cognitively_dislocated

My boss frequently makes rude, smartas$ remarks to everyone at the company, critcises everyone for everything (and will even make stuff up if he can't find anything else to nitpick about)...he makes racist and sexist comments about employees to their face, and about clients behind their backs. Everyone is told at least once a week that we are replacable. Unfortunately, this is not the first time I have had such a boss.

Anyone else deal with this? I am sure this happens everywhere (to varying degrees), but does anyone else deal with a boss this bad? or Worst? Details appreciated.

How many groups of people (ethnic, religous, political, social, etc...) can you think of that live in their own little world? Where they view the world as "one of us" or "not one of us"...

Off the top of my head, I can think of the following :

Marine Corps Vets,

Orthodox Jews,

British Rugby Fans,

Russian Mafia,

the Chinese,

Texans,

white supremacists,

black seperatists, and

Islamic fundamentalists.

Can you think of any I missed?

After the Cease fire in Lebanon, Hezbollah declared that it had won a "major victory". The Israeli Army stated that it had achieved all of it's military goals during the conflict with Lebanon. It seems that everyone walked away from this conflict a winner (or were at least carried off the battlefield as winners). Who says you can't have a Win - Win situation in the Middle East?

In some Central Asian countries, there is a push to switch from the Russian Cyrillic alphabet to a Western Roman alphabet. They hope that this will facilitate trade and language learning between their region and the West.

The A smiliar precident is Turkey, which adopted a Roman alphabet in the 1920's (and did away with their Arabic script). Today, Turkey has excellent relations with the West, which can at least partially be attributed to langauge (alphabet) similarity.

The resistance comes mostly from nationalists, who insist that adopting a new alphabet will cause their cultural heritage to be lost (the same argument was made in Turkey in the 1920's).

What do you think? Should the world adopt a Universal Alphabet (I don't mean the IPA). Why or why not? Which alphabet should be chosen? Why?

I know this is a shot in the dark, but I was wondering how people (especially Americans) reacted to the death of Shamil Basayev. I know that most American's probably have never heard of him, and I am not looking for a wikipedia answer. I want to know, for those of you that follow Chechnya, what your feelings are?

Personally, I feel sympathy for the Chechen cause but I also understand the greater political implications....Cilvil War(s) in Russia would be a disaster for just about everyone. I personally think Shamil Basayev got what he deserved, remember he did kill civilians at Budyonnovsk.

Serious thoughts are appreciated. Thanks!

Who wants to be a superhero on Sci-fi? I understand that ALL reality TV is scripted, and that the winners and losers were all chosen long ago by network executives (as in any reality contest type show)....but Iron Enforcer's stupid answer to the "steroids" question, purposely abrasive attitude, and his giving up on the dog challenge all seemed to be WAY too obvious. If a girl 1/3 his size can make it to the door, so could he (in fact he did, all he had to do was lean forward, he gave up with no excuse or explination). I know he was to be the "guy we all love to hate" from day one, but does anyone else feel cheated by this blatant insult of the viewer's intelligence?