I'm not playing this reset, so I don't know -- but have we really lost players that quickly? Are there actually only 101 players in Alliance?

I say 101, because I know that you can beat Scode.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

UCN v. SoL, c. 2000.

No question.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I'm here every few days. I don't post much though.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Yes, I'm sure there's "a Christian" who feels that way.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Send it my way Tavi. Happy to help :)

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I hadn't been following this thread, but I just stumbled upon this comment. I'm absolutely flattered.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Martian, what's the text of the pledge which does not mention the Queen? I'm not familiar with one, and a brief online search hasn't revealed one either.

There's The Oath of Allegiance, which I quoted above in full. Persons are permitted to "affirm" rather than "swear" and omit the phrase "So help me God", but the mention of the Queen is mandatory so far as I am aware.

There's also a separate oath for Parliamentarians, and an equivalent affirmation which they can choose to take in abeyance of the oath. However, both of these also reference the Queen.

Could you provide a source for a valid Oath of Allegiance which does not contain a reference to the Queen?

While I'm at this, I also take issue with your other comments:


This is patently false. The Governor General is appointed exclusively by the reigning monarch. Since 1935, the Monarch has deigned to seek (and follow) the advise of her Canadian Ministers exclusively, however this does not change where the power resides.

Should the Monarch wish to appoint some other person to this role, such is the royal prerogative. This could only be changed by an amendment to the constitution which would require the assent of all 10 provincial legislative parliamentary bodies as well as the Federal one.


It's a Canadian tradition.


I don't understand the relevance of this. The last vestiges of British control over Canada came to an end in 1982. It certainly did happen in stages (with 1947, 1935 and 1867 being years of key changes) but what that has to do with the institution of the Canadian Monarchy is somewhat unclear.


Canadians still do sing this song. Frequently.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

The problem with that article is that it's written by someone with a very deeply held amero-centric world view, who is trying to argue that the world is centred outside of America.

It just doesn't work.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

"I, [name], do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Canada, Her Heirs and Successors. So help me God."

It's required in order to fill many government positions, be a member of the armed forces or join the RCMP. It's also the beginning of the Oath of Citizenship, required of all naturalized citizens of Canada.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

You pledged allegiance to the Queen of Canada and all her heirs, crazyserb. That is not the same as pledging allegiance to the Queen of England.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Funny that no matter who iMagNum goes to war with, someone always claims that that alliance is "always" iMagNum's target.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Higher SDI is more effective. The question has been raised before whether or not the formula is working right -- the answer is yes. The admins released a pretty large sample of missile attacks with SDI information and random chance factors.

I broke it down and was satisfied that there is no error in the formula.

Higher SDI is always more effective.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I think you can delete the word "access" from the title here. (someone had to say it)

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I've only done it a couple times... but I do remember that once, a month or two after EE launched, I caught myself typing the old eesite address.

Apparently these habits live somewhere in my brain for a long time... and come out every now and again for a stretch. Much to my chagrin.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

The price point information here is good, but no one's touched on the reliability issue.

The truth is that laptops have changed in the last five years. Brand used to be the most important part of determining the reliability of a laptop. If you chose the right brand, you could assume that the thing would run well for at least 2 years regardless of how much you paid for it.

This definitely isn't true anymore. Today, if you spend less than $600-$700 for your laptop, you need to expect to be replacing it in 12 months. They're simply not put together well -- no matter what brand you buy. And the warranties don't help.

Even after a few months, you're liable to start running into problems with your speakers not working, your battery life fading, your screen flickering; not to mention the whole damn thing over-heating. Those are just a few of the common issues with cheap laptops.

On the other hand, desktops in the $300-$400 will typically run fine for 2 or 3 years without any hardware issues (also, despite what some have said, you do get better specs for what you pay in a desk top).

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

The Russians haven't exactly been secretive about their plans. They want to build ships of the same kin as the Charles De Gualle and HMS Queen Elizabeth. Vessels which carry 40-50 aircraft and are adaptable to various roles.

No one wants the same kind of ships that the US has -- designed to fight complete wars practically single handed. Rather, they want to augment existing naval capabilities with the ability to deploy appreciable air assets.

I have to say, though, that to call the current soviet ship a glorified ASW destroyer is a little unfair. It does have some ASW capabilities, but that was never the niche that the Soviets saw their carriers filling. Rather, it was designed to achieve air supremacy in order to protect their Ballistic Missile Submarines from air attack, and potentially (in some situations) to do the same for their surface fleet.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I guess.

There's a lot of aircraft carriers planned to come online in the next 10 years.

The UKs got its 2 in 2019 and 2020.
India's got three, in 2012, 2015 and 2017.
China's got the two mentioned above for 2014 and seems to want to launch a nuclear one in 2020.
And, of course, the US is launching its first Ford class ship in 2015, with another in 2018 and a third in 2021.

That's 11 new carriers in the next 10 years -- and doesn't even account for Russia's plan to build 5 or 6 new carriers (it's still unclear if they'll get the first one launched by 2021) or France's talk of building a second ship to augment Charles De Gualle.

At the moment, there's only 21 in service world-wide. That's a huge increase.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

The Royal Navy is currently in the process of decommissioning its Invincible Class Carriers. Of the three ships in that class, two have already been decommissioned. Only the HMS Illustrious remains in service.

HMS Illustrious is currently serving as a Helicopter Landing Platform until 2014 when HMS Ocean is due to finish her re-fit and fill that role. At that point, HMS Illustrious is expected to be retired.

The UK is currently constructing two carriers in the Queen Elizabeth class. However, only the first of these (the HMS Queen Elizabeth) is sure to enter service with the Royal Navy. When the current government entered power, it wished the scrap the second ship in the class. However, cancellation penalties meant that it will actually be cheaper for the government to build both ships.

The fate of the second ship is uncertain. It may enter "extended readiness" or simply be sold to another friendly nation immediately upon its launch.

Both of these ships were originally meant to be STOVL platforms. However, it has since been announced that the HMS Queen Elizabeth will be built in a CATOBAR configuration. It is unclear what design the second ship will follow.

At present, these ships seem likely to enter service in 2019 and 2020, respetively.

As for China, they are indeed in the process of building two carriers. These ships are expected to displace between 50,000 and 60,000 tonnes. For comparison, the HMS Queen Elizabeth will displace 65,000 tonnes and the upcoming US Ford class carriers will displace 102,000 tonnes.

Obviously this means that these ships will not rival US carriers in size. They will, however, give China appreciable naval air capabilities.

These carriers are not based off any existing design. China has bought a number of derelict carriers from around the world for study, but they are currently constructing based upon original designs.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I call bullfluff. I'm sure there's a couple alliances who iMagNum has warred 1 v 1 7 times. They may not all exist any more, but it's happened.

SoF may even be on the list.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Yep. A full 8% of the population is Anglophone, if I remember correctly.

My previous statement stands.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue

Yarr!

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Yeah, that's why none of them have ever voted to remain Canadians.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Yes, Pain. And we should avoid water because people are KNOWN for drowning in it.

How about a little perspective?

In 2010, there were 46 reported hijackings/attempted hijackings by Somali pirates. The vast majority of these were off the East coast of the country.

The yacht in question was not off the East coast of Somalia. In fact, it wasn't off the Somali coast at all. It was off the coast of Oman on the opposite side of the Gulf of Aden approaches from Somalia.

The Gulf of Aden is among the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Depending on what statistics you use, there are between 20,000 and 47,000 ships that transit the area each year. This is also the area where the majority of the anti-piracy patrols take place. I don't think there have been more than a couple hijacking reports as far north as this yacht was.

I should also point out that, of the 46 hijackings/attempted hijackings in 2010, there was not one non-pirate fatality.

Here's an analogy that may help make sense of this:

I used to live in Windsor and I went to Tigers' games in Detroit pretty frequently. I know that there's some neighbourhoods there where I don't want to be at midnight... but I also knew that I'd have to be incredibly unlucky to even get mugged between the stadium and my bus when the game ended at 9pm game.

If I'd been shot during that walk from the stadium to the bus, anyone who knows Detroit would say I was unlucky. Whereas ignorant people from the other side of the world, who've only ever heard Detroit's overall reputation, might say that I was stupid for being in that city after nightfall.

The people on this yacht took a risk, but I judge it to have been far less of one than you seem to suggest. I know that when I've travelled in Africa, I've taken more serious risks than the one they were taking. They got unlucky. It happens.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

That's easy to do. And the intention is that bots will sometimes take retals.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

But isn't the point that we want to make a difference? Adding just a few bots won't change anything in-game... so there's no point in doing it.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Rockman, if you don't want land trading you might as well be playing on a server by yourself.

Land trading is competition. Some people quit because of competition, but more people quit without it.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

When the bots are introduced, can they please run in long extinct tags?

I want to be able to LG UCN, RoCK, Arrow, HAN and all the other oldies again :)

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I'm glad that iMagNum won't have to reactive "Scode's Stoners".

I'm glad you're okay mate.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

This thread has more ignorance than I can handle.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I wouldn't have expected that I could win either. I didn't think I was actually that popular around here.

As for the rest... the "Big Bang" is just another name for the "Birds and the Bees", isn't it? So why not start there :)

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

You have nothing to worry about mate.

Report it, because it's extortion -- but they're idiots if they've actually reported you because to do that they need to provide the police with information on who they are.

It's just a stupid phishing scheme.

As for your right to sue them, I doubt it. You can only sue someone if you can prove that you've suffered financial harm. You haven't. They've commit a crime, and if they're in a reasonable country they can be charged with it. But you won't get any money out of this.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

It looks like voting is done, are you going to post the results?

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Yeah, but you can't drive from Victoria to Vancouver.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I think it was handled beautifully, after it became clear how serious the situation was.

Early on, Clinton made a mistake. It wasn't clear how serious the situation was, and she made comments that gave the impression that the US was solidly behind Mubarak. I don't blame her, there's no way she could have known and refusing to answer reporter's questions is sort of impossible in the US -- but it made the choice of silence untenable.

The US has significant interests in Egypt. It would be a major problem for the US if an unfriendly government was in power there. The US needed to be in a position where neither Mubarak nor the potential future government would feel alienated after this crisis ended.

The US had two options for how to do this. Either maintain silence, or speak relatively neutrally. Neither was a guarantee, but they're hard to choose between if all other things are equal.

Of course, all was not equal. With Clinton's comments, silence would have alienated the protesters. As a result, the US had no choice but to speak out in as neutral a manner as possible.

It's absolutely true that some in the Arab world will now claim that the US imposed its will. But silence would have just been a catalyst for those same people to say that the US doesn't care about its ideals and will support the oppression of the people.

The US had two equally mediocre choices... and accidentally undermined one. The decision to follow through on the other choice is, in that circumstance, a no-brainer.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Did he send a pact to you, then cancel it?

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Because I firmly believe ignorance ought to be eschewed, and such news agencies are a good source for specific kinds of information.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Didn't I predict this earlier in the thread?

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Patience, I created this thread to discuss a specific view that I hold. I recognize that it may be somewhat controversial, but I don't think I've been particularly insensitive in the way that I've broached the subject.

If no one else has any desire to discuss this, fine. I'll move on. However, as long as people continue to ask questions about; misunderstand; or attack my view point: I will continue to inform, correct and defend.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

No. You have my quote right there mrford, you can see for yourself that I didn't ask why that event has not received the same treatment.

Rufus brought up the London 2005 attacks. All I did was mention that my original point (that no event in history has received similar treatment) applied in that case too.

This is true for any comparison you care to make. Personally, I can't think of an event that's been as obsessively discussed and references even 2 years after it took place as 9/11 is today.


You're making my point for me. The fact that so many things fall under the umbrella of "post 9/11" demonstrate how we've let it become the focus of the world. We dwell on it. We try to tie everything we view as important back to 9/11.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

London 2005 is not given the same treatment as 9/11... it's become part of history.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Rufus, I already pointed out the error of that suggestion. Every on-going event has an antecedent event which can be directly linked to it.

This does not, however, mean that the antecedent event is still "current". Previously, I gave the example of the declaration of independence not being a "current event" despite the fact that it is a direct antecedent to America's existence (which continues).

Another, more timely, comparison might be this: The assassination of Anwar Sadat is a historical event, not a current event, even though it is a direct antecedent to Hosni Mubarak's presidency (which continues).

History is the study of the events that have led us to where we are. Despite the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, 9/11 fits into this definition. If we ignore this definition, and accept yours, then every event in history becomes part of "current events" and the term becomes meaningless.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I don't think it's a nationalistic thing Zen. I suspect that I felt the same way on 9/11 as most Americans did. I think what this comes down to is my view on a healthy grieving process.

Let me shrink the scale a little bit here for the sake of comparison.

I'm dating a girl right now who's sister died about 2 years ago. I know that she still thinks about her sister, misses her sister, and grieves for her sister and, in my opinion, this is only right. The loss of her sister is probably the most significant personal event in her life up until now. But, her sister's death isn't at the centre of her life. She doesn't dwell on it, and it's not the determining factor in how she chooses to live her life... or a conscious part of her decision making process.

In other words, she's made it a part of her past instead of her present.

To me, that defines a healthy grieving process. You're changed by the tragic event, but it's not the only thing that matters in your life like it was while the event itself was taking place.

This is the step that the US media has refused to take. It dwells on 9/11 like you do when a family member is dying in hospital... when it should move on like you would years after that family member is gone.

That's not to say it's a taboo subject. I don't hate discussion about other tragic events. As long as it's allowed to become part of the past and isn't clung to as to defining part of the present.

To me, it seems like the US has been stuck in the same part of the grieving process as it was on October 11th, 2001. Maybe I'm wrong to blame the media, and they're stuck there because the nation is. But the sense that I get is the opposite -- that it's the media's obsession with 9/11 that's holding the country from moving on with a healthy process of grief.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I live in Kitchener, about an hour away. But I know people who live there and who want to move there.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Sort of Braden.

"proper noun denotes ones capitalization" is reversed. We use capitalization to denote that something is a proper noun.

I don't know for sure, but I don't think the "-our" ending dates back to the Norman invasion. In Middle English (the English developed immediately following the Norman invasion), the word was most frequently spelled "harber".

My assumption is that the spelling "harbour" developed directly from a reduction of the word "harborough", which then became obsolete.

As for the word "harbor", I'm sure we have Noah Webster to thank for that desecration of the English language.

Back to the earlier point though... the fact that it's a proper noun does indeed dictate the "Pearl Harbor" is the only correct spelling. When dealing with proper nouns, regionalistic spellings don't apply. The assigned spelling is what matters.

For example, my first name is "Jonathan". In other regions, the same name is spelled "Jonathon"... however if I were to visit such a reason, it would not be correct to spell my name "Jonathon".

The same applies to all proper nouns. You have to use the assigned spelling. If the name of "Pearl Harbor" was, in fact, "Perl Herber" but pronounced the same way... that would then be the correct spelling, even though neither word is spelled that way in general usage language.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Where in the city? I'm not looking, but I know some people who are.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

I live in Canada, ZEN, and I was born here -- though, I have both UK and Kenyan citizenship along side my Canadian.

However, you're right. Pearl Harbor is a proper noun and should no be spelled any other way no matter where one lives. "Harbor" just doesn't look like a real word to me.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

Klown, the point is that there's a consequence for attacking. A vulnerability inherent in it.

If you want to stay at 85% WW, yes you can only make 30 attacks.

On the other hand, if you want to make 120 attacks, you can do that too. It just has a consequence.

Nothing stops you from playing as much as you do now... there's just a cost to attacking someone.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

So the process is: kill cereal, kill animals, kill people?

I wonder why we name them after the first thing they kill... even once they've killed things of far more importance.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

The class name is Soryu... it has some accents on it though, and the forum here doesn't let me write it properly.

And the Virginia class doesn't carry the Trident... it carries Tomahawks. Cruise missiles, rather than ICBMs ;)

The Soryu carries Harpoons... which is an anti-ship missile with a range of about 70 miles. Far short of the Tomahawk (which has a range of about 1500 miles), but the harpoon is more likely to get past the counter-measures deployed on ships.

Again, just different weapons for different kinds of fighting.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.