16 bit files almost unlistenable now...

[wgscott]

There is someone here who does make this claim.  I'll let @sandyk explain, lest I get it wrong.

 

A zero-filled file however will have a different checksum.  (As you note, it will be larger as well.)

[wgscott]

If I understand correctly, the 16-bit file and zero-filled 24-bit file each get converted, separately, by the decoding software, in such a way that what gets fed to the DAC is the same in each case. So the DAC sees no difference.

[wgscott]

We need some music ...

 

 

[wgscott]

3 hours ago, mansr said:

Do you believe the requirement for a licence to drive a car is also unconstitutional?

 

So, here is an interesting difference between the US and the UK.

 

In the US, the Drivers License (sic) is essentially a domestic passport, complete with photo (and now there are new biometric ones).  You need one to fly domestically as a passenger, it is the de facto ID card, etc.  Police assume you have one and can demand to see it as ID, even if you are walking or on your bike.  

 

In the UK, the populace refuses to allow the government to require photographs on their Drivers Licence, precisely to prevent this sort of abuse.  So in that sense, the British population is much more libertarian.  On the other hand, no one seems to have a problem with TV licences and TV police being able to demand entry into your home without a search warrant to see if you are watching TV without having paid the government.

[wgscott]

I've been pulled over on a bike.  I will not produce my drivers license, on principle, and also because I don't want to facilitate anything going on my driving record.

[wgscott]

It was in Berkeley back when I was a grad student.  I ran a red light and went through a tunnel because I was late for a discussion section I was teaching, and had to hand back exams.  The students all waited very patiently.  I got a big fat ticket (but prevailed on the ID).  

[wgscott]

29 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

I merely gave you the accepted definition of an American liberal. 

 

Accepted by the alt-right only, and maybe by male separatist lunatics who view Feminism as an existential threat.  (I suspect the Venn diagram on that one shows a lot of intersection.)

 

 

[wgscott]

4 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

 

See. In American politics that definition fits a Conservative, not a liberal. Here the 'L-word' means what I said above. The English language here and in the UK are similar, but not exactly alike. This is one place where the words are the same but the meanings are different.

 To get a better feel for American Liberalism and how it differs from the European meaning of the word, go to Wikipedia:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism

 

Not only are the words identical, but the entire history of both Conservatism and Liberalism have their origin in the British system.  This is just profound historical ignorance and an attempt to efface history and re-define terms to fit an alt-right world-view.

[wgscott]

3 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Here they would never go up. Your country once had NO speed limits. That's the kind of Liberal, freedom loving thinking that I could get behind!

 

They are up, everywhere.  Open your eyes.

 

Here's a hint:  The people that put them there do not fit the Anglo-American definition of Liberal or Conservative.  

 

Think about it.

[wgscott]

2 minutes ago, Sal1950 said:

Kind of like today's US Democratic party.

 

You got that one right.

 

With the Super-delagates used to exclude voices like that of Bernie Sauders, 

35 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Sorry, that makes no sense. See, in politics, platforms change. Over the last half-century the Democratic Party here in the USA has migrated strongly to the left. 

 

Note to mansr:   "Left" here in non-Newspeak means "Right" (or at best, "neo-liberal").

[wgscott]

47 minutes ago, lucretius said:

 

Bigger changes can be seen in the Republican party since it's domination by social "conservatives" and the religious right.

 

Good job with the quotation, since it is in reality as far from genuine conservatism as is a New-Deal Liberal of old.

[wgscott]

30 minutes ago, firedog said:

But it doesn't matter. In the US the meaning of the terms has been transformed. It isn't just an "alt-right" thing. It's been going on for decades so that most people don't even remember the original meanings of the words.

 

It didn't really catch hold until Ronald Reagan came along, and fundamentally changed the Republican Party.  He (or more accurately, his handlers) made a point of turning the word "Liberal" into a pejorative, so much so that they managed to set the agenda for the Democratic party henceforth.  Clinton's Neo-Liberal economic policy (as you noted) was considerably further to the Right than that of Nixon (who was arguably the last Liberal president, at least prior to Obama.)  RR handlers realized if they controlled the terminology of political discourse, they could effectively constrain it to within vary narrow bounds.  Once "Liberal" became a dirty word, "Socialism" essentially became synonymous with anti-American enemy extremism. The most ludicrous assertions could then be made without any hint of the derisive laughter that they deserve (such as the claim that the American corporate media is pro-labor, or even the suggestion that there is any "Left" left in American politics).  Meanwhile, radical military-Keynesian economics and other forms of State intervention in the economy, and the rise of the National Security State in general, could be called "Conservative" without a hint of irony.

[wgscott]

11 minutes ago, esldude said:

It most definitely is in the US. Just ask Bernie Sanders. He's both a US liberal and socialist. His words.

 

He describes himself as a "not very good example" of a Socialist.  But what is remarkable is that after decades of the term "Socialism" being used as a term synonymous with "enemy of the state", "traitor" and "anti-American," the ideas (and even the term itself) resonate with a subset of the electorate to such a degree that the right-wing liberal establishment Democratic party had to use every dirty trick in the Nixon handbook to try to eliminate this "insurgent" threat to their candidate (and in doing so probably alienated enough people to facilitate the election of Agent Orange).

[wgscott]

5 hours ago, mansr said:

I'm not aware of any party in the US with "liberal" in it's name that fits George's description either.

 

The Republicans and Democrats are essentially two different right wings of the same state-capitalist business command-economy party. Both the Republicans and Democrats are profoundly anti-Libertarian. There is no (significant) analogue to a Labour or Liberal Democrats party.  Labor unions in the US tend to be fanatically anti-communist/socialist and controlled by the mafia, and have been on the decline since (at least) the early 1980s.  Most of the anarchist and anarchosyndicalist (IWW) labor movement that existed in the US was wiped out and/or executed. There is essentially no (organized) "Left" left in the US, and labeling right-wing neo-Liberal Democrats the "Left" is a remarkable propaganda coup for right-wing zealots.

 

Similarly with the Media.  Despite the claims of "Liberal media bias," there is no liberal media.  (Check the NYT, Wash Post, Wall Street Journal for their extensive Labor section. The idea is absolutely comical.)  There is no Guardian or Independent in this country. (Thanks to the internet, at least we can now access these.)

[wgscott]

More important, where is the dinosaur genitalia guy?

 

@Priaptor

[wgscott]

Just now, Jud said:

 

Do you figure human-caused global warming is part of that? 

 

Dang.  

 

He had such good instincts when it came to audio cables.

[wgscott]

5 minutes ago, Sal1950 said:

If he is, he's making a better choice than listening to disgraceful garbage propaganda being spread as news by NBC and the rest. You'd think we were living in China for the lies and bias spread by the liberal news organizations.

 

 

So Infowars conspiracy theories like the idea that the Sandy Hook school shooting was fake are more respectable than NBC and the rest?

 

Wow.  I've got a magic power cable I can sell ya ...