling and murder are two different things.

Re:

[Elemenope]

Uh, no, no. Some modern interpretations of Christianity hold only murder to be wrong, while many historical strains (and certainly the text!) argue for the stricter interpretation. Christian "just war" theory is a hotly disputed topic amongst even modern Christians, and for good reason: there is barely if any scriptural support for it, and many see it as simply a pragmatic concession to the fact that living as a Christian in a cruel, cruel world is rather difficult. I would point you, for example, to Marti

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, no. The original text indeed says "murder" rather than "kill"; this was mistranslated at a later point and has - by now - pretty much become dogman in the christian churches, but "murder" is not a modern interpretation or re-reading.

In fact, ask any rabbi about this, and you'll see for yourself.

Re:

[Elemenope]

Actually, I was referring to the New Testament (which any rabbi will tell you is simply Hellenic heresy, so don't ask a rabbi); e.g. turn the other cheek, etc.. That text repudiates the earlier rule that, it must be noted, governed a tribal people struggling to survive in an unpleasant neighborhood rather than a captive sedentary enslaved people living in Roman occupied territory. So, yeah, the OT splits the distinction between killing and murder, as the many military campaigns throughout the books describ

Re:But they're anarchists! They can't have meeting

[HadouKen24]

Actually not.

If you're referring to the injunction "Thou shalt not kill" in the Ten Commandments, you'll find that the word used--transliterated as ratsach--does not necessarily refer to murder. While that is one of its primary meanings, it also includes unintentional killings as well. Indeed, this is the most common use of the word in Deuteronomy. It enjoins the Israelites to found three cities as refuges for those who kill unintentionally, so that they can flee there and be safe from vengeful relatives.

I'm not sure where the claim that it just means "murder" comes from. A good translation and a concordance will quickly show it to be simply and obviously false. In any case, it is shamelessly used by (mostly) Protestant preachers to justify all kinds of killing as not being "murder." Which isn't exactly in the spirit of Christian charity, to my mind.

Not that it matters to me all that much. I haven't been a believer for years.

Re:But they're anarchists! They can't have meeting

[thegameiam]

The "unintentional" killing you're referring to is closer to the American concept of "negligent homicide" - it was crimes for which the punishment was exile to once of the cities of refuge.

lo tirtzah in the Ten Commandments is a little bit broader than "don't murder," but it's a long distance away from "don't kill." Attempts to interpret it to mean "don't kill" are well-intentioned, but are not faithful to the actual meaning or historical interpretation of the text. If "don't kill" had been intended, lo ya'areg would have been used instead.

This is the standard Rabbinic interpretation of the phrase in the Ten Commandments - all of them refer to crimes for which one can receive the death penalty, so "don't steal" is limited to "don't kidnap [i.e. "don't steal people"]" - one cannot receive the death penalty for homicide which is not murder in Jewish law, so the that's another data point supporting the interpretation of the word as "murder."

Re:

[qbzzt]

The whole point of Judaism, possibly of religion in general, is that there is a power above the state to determine right and wrong.

A Nazi einstatzgruppen "soldier", shooting helpless Jewish civilians with full state sanction, is still a murderer. A partisan, shooting at the soldier without the sanction of the state, is not.

Re:

[zeromorph]

One of the main difference between "killing" and "murder" in many languages is that "murder" requires the patient of the action to be human, while "killing" applies to any living being. I don't know Hebrew, but I'd guess that this is a crucial difference in the lexical semantics there too.

Re:

[FredThompson]

That was my point. You must kill a plant in order to eat it.

There's also no perfect 1:1 relationship between languages, especially a modern language and one that is a few thousand years old.

Re:But they're anarchists! They can't have meeting

[plantman-the-womb-st]

To nature, all life carries the same value.

To nature, all live carries NO value.

A value of zero is still a value. Both of you are correct.

Re:

[tomhudson]

Just because we're here doesn't mean that life has "value to nature." Nature doesn't "care" one way or the other. "Nature" is not a sentient being, and should not be anthropomorphized.

Re:

[tomhudson]

Otherwise, we'd have to argue that rocks and managers are sentient :-)

I'll give the benefit of a doubt to the rock.

True ... nobody's ever even *tried* to sell pet managers ... just no market. I guess they're not perceived as being as warm and cuddly as a rock.

Re:

[FredThompson]

Read what I typed, not that which you wish to project into it. Killing and murder are two different things. Any dictionary clearly documents that.

As far as Christianity goes, it is an inextricable extension of Judaism with the realization of the prophecies in the OT. The NT doesn't negate the OT, it fulfills it. The nature of God doesn't change.

I didn't type anything about "just war". Even so, you're wrong about that. There are plenty of citations in which God directed "just war". God did not instruct peop

Re:

[Elemenope]

The NT doesn't negate the OT, it fulfills it. The nature of God doesn't change.

That's a cute notion, and all, but the text does not bear that out. Jesus instructed his disciples/students when struck to *not retaliate*. I've heard this canard about Christianity "completing" Judaism and maintaining a consistent nature for God, and it's an utter crock that reading the Bible for five whole minutes can put to rest.

Re:

[FredThompson]

No canard, it's right there. Jesus was the blood sacrifice which meets the sin debt of the OT. That's what the OT prophecies point to.

You are cherry picking. Turn the other cheek doesn't mean allow yourself to be killed, stolen from, etc.

The Jesus of the NT was a very buff guy, as would be anyone who was a "carpenter" in an age of only hand tools who was able to throw merchants out of the temple given all trade was done with coin, not electronic credit, and there would have been a lot of hired bodyguards.

Re

Re:

[Elemenope]

The first passage simply extends my point: it is not in the purview of *humans* to visit violence upon one another; that, at best, is God's job. Same, BTW, for the third passage (vengeance is not *yours*; at best it rests with some God-ordained authority, if not God Hisownself). Also, it should be noted that the epistolary rulings diverge significantly from Jesus' teachings. Paul was a dirty revisionist, if you ask me. :)

The Luke passage, which is often trotted out in defense of a violent Christianity, is

Re:

[Elemenope]

I agree, and that's a great way to approach this very difficult religion: as a striving towards an example (Jesus).

But it is an awful stretch to say that killing is merely a sort of "concession" or "compromise" with our natures that would be acceptable *at all* within the ethical/spiritual rubric that Christianity as it is presented in the Bible represents.

Re:

[Ma8thew]

Jesus was a Jew...

Re:

[Gerzel]

John the Baptist or are you talking about Andrew?

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, it seems that some might not agree with you;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments#Killing_or_murder

And frankly your argument sounds like the kind of technicality that allows some so called Christians to support Bush.

Re:

[Glock27]

Of course you're right, because Wikipedia is the authority on all things spiritual. :-P

Christians have engaged in war for centuries, it's a well-established tradition. ;-)

"Those who beat their swords into plowshares usually end up plowing for those who kept their swords." - Ben Franklin

Oh, and by the way, for the most part Bush has done a fine job. You'll regret it if a Dem is elected.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:It's murder, not killing, that is condemned

[the_B0fh]

So, if you want to kill someone the right way, all you have to do is declare war on them? How small does the scale have to be? Can you have a war on one person? Who determines if this is a war? Does things like gang wars count? What about war on poverty, does that count? Would killing convicted monopolists fall under the protection of the war on poverty?

Thanx for any clarification.

Re:

[hacker]

It is nothing more than a fictional novel written by dozens of people (real and imaginary, for example there is zero evidence in the historical record of any civilization that a man named 'Moses' existed at this time who did the deeds he was claimed to do). who wanted to have their say.

Re:

[maxume]

No historical evidence? But what about the Bible?

I kid, I kid...

Re:It's murder, not killing, that is condemned

[jbengt]

It is nothing more than a fictional novel . . .

The Bible is definitely not a novel, not even a single book (as you indirectly allude to).
It's not really a work of fiction, either (true or not). It is partly historically, partly mythological, and somewhat akin to a docudrama with a purpose, trying to answer the question "Why?".
One should expect contradiction within it, since it is a collection of a number of books written by different authors at different times for different purposes. That does not make it irrelevant or unhelpful.

Re:

[amRadioHed]

One should expect contradiction within it, since it is a collection of a number of books written by different authors at different times for different purposes. That does not make it irrelevant or unhelpful.

One viewing the book from a secular perspective would not be surprised to find contradictions in the Bible. On the other hand, the Christian view is that the book is the word of God in which case contradictions would not be possible.

Re:

[something_wicked_thi]

Then why is the old testament included? And, what's more, the other two examples I quoted were straight from the old testament. The new testament also doesn't agree with itself, with different ancestry of Jesus, as well as different accounts of Jesus' apparent resurrection, so my point stands.

Your religion is bunk, my friend. :-)

Re:It's murder, not killing, that is condemned

[tomhudson]

Jesus said to turn the other cheek. He said to forgive those that trespass against you.

That was 2,000 years ago. What's he done for me lately?

Re:Tech

[Vectronic]

Yes, that they both have websites, thats all.

Re:

[nurb432]

Yes, it tells you something: It tells you they understand marketing in 2008.

If you think the candidates have a clue ( or care ) what their websites are running on, or could even understand it all you are sadly mistaken. I doubt they even know who is doing their web stuff, its all handled by their respective 'committees'.

   

Re:Tech

[GlobalEcho]

Yes and no.

Obama is intelligent as well as charismatic (yes, I'm from Chicago and I have met him). When asked -- jokingly -- a question about sorting at some university function, he replied, "well, I wouldn't use the bubblesort" which is pretty damn good for a lawyer, especially a constitutional lawyer.

I also find it telling that his technical advisor is an MIT professor. (Contrast with McCain, who I have not met but IMO is basically a stand-up guy embedded in a free-spending, anti-freedom party. McCain has an ex entertainment industry exec as HIS technical advisor).

Re: video of Obama's bubblesort comment

[llamafirst]

Link to video of Obama's bubblesort comment at Google...

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=k4RRi_ntQc8 [youtube.com]

Re:Tech

[dpilot]

The most important skill for a politician at this level is the ability to pick the right people. People who are more competent at their specializations that he is. People he can trust to deliver worthwhile information and opinions to him, including "No!" as needed. It could be said that this has been both Carter's and GWB's failing, the former for not building and trusting a sufficiently competent team, the latter for building a team of "True Believers" without enough dissent.

While the subject of the article is in no way sufficient to say that Obama is a good candidate or would be a good President, it is a necessary part of that. He is seeking competent assistance, and I didn't see "true belief" in the list of qualifications, as it was in building the Emerald City.

Re:

[Hankapobe]

Hillary Clinton's (Windows/IIS hosted by Rackspace).

Already tells you something about the candidates, doesn't it?

Hilary overestimates her bra size?

Re:

[Foofoobar]

It's mostly been embittered Hillary fans and angry feminists but you're right. But not to worry... the US is slowly losing as a superpower and having to take a backseat thanks to the administration of the last 8 yrs. The EU is now kicking our ass and people have now learned not to invest in the US dollar, US real estate and other risky US investments. We will soon be coming to real countries for help. :)

Re:

[TheoMurpse]

We will soon be coming to real countries for help. :)

Um, I think you reversed the : and ). That is, unless you want your country to be in dire need. If so, are you aware of the old Robot saying: "DOES NOT COMPUTE"?

Re:

[croftj]

So which utopia do you live in? Where on earth do you live where people just get along? I mean, I guess it could be in Russia, N. Korea and Myanmar. I hear they don't have problems like this during their elections.

Re:

[avandesande]

What makes you so sure that it was hacked by an American? Look in the mirror...arrogance.

Re:What's wrong with you people?!

[InfoVore]

Is everyone in the US so effing polarized that you can even get your website hacked by someone supporting a person you're running against, /even if they are in same party/?!

We are in the early death-throws of the so-called "Culture War" here. Since the Culture War is just another name for the Boomer generation's moralistic squabbling for power amongst themselves, then yes it can get ugly. As political transitions go, historically this one isn't that bad. Read a little history; not U.S. history, just plain old history. Lots of examples of treacherous, conniving, deceitful and brutal ideological power changes from just about every major western democracy. One of the most entitled, arrogant, and narcissistic generations in American history is starting to be pushed from power. I'm surprised the transition has so far been limited to mostly bombastic rhetoric and easily fixed shenanigans like redirected web-pages.

This isn't democracy, it's a slum.

And what pristine example of harmonious democracy do you hail from? Take care with that stone, you may live in a glass house.

What gives here, honestly? It's /just/ a presidential nomination, not an attack on freedom or something.

Obviously you aren't paying attention. First, this is a fight for arguably the most powerful political position in the world. Don't bother protesting, we're still the Big Burrito on the block, even if our power and influence are waning.

Second should Obama win both the Democratic nomination and the presidency, Hillary Clinton will never have a shot at the presidency. Her and her supporters feel she is entitled to that position. In their minds, she was supposed to be the first woman President of the U.S. In addition to the Clintons' feelings of entitlement and the gender politics involved, lets throw in racial politics (possible first black president), a failed presidency (Bush, Jr), a faltering economy, the expensive quagmire in Iraq, and fear of losing control by a generation entitled Baby Boomers. In point of fact, the whole thing is about the future of freedom - specifically who will set the tone and policies of the next generation of U.S. politics.

If you spent half the effort on real problems that you spend electing a leader for your arrogant little country, the world be be such a better place.

Go ahead throw your stones. We can take it. We have enough real problems to deal with (like fixing our economy, ending a stupid war & bringing our troops home, repairing our standing in the world, replacing our aging infrastructure, competing with the rising new economic superpowers, and healing the internal wounds from the corrosive Culture War in-fighting of the aging Boomers). We really appreciate your constructive suggestions on how to run our political selection process.

Christ, _just get along_.

We're trying. You're not helping.

-IV

Re:What's wrong with you people?!

[InfoVore]

Obama isn't a Baby Boomer. He's in the post-boomer generation variously called Generation-X, Generation-13, Post-Boomers, etc. Basically those born between 1961 and 1981 (read GENERATIONS by Howe & Strauss [amazon.com] for a profile of American generations for the last three centuries).

Also, Obama is a reformist leader who has based his campaign on changing how American government works. He is literally the voice crying "STOP" for the two frustrated generations (Gen-X & Millenials) who follow the Boomers.

Clinton is a machine Democrat with 35 years invested in keeping Washington working the way it does now (aka lobbyist rule). So your "same side" argument lacks any basic understanding of current American presidential politics. As such, I have to devalue your criticisms of our system.

So you prefer your nastiness to go on behind closed doors? I guess tastes differ. I prefer openness even if it is messier. Sunlight and fresh air will kill lots of nasty things that live in the dark places.

What the hell are you talking about with my supposed "sit back until they die" approach? I said that we are in the initial stages of shoving the fractious Boomers out of power. We certainly aren't waiting for them to die. Heck, it may require copious amounts of holy water and wooden stakes through their hearts just to get them to back down.

As to the Boomer children being taught to act like their parents, the Millennials are a largely a civic and cooperative generation unlike the Boomers, who are individualistic and rhetorically idealistic. The Millenials do not show the narcissistic sense of "we're right, everyone else is wrong" ego that the Boomers enjoy. As a group the Millennials seem to be naturally cooperative and conscientious, if somewhat immature and naive. Like most civic generations, they were sheltered and cherished so it will take them a while to mature. But when they do, America will change as it has not since the last great civic generation: the G.I. (aka "The Greatest Generation").

In the interim it is the Gen-X folks that will be taking the reigns for a while. This is the truly galling part for the Boomers. They HATE the Gen-X generation (its a long story. read GENERATIONS). So the Boomers will renew their grip and force everyone to drive them out of power inch by bloody inch. Their entire generational ego is predicated on the notion that they know better than anyone else. They won't go easily. This fight is going to take years. The 2008 election is just the first battle in a long war.

Your logic on tying the War on Drugs to the campaign rhetoric is flawed. Certainly that is one of the many stupidities we have to address, it is NOT however one of the problems with the functioning of the primary campaign (your original point). It may be an issue not addressed by the campaigns, but it isn't an issue WITH the campaigns' operations. Nice try at a redirect, but a failed one.

Finally your statement that no one over here seems to be doing anything either is specious and insulting. Of course we are doing something about it. Why do you think so many people are actively working to elect their favored candidate? Its a fight. It is ugly and it will get uglier still. We who are actively engaged in that fight know this. We aren't disheartened that it is ugly. We know things will get better. That is what we are fighting for; not just to fix some of our problems but to fix the system so that it doesn't create these catastrophes in the first place. So bear with us while we try to sort this out.

Of course you wouldn't know what it is like to have to dig in and try to fix the basics of a broken govenment, since you rely on it all being nicely sorted out in a comfortable back room some where.

Re:What's wrong with you people?!

[InfoVore]

No my analysis isn't wrong, it just didn't include that aspect of the larger election. Of course the general election will be the final repudiation of the Reagan revolution and the neocon insanities. Not one of the candidates is a champion for that camp, including the Republican candidate (which is why their base hates McCain so much. he's not "one of them".)

There is more going on in this election than a excoriation of GWB, the Reagan revolution and the Neocon philosophy. Specifically the fight between Clinton and Obama is a generational struggle for control. Yes there is more than that going on in the entire race, but it is a large component driving the contention between those two candidates supporters.

How do I really feel? Yeah, I resent the Boomers as a group. I'm one of the Gen-X generation that has been uniformly crapped on by the Boomers since we committed the ultimate sin of not worshiping them.

My rhetoric applies to both the Boomer fueled neocons (look at the neocon philosophical heavyweights - all Boomers) and the machine Democrats (they aren't cohesive enough to have their own group name), like the Clintons.