1gor

Ruby: Roda

From the author of the Sequel gem. It can do everything that Rails can, faster and lighter by order of magnitude, expandable (turn on only the plugins you need), and it does it all 'the Ruby way', not 'the Rails way'. That means simplicity, clarity and power. Generally, all software Jeremy Evans releases is of excellent quality and actively supported. Oh, and this Roda framework is in active use by the US government and is subject to regular security audits...

The definition of obscure but powerful and quite beautiful web framework.

APIs you provide to consumers should aim to make their badly written code just work. That's what Linus said.

There was explosion on the sea platform and men were thrown off it by the blast to the water. They were searching for them for a while before pronouncing them dead. This was reported in the Russian media.

The article's study found that "people really don't want to confront information that could potentially disrupt their worldviews."

This thread's comments against "anti-partisanship" articles show that people also don't want to confront information about them not willing to confront information... etc.

The number of people in slavery would have still decreased

On what basis are you making this assumption? "The fall of Rome" was not an anti-slavery uprising. It was gradual disappearance of the central authority (and all its benefits such as roads, law and order etc).

About 10% of England's population entered in the Domesday Book (1086) were slaves. Compare that with the Roman Empire where slave population (including Rome and all provinces) are estimated at 10-15% of the total.

If you were a slave, you probably ended up somewhat better off

Slavery continued to exist in Western Europe after the fall of Roman empire until at least year 1000 AD.

In other former parts of Roman Empire such as Northern Africa slavery continued to flourish almost until the 19th century.

James C. Scott is a good illustration of 'no skin in the game' syndrome among intellectuals.

It would be very persuasive to see him personally bolting for freedom between warring warlords in present-day Libya, or improving his welfare in lawless mafia-ruled cities of ex-Soviet Union in the 1990s.

But no such chance, so his views may be safely ignored.

Funny thing is that a US project of nuclear-powered cruise missile Project Pluto has been abandoned in 1964 among other things in order to "not to provoke" the Russians into developing something similar... "against which there was no known defence".

Github is down for Russian developers because some anti-Putin political activists are eager to make a point.

It works like this:

- they push some content deemed illegal in Russia to a github repo (something like instructions on committing suicide or on growing marijuana).

- then they themselves post a complain to the Russian internet regulator, accompanied by the link to illegal content;

- the ugly bureaucrats machine (which is mostly automatic) bans the whole of Github.

- at some point later in the day a human intervenes and unblocks the site, as happened several times in the past.

However, by that time the media has picked up the story, and many oppressed Russian developers who don't know how to use a US proxy, have received job offers.

Imagine someone going to a library and making them remove a book from their catalogue/index.

That book then will be forever covering dust on a library shelf.

That is not a censorship, since anyone who knows where that basement shelf is can read the book. Or is it?

Try Padrino http://padrinorb.com

I obviously won't change your opinions, but here are some facts that may be relevant.

  Ukrainian Jews seek urgent help from Israel Director-general of European 
  Jewish Association urges Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense 
  Minister Moshe Ya'alon to send security forces to Jewish communities 
  in Ukraine due to 'growing wave of anti-Semitic attacks.'

http://www.totpi.com/2014/02/25/ukraines-jews-to-israel-help...

Plenty of Jewish activists hate Putin enough to complain that such appeals 'help Russian propaganda'.

But there is another way to look at it, and it is that Russian views are correct from the outset:

The Ukrainian coup that deposed a legitimately elected president has been spearheaded by neo-nazi paramilitaries.

They now control key positions in the government, intimidate their political opponents, including what has remained of the Ukrainian parliament.

I think your 'Goebbels this' and 'Goebbels that' arguments are amusing.

Thanks for confirming that 5 TV channels carrying alternative views are banned in Ukraine. That's no problem for you because you call them propaganda.

Some people disagree. A lot of Ukrainians Russian-speakers feel that their point of view is not represented in Ukrainian official media, and that Russian news provide some valuable alternative. After all, one of the first laws of new Kiev govt was an anti-Russian language law.

And then in a single breath you deny neo-Nazi issue as a bullshit. You obviously know that lenta.ru editor was fired allegedly for publishing a link to Ukrainian "Right Sector" content.

Next you of may want to deny that Svoboda and their paramilitary wing Right Sector are neo-nazis... I could refer to to European Union officials expressing concern about Svoboda's position in Kiev government, but I think my arguments will be lost on you.

I've corrected my comment. Not all Russian language news were banned.

Still, it seems Ukrainian government is also trying to censor some news sources.

I corrected my remark above. They did not ban all Russian language channels, only some of them.

Did EFF complain about Ukraine government outlawing access to any Russian language news a few days ago?

Correction: Above sentence is not correct. Not all Russian language news were outlawed. Instead, only Russian TV channels were banned in Ukraine a few days ago. This has caused OSCE to express concern. See the link below.

Almost a half of Ukrainians speak Russian language. New Kiev government has banned national broadcasts in this language, effectively denying its people access to information.

When we hear the arguments that banning Russian-language press/TV in Ukraine is OK, since those are necessarily 'Putin propaganda', but banning radical sites[1] in Russia is wrong, because they are 'independent news', we can only admire the ability to maintain double standards without as much at batting an eye.

(http://www.osce.org/fom/116312)

[1] I don't necessarily agree with Russian government definition of 'extremist/radical', but their point is that above Russian sites have given their pages to neo-Nazis to call to armed struggle against the state.

While the press freedom is important there are different priorities during the wartime.

Russia today is ready to go to war with the West in order to keep Ukraine from joining NATO. "Russia regards this as an existential threat and will do whatever it takes to prevent it happening. (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26566452)"

The banned sites are considered enemy propaganda outfits by Kremlin.

  Putin is pretty evil

Because ~65% of Russians voted for Putin, and they did it three times. He is very popular. Not difficult to see why. Since he came to power their GDP per capita (PPP-adjusted) almost doubled, law and order improved, corruption went down. And more Russians are being born than die, so the population decline is reversed.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2013/02/04/five-myt...

For all his populism, Putin's economic policies have been very shrewd - Russia paid out its foreign debt and has currently some of the largest foreign currency reserves, and one of the lowest tax rates in the world.

As to the efforts to present Putin as some evil thug, throwing journalists to gulags etc. - this is just laughable. The best example are Pussy Riot. When the best anti-Putin propaganda can do is to call a punk-group who insults religious minorities a victim of political prosecution... Well, probably, Russians have to conclude that there are no real issues with freedom of speech in their country!

It's perfectly fine not to like Russians improving their life and enjoying a stronger country. But don't blame poor Putin for that. He is simply an elected official, it's just that Russians have been lucky to find a capable one.

   > starving ukrainian farmers

There is a propaganda soundbite going around that Soviet famine of 1932-33 was created artificially to target Ukrainians (Holodomor). Let's not repeat it here. All people of USSR were victims.

It is very clear that the decision to prosecute ... was politically motivated.

No, the opposite is clear.

The ECHR court "found no basis that the case against the two was politically motivated, as Khodorkovsky and Lebedev alleged in their complaint" (direct quote).

The supra-national court is in no sense a pro-Russian organisation, and the judges were perfectly aware of the political implications of their ruling. They did note several improprieties of the trial (keeping defendants in cages etc.), and even ordered Russian state to pay some compensation to the defendants, but that did not change their core conclusion.

Khodorkovsky was enriching himself by defrauding the state and the Russian public (most of the social security is funded through oil taxes). This was the reason for his prosecution, regardless of what "everybody understands" thanks to various PR campaigns.

The European Court of Human Rights said there was no violation of the defendants' right to a fair trial.

This is from the linked article on Radio Free Europe site.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that Mikhail Khodorkovsky's trial was not politically motivated. (http://www.rferl.org/content/russia-european-court-khodorkov...).

This means Khodorkovsky was jailed for his economic crimes, not because of his anti-Putin stance.

Why Western media keeps referring to him as a 'political prisoner' and 'freed dissident' (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25472250)?

Relevant XKCD: http://dynamic.xkcd.com/random/comic/

This coverage reminds me Soviet articles from my childhood about hard life of common people in the USA. Funny to see same propaganda being produced for domestic consumption in the USA now.

j1z0 So, out of the countries you mentioned, where one could engineer the best bootstrapping lifestyle? Why have you chosen Malaysia?

   constant, evidence-based accusations of widespread electoral fraud

Accusations of fraud are mostly aboutRussian parliament elections of 2011. Pro-Putin party was accused of fraud in many districts, which I personally think is correct. (But, strangely enough, Israeli foreign minister, has found those elections fair and democratic... http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/lieberman-russ...)

On the other hand, most definetely Putin did not need any fraud to help him win presidential elections in 2012. He had an overwhelming support among common Russians. Forecasts by anti-Putin polling organisation Levada Centre promised him 63% of the vote (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_presidential_election,_...), and he indeed got 63.5%. His closest competitor (a communist) got 17%.

To win elections fraudulently, Putin had to doctor close to half of the bulletins, which seems unlikely, given worldwide scrutiny of the election, and his own efforts to dispel doubts such as installing live webcams at every polling station etc.

Tl;dr Putin won because he is popular, not because of the fraud.

I am not aware of any "extra judicial killings" by Putin.

There are claims that Dr Kelly was killed by Tony Blair for opposing Iraq war. But I am not believing it either.

Has it ever occurred to anyone, that Putin's Russia today is a conservative's "paradise"? I mean, if you do not agree with everything that the 'progressive left' stand for, you may feel quite good in Russia.

Putin's government is supporting the church, and promoting traditional family values. They have instituted significant money benefits for families with children, and as a result the much talked about decline in Russia's population has been stopped in 2013. For the first time in modern Russian history there are more babies born in Russia than people die of old age. http://www.amren.com/news/2013/06/russias-population-decline...

The laws prohibiting "gay propaganda" should be viewed in the context of these policies. Obviously, being gay as such is not illegal in Russia. There are gay bars in any large Russian city, and quite a few of celebrities have admitted to be gay. However, they have made it illegal to promote homosexuality publicly.

Then, there are economic policies of Putin that would make Reagan jealous. Russian government has adopted a flat 13% tax rate on all incomes in 2001. Not only this has made Russia one of the lowest tax jurisdictions in the world. Most importantly, the flat rate has removed thousands of 'tax exceptions' that is the source of economic inefficiencies and outright corruption in most of 'developed' countries. Here is a noted US conservative lamenting that Putin has achieved something he had worked on most of his life. "We won the Cold War, but Russia gets a flat tax while America is stuck with a Byzantine tax system based on class-warfare ideology." http://www.heritage.org/research/commentary/2003/03/russias-....

Finally, the 'freedom of press opression' and 'political persecution of opponents' thesis is in many ways overblown. Most popular Russian internet media outlets are openly anti-Putin (lenta.ru, slon.ru etc. etc.). The most listened to news/talk-show radio station (Echo Moskvy) is strongly anti-Putin, and a very popular cable TV channel (Dozhd) is also anti-Putin and anti-establishment.

And the trial of the poster-child of anti-Putin opposition Mr Khodorkovsky (who was imprisoned years ago on fraud and tax-evasion charges) has just been recognised as a 'non-political' by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) (read: Khodorkovsky was indeed a crook, and his sentencing was not influenced by his anti-Putin stance). http://www.rferl.org/content/russia-european-court-khodorkov...

Putin's government is also following Western conservative script with regard to intellectual property. Actually, today the have effected a broad-reaching anti-piracy law that would outlaw any internet site that publishes links to illegal movie download or torrent-trackers. To Putin's credit, the downloaders of illegal content themselves will not be prosecuted. So, parents of teenagers need not worry about gigantic fines etc.

Obviously, Putin is no friend to US conservatives, primarily because Putin is a nationalist and conducts an independent foreign policy. What is good for Russia need not be good for the US. And vice versa. But Putin may be good for those Russians that hold traditional conservative values. Hell, such people may feel Russia is the last bastion of true conservatism left in the world, while not being exactly a Pinochet-like fascist place.

  Think Osama bin Laden granting asylum to Snowden in some remote Taliban camp.

Kasparov is a totally manufactured 'Russian opposition' figure.

As late as 2004 he was a member of a US "Security Advisory Council" (NSAC). It was funny to see Kasparov's name on the website under the slogan: "Advisory Council members have dedicated their careers to American security", right next to assistant Secretary of Defence http://img717.imageshack.us.nyud.net/img717/1337/kasparov.jp...

I respect his anti-Putin views, and his chess achievements, but how exactly can he make a political career in Russia with such a background?

Most likely has left Russia because he has became completely irrelevant as a politician there, not because of some crackdown.