Subject line in post. The board hates me...

[Akaran_D]

What would you do if you had the power to "fix" the world to your own personal liking? IE: How would you "fix" the middle east, how would you adress home issues, how would you adress world hunger, aids, forigen policy, ect?

Discuss, be as detailed as possible. Try and keeps flames to a minimum on this one, but not asking for a FF.

[XunilTlatoani]

Methinks your subject got cut off...dunno what to discuss

[Kindo]

What would you do if you had the power to "fix" th

I didn't know "th" was broken...

[Neroon]

Though "th" is a common letter combination in the English language, it generally appears at the end of most words (the back of the words if you will). Sometimes it will appear at the beginning (as in "the", which you just saw in this sentence). But, for the most part it is being discriminated against, and made to sit in the back.

Pretty sure that's what he is referring to.

[Akaran_D]

My beautiful subject line!
A pox upon you, board gremlins!

[Voronwë]

i would delete this thread!

[masteen]

I would dust off and nuke this post from orbit. It the only way to be sure...

[Zaelath]

This:

"Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged was --indeed, is - one of the
Universe's very small number of immortal beings.

Those who are born immortal instinctively know how to cope with
it, but Wowbagger was not one of them. Indeed he had come to hate
them, the load of serene bastards. He had had his immortality
thrust upon him by an unfortunate accident with an irrational
particle accelerator, a liquid lunch and a pair of rubber bands.
The precise details of the accident are not important because no
one has ever managed to duplicate the exact circumstances under
which it happened, and many people have ended up looking very
silly, or dead, or both, trying.

Wowbagger closed his eyes in a grim and weary expression, put
some light jazz on the ship's stereo, and reflected that he could
have made it if it hadn't been for Sunday afternoons, he really
could have done.

To begin with it was fun, he had a ball, living dangerously,
taking risks, cleaning up on high-yield long-term investments,
and just generally outliving the hell out of everybody.

In the end, it was the Sunday afternoons he couldn't cope with,
and that terrible listlessness which starts to set in at about
2.55, when you know that you've had all the baths you can
usefully have that day, that however hard you stare at any given
paragraph in the papers you will never actually read it, or use
the revolutionary new pruning technique it describes, and that as
you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to
four o'clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the
soul.

So things began to pall for him. The merry smiles he used to wear
at other people's funerals began to fade. He began to despise the
Universe in general, and everyone in it in particular.

This was the point at which he conceived his purpose, the thing
which would drive him on, and which, as far as he could see,
would drive him on forever. It was this.

He would insult the Universe.

That is, he would insult everybody in it. Individually,
personally, one by one, and (this was the thing he really decided
to grit his teeth over) in alphabetical order.

When people protested to him, as they sometimes had done, that
the plan was not merely misguided but actually impossible because
of the number of people being born and dying all the time, he
would merely fix them with a steely look and say, "A man can
dream can't he?"

[Winnow]

I'd put Newt in charge. That girl survived longer than seventeen days with no weapons and no training against aliens with acid for blood.

[Aaeamdar]

Maybe so, but they did mostly come at night. Mostly.

[Dregor Thule]

Maybe so, but they did mostly come at night. Mostly.

Best reply EVAR

[Kylere]

Indisputable ruler of the world?

Okay I would start by cutting all but 2% of the world budget spent on military uses, all the overlapping research projects, all the overlapping intelligence agencies, all the overlapping efforts to solve the same problems. I would then grab the top ten in each area and let them brainstorm the best way to work any research along with 5 practical engineers and 2 sci-fi writers and 3 normal joes who have a vested interest in whatever line of research is covered.

Next I would offer the Israelis and Palestinians 3 options, 1 Work it out in 24 months, divide north south, or I can let them all be relocated to seperate L5 stations.

I would use the money saved by eliminating the corrupt governments in Africa to buy food from areas with excess and offer it free to anyone who is willing to use Birth Control. Then I would offer a 100 Billion dollar prize to anyone who can come up with a practical solution to increasing crop production in northern and eastern Africa.

I would allow all religions to be practiced without any intolerance, however those who choose to be intolerant of others beliefs will be offered a choice of death or STFU.

I would legalize any crime that does not have a victim, and self is up to each person.

I would socialize health care for any citizens who choose to give 5 hours a week working at improving their communities.

Really though, being a benevolent dictator would save the world so much money by eliminating military efforts, and all the duplication of work that most problems would shake themselves out.

I would assign WSA ( World Space Agency) the task of retrieving the endless bouty of the asteroid belt within a decade. Not to mention moving as much industrial activity into orbit as possible.

I would offer people with AIDS full treatment for free as long as they sign a waiver letting me punish them with death if they have unprotected sex.

I would use a large amount of money to develop energy altenatives to oil, NOW not tomorrow. Removing money for oil would weaken middle eastern terrorists, if they 911 people had to have jobs they would never have been able to pull of their attack.

[Kaldaur]

Here, here, Kylere.

[Akaran_D]

About time, soemone took this post seriously.
Thanks bud.

[masteen]

Well, if we're serious...

I'd build gigantic solar collection arrays in orbit. I'd equip them with microwave transmitters, and build gigantic collection stations on the most deserted portions of each inhabited continent. Well, maybe a couple huge ones in Russia, because odds are they would have to provide juice to Europe and a lot of SE Asia, plus they have lots of useless land.

Anyway, with this much energy coming in, we could totally eliminate the coal and oil power plants, and only keep the most modern and safe fission reactors online for backup. Oil could be used exclusively for transportation and manufacturing, which would stretch our supply a long way, as well as reducing pollution.

Orbital manufacturing is the future. No direct pollution, and lots of benefits. We'd also have to start serious studies on how well people adapt to extreme long-term zero and low-G environments. Also, an increased orbital presence is necessary for non-terrestial bases, plus not having to escape the gravity well reduces costs of interplanetary by a lot.

No more bullshit government crop subsidies. No more paying fuckers to not grow corn, and no more price supports that benefit only the agro corps. The US, with minimal crop rotation and macro-managed, family-run farms could feed the entire planet and make a tidy profit doing so. This would also help address the unemployment issue here. Farming should not be reviled as a professions for rubes.

Fisheries need to have a unified controlling body, so that we don't allow the same populations of migratory species to be fished 8 times every year. Industrial waste needs to be contained and monitored, because Goddammit I like toro! Whaling is out, until and unless we see such dramatic population recoveries that they become a nuisance like seals and sea lions.

Everyone out of the fucking Holy Land. You can't live together, then nobody gets to live there. Archaeologists are going to dig up that whole region, and we'll see what we find. Also, Egypt gets the same treatment, as do areas of Iraq. I want to know where we really came from, and exactly how old human civilization is.