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Pretty sure the military is our biggest spending item.

Nope, not even close. Spending on social services ("entitlements" is what it is usually called) is far and away the largest expenditure and was expanding rapidly even before Obamacare which has caused a whole new level of fiscal pain.

Lots of sources show this and those sources who tend to support big gov frequently try to hide the fact that entitlements are the real spending culprit by dividing up the budget pie chart in ways which conceal the true total of all entitlement spending. Defense is about 18-20%. Social spending is something like 50-70%, depending on what you include and, as I mentioned earlier, is rapidly expanding whereas defense spending is not.

Ezra Klein at the WashPo is a pretty reliable Dem loyalist who provides a graph.

As the US population ages, spending on entitlements, if not reformed, will crush the US economically. The welfare state does not work in the long run. Eventually, the money used to buy votes will run out, leading to civil unrest and an authoritarian govt.

Reagan ... Bush ... But somehow Democrats are the tax & spend party.

The DP has been using tax dollars to buy votes for nearly a century. Everyone knows this. It is not a secret. DP media partisans throw a tantrum every time a pol or pundit mentions it.

If you want to play the partisan blame game, a chart from Jon Gabriel at Ricochet.com ( a Repub establishment mouthpiece site) is helpful. The chart actually makes Clinton look good because it doesn't provide the context, which is that the deficit increase under Clinton was slowed by the Repubs gaining control over Congress under Gringrich. It also ignores the fact that Reagan had to deal with a Dem congress which kept jacking up domestic spending as the cost of supporting Reagan's main priority which was winning the Cold War.

Do I really need to mention that spending on national defense is actually constitutional while spending on entitlements is not?

Sorry the deception is coming from those who promote the meme that it was simply people sitting down. They were blocking the removal of people who had already been detained. A large crowd of protesters converged on the spot where these people were detained. The crowd was chanting "let them go and we will let you leave". Whether the sitting protesters had intended to be part of that or not, they made themselves part of it by staying put. They were repeated warned and what was about to happen was carefully explained. Watch the full 15 minute video to learn the truth.

http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened

Take your own advice and open your own eyes, watch the full 15 min video: http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened.

Whether they intended to do so or not, those blocking effectively assisted those chanting "if you let them go we will let you leave". And those blocking were repeatedly warned and what was about to happen was explained. Its on the video.

I apologize for calling you stupid - I certainly see where you get your viewpoint from.

That being said, I still don't think that (a) the police were in the right for breaking up a peaceful protest by students who had the right to be on their own campus and (b) that the use of pepper spray was appropriate.

Take your own advice and open your own eyes, watch the full 15 min video: http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened.

Whether they intended to do so or not, those blocking effectively assisted those chanting "if you let them go we will let you leave". And those blocking were repeatedly warned and what was about to happen was explained. Its on the video.

Your video conveniently omits events prior to the pepper spraying. A large group of students marching to the spot where those in custody are being detained. Chant of "If you let them go, we will let you leave".

http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened

Have you seen the full 15 min video?
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened

The movie you offer is the 1 minute fragment that distorts what occurred. Here is a 15 minute video that gives a much better perspective on what happens. A large group of students decided to march on the spot where those in custody were being detained. Note the group chant of "If you let them go, we will let you leave".

http://ricochet.com/main-feed/UC-Davis-Pepper-Spray-Incident-What-Really-Happened

The individuals on the path weren't the source of danger. The larger crowd around chanting for the people in custody to be released were the danger. The people on the path sillily decided to block the exit.

Let's set aside completely irrelevant analogies, such as your taxi drivers. We're talking about H1B visa program, which works only for people with college or advanced degrees.

As an AC down the thread pointed out, the law is about greencards and not H1B. The distinction is fuzzy though, as H1B is usually converted to greencard, and the effect is the same.

I can hardly imagine how the foreign H1Bs are replacing locally grown PhD. If they're worth a damn, the locals should stay on top. We have the best PhD education in the world, and this is why our graduate programs are filled +50% with foreigners.

My argument was not about PhD's but to point out that all types of work/levels of education are affected by this. The companies I worked at lately have very high proportion of H1B's working for them. Guess what did that do to wages. They are also in a kind of slavery situation, where they come to work on weekends because "only the best will get greencards" (official memo circulated Bloomberg L.P.), so it is hard to compete with them, unless I am willing to do the same.

Regarding the wages.. yes man, if you get paid $4000 a month but exactly the same job can be performed equally well by someone in Taiwan for $1000 a month, I don't see a reason for your job to exist here. However, the United States sets the pace and standards in technology. The other countries are just followers. If your job is threatened, this means it's time to update your skill or change career. This is a global economy and you can't sit still. Go get a new certification, a graduate degree or certificate, or attend a technical conference. It's not that hard to stay on top.

This is a very treacherous topic, and I cannot claim to understand it (I doubt anybody can). I will just throw a few arguments up in the air:

I. The life is cheaper in Taiwan (and India), so getting a comparable wage will put working Americans in poverty.

II. You would think that lower wages will bring down the product prices and cost of living? Not in the global economy, it will not! Which means that somebody pockets the difference between lower wages and stable (global) sales. Hello even deeper rift between rich and poor, the third world style!

----

"the best PhD education in the world" -- Unfortunately it is a myth to trap the naive

The vast majority of people who support the decriminalization of pot are people who would vote for Obama anyways. (There might be some libertarians in the Tea Party but even bringing up legalization at their rallies had lead to booing. See e.g. http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Pot-Legalization-Brings-Boos-at-Tea-Party-Rally.).

At least some pot--not necessarily the stronger strains--should be legalized because nearly all of the anti-nausea medication out there is completely ineffective and is massively expensive. Even if pot of traditional potency were as bad in terms of addiction as the naysayers suggest (personally, the stench of it is what bothers me), it should still absolutely 100% be available for people undergoing intense chemo. Even if you limit the people able to give prescriptions to oncologists with particular CME training. There are lot of people for whom no drug at all works, they're miserable, and the drugs that the docs prescribe are much more expensive than pot.

The translation for most of these is really simple: The obvious political calculations don't support the petitions. The vast majority of people who support the decriminalization of pot are people who would vote for Obama anyways. (There might be some libertarians in the Tea Party but even bringing up legalization at their rallies had lead to booing. See e.g. http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Pot-Legalization-Brings-Boos-at-Tea-Party-Rally.). The only one that's even more blatant than that is the petition answer about removing "under God" from the pledge of allegiance. The people who care about that definitely aren't going to vote for anyone other than Obama (well, if Huntsman won the Republican primary then maybe, but right now he's polling at 2% among registered Republicans...). That petition response is even more noteworthy for having a nice mix of trying to claim that non-believers make up an important part of the US even as Obama endorses the claim that God is important to nation. The worst part of all this is that his political calculation is correct: Next election I'm probably going to be voting for him. Because the other option will be a lot worse.

Certificates it's what's not for dinner. Especially on my rack
XP graduates to cloned, offline built, air-gap-ed-hood
7 graduates to cyber nanny infested, wrongful accused, business killing, ad network for anyone left with money much longer
NETBSD and LINUX users scratch their heads or asses wondering if consequences mean restrictions on data, speed, ports, commerce, content

Certificates as an idea, vision, and framework is another fiat terrorism (TM) "DHS/TSA" for small business, journalists, media, artists, bands, or people who just want to have a server and host things non profit.

The heck with working on the predictable tcp packet sequence problem
or ipv4 or ipv6 or ipv4/6(mix em and matchem) firewalling right?

You break a big rule in my book, you've make it not fun to be here.

You've made your "problem" into something which could quite literally backfire on everyone, including you and do even worse damage to the economy if it be maliciously foisted on an already hurting, paranoid from legal abuse, bankster, mortgage, bailiout, theft and vague false flag laws, unacceptable unconstitutional tos/aup and spied(1) on rotting unless part of the mix of Orwell 1984 + sky net infrastructure with rapidly worse choices of points of entry. You've also threatened everyone with "consequences" , do you think we are all your slaves. Are you really that insolent. Your likely one of those idiots who don't understand chain of custody and public oversight is the problem with internet voting, not which crypto is best(2). You probably think NFLX should be able to foist it's bandwidth problem on everyone else. But like crypto since the mid 90's not much have changed with all that dark fiber and this retarded-ness we call communications ran by a public hating fcc board who our financial and sometimes very physical life depends on. We are called customer, not US citizen(3). Everything is broken you better wake up. It's past time to start nipping these fascist framework visions in the bud.(4)

1. cryptome.org - Online Spying Guides
2. blackboxvoting.org - (USA) 1/11 - TOWARDS A MORE EFFECTIVE APPROACH TO FIGHTING INTERNET VOTING - by BEV HARRIS
3. I am Not a US Customer, I am a US Citizen

4. The Ben Burnank, Bill Gates, BLS, Corruption, CPI, Credit Crisis, Crude Oil, Federal Reserve, Fractional Reserve Banking, Hyperinflation, Meltdown, National Debt, Quantitative Easing, Recession, recovery, Reserve Currency, Unemployment, World Bank, The Sheeple

Now, if those True Believers would give up their cars and big homes and truly change the way they live, I can’t imagine that there wouldn’t be some measurable impact on the Earth in just a few short years. I’m not talking about recycling Evian bottles, but truly simplifying their lives. Even if you were, say, a former Vice President, you would give up extra homes and jets and limos. I see communes with organic farms and lives freed from polluting technology.

Oh lord, won't you buy a ricochet modem http://www.ricochet.com/

My friends are all wired, I must make amends.

Worked hard all my lifetime, no help from the Feds.

So lord, won't you buy me a ricochet modem....

This municipal wireless network thing would be interesting (perhaps as a backup to the cable modem), but I haven't been able to use my 802.11b card with my notebook ever since I upgraded to FC2 and a 2.6 kernel.

If they want a controlled network, they have to license spectrum from the FCC, like Ricochet. Educational institutions can usually get a good deal on spectrum. But they can't just arbitrarily take spectrum.

/. featured a story about the buyout 2 years ago, yet the new company has yet to bring service back.

It's back in San Diego and Denver.

Sometimes, the best links on an article are the ones that go to yet another story.

SFGate.com also has this interesting article from almost a year ago on the return of Ricochet:
Ricochet is also targeting residents who can't get high-speed access otherwise. Its signals are sent from radios on poles and rooftops, allowing users with laptops and other mobile devices to stay connected while they roam around.

It sounds like Ricochet is going to use the unregulated 900 MHz band to do the same thing that the FCC is going to do with regulated spectrum (that's already in use by the military).

Of course, another kicker is this paragraph:
Aerie Networks Inc. has resurrected Ricochet, spending $8.25 million for technology and equipment that Metricom spent $1.3 billion developing.

Of all the times to have spent $8,250,000 on lottery tickets!

This is probably a good time to create a current review of the long distance (>> 300 ft) Wireless solutions that are available in the market.

Richochet is one http://www.ricochet.com/

and another is Vivato http://www.vivato.net/

What are the other ones in the market?

That Ricochet thing looks pretty interesting, but I'll need to find the Triforce to complete step 3...

Ricochet nodes are very similar, except that they plug into street light photocell connectors.

176 Kbps Ricochet spread-spectrum wireless (lower bound)
430 Kbps Ricochet spread-spectrum wireless (upper bound)

That's what I'm using now...faster than dial-up, you don't have to screw with the phone or cable company, and it works under Linux. Unfortunately, only people in Denver and San Diego can use it at the moment...

I live in San Diego, California. Just within the last few weeks, Ricochet Wireless has been advertising here, hard. I hadn't seen anything from them in even the newspapers for many, many months.

The deal they are offering in San Diego starts with what you need:
A Ricochet External Modem or Internal PC Card Modem available for $99.95*.(free if you sign up for 6 mos) A Ricochet service account at $44.95* per month, with no activation or per minute fees. A desktop computer, laptop computer or PDA meeting minimal system requirements of the External Modem or Internal PC Card Modem. A service address in a live coverage area. *Plus applicable fees and taxes

And this is what you get:
A Ricochet Modem A Ricochet software CD Up to 10 email addresses 10 Mb of personal web space An out-of-coverage, national dial up service plan No service contract is required Download Ricochet SoftwareSystems: Windows®, Mac® and Pocket PC® Compatible. Speed: Typical speeds of 176 Kbps, with bursts to 400 kbps. Access: Unlimited Internet access within the coverage area. Support: 24x7 toll-free 1-888-RICOCHETIt's not too bad a deal. Free modem with a 6 month contract for whatever platform you use, you're mobil and on the net @ 170+Kbps, go out of coverage area you have dial-up access still, and no service call from your neighborhood cable guy or phone dude.

I'm running right now with a Ricochet wireless modem plugged in via USB. No problems under Linux here, once I figured out how to make it appear as a serial device (/dev/ttyUSB0).

Their web site is here complete with wierd music and all. And Denver Business Journal article here.

Ricochet is about 40-100Kb/s, so it's comparable to 3G. And it's flat-rate, at $44.95/month.

I had Ricochet service five years ago, and it was quite good. It was a viable alternative to dial-up at the time.

... the author needs to get in touch with the times

Someone does :-) -- looked at ricochet.com lately?

i think there's enough competition just based in the fact that cable will have to compete against DSL. for competition, you only need one other player.

just wait until ricochet gets back up and together. that'll make three.

and personally, i'd rather have unlimited 175kbps wireless @ only $44.95 per month wouldn't you?

furthermore - having several "providers" that share the same pipe really isn't competition. be realistic here.

For the past 15 months, I've tried virtually every option available and I can't get it. The .com bust didn't help some struggling providers, but the real problem is the bastards that control the last mile. Because they have monopolies on the copper coming into my house, I am left with the poor prospect of allowing SpeakEasy.net to service themselves monthly on my posterior, while being grateful that they're only charging $89.99 for an 128k line.

I'd like to have other options, but reality has a nasty way of intruding on my dreams. Here's a quick rundown for those who are interested:

Cable Modem: Real Soon Now[TM], @Home says so. And that's been their story for the last 15 months.

Sprint Wireless: I live in a local valley that line-of-sight technologies can't penetrate. Of course, Sprint isn't even offering this now...

Wireless (Ricochet): Had a fat 128k pipe, but Chapter 13 took down the connection. Aerie (who bought Ricochet) claims to be offering service again. If only they would have done something 2 months sooner.

Satellite: Check out Huge Aircrash's, er I mean Hughes Electronics' spiffy DiRECWAY technology. What's that? Only available for Windows 98, 2k, and ME? Well Windows ME harder! I refuse to buy another computer to access the 'Net.

Fiber: I can pay to have Fiberhood run fibre to the rental I live in...or not.

DSL: Some local monopoly claims that they'll be upgrading their equipment in my area, which will shorten the 23,400 feet distance between my home and highspeed heaven Real Soon Now[TM]. And it's been their story for 15 months, too.

The real problem is that no one can afford to compete with the incumbent telcos. Even if someone could come up with a high-speed wireless solution (and 128k does not qualify) for my area, they'd be out of business within 2-3 years of inception and within 6-9 months of deployment. Why? Guess where the monopolies would spend their time upgrading their services--areas where customers have no choices, or areas where their monopoly is threatened?

The demand is threre. Content is not really holding up broadband. Broadband is being held up by the ILECs--at virtual gunpoint.

Really? Since using a 13.3" TFT LCD (on a Toshiba 2805) I've hated switching back to CRTs. In fact, I use my laptop at work rather than a company-provided desktop w/ CRT. (And until Ricochet died I would often not plug in to the company network, but that's another story.)

Let's just hope it turns out better than these guys did. Thud! ::ducks::

What is Chapter 11 and what does it mean? A: Metricom has voluntarily asked the courts to provide it protection from its creditors while it works out a repayment plan. The plan is then voted on by its creditors and submitted for the court's approval. This allows Metricom to continue to operate, provide services and consider its options for the future, while working out payment plans with its creditors.

Is the Company being shut down? A: No, Metricom continues to operate, and we are all striving to maintain the technology and services so prized by our partners and many loyal Ricochet users. We believe that our wireless Internet access product is viable and we believe that today's filing is the best means to preserve this asset moving forward.

So it sounds to me like they won't be turning off the wireless modems if they can avoid it. But I do wonder what's going on with the acution. It'd be kinda hard to continue to operate a wireless network if you sell all the pieces of it.

America currently has the fastest and most widespread microcellular data network commercially deployed. It's called Ricochet. And you don't need a buggy phone, just a rechargeable external modem or PCMCIA card. 128kbps...you'd need nine or ten cellular connections tied together for that kind of speed!

Here's the Ricochet web site.

Currently getting 260kbps - fast enough for streaming video. Outside, in a county park. And I don't have to rely on someone's 802.11 base station or pay per-minute charges to MegaCellCo.

What about Ricochet? It would give you a nice, high speed connection and you could use any old hardware you have lying around to connect the camera to. When you don't need surveillance, you've got a nice, mobile high speed connection for your laptop or PDA.

You don't mention how far away the remote location is, but there are video transmitters from X10 that can send a video signal a few hundred feet. You could watch on a TV... no computer required.

Ricochet is offering 128kbps Internet access via a PCMCIA card in a laptop or a PCI card in a tower/desktop for about $70.

They don't offer it in many cities though, so you may want to check their wireless map.

Wireless access is probably the way of the future. Always on, non-physical connections... Imagine the possibilities with 2.4mbps. Webcam in a car, anyone?

Ricochet is offering 128kbps Internet access via a PCMCIA card in a laptop or a PCI card in a tower/desktop for about $70.

They don't offer it in many cities though, so you may want to check their wireless map.

Wireless access is probably the way of the future. Always on, non-physical connections... Imagine the possibilities with 2.4mbps. Webcam in a car, anyone?

802.11 is nice, but just isn't nearly as versatile as Ricochet. I'd rather wireless at 128-250kbps all over town than 2-3Mbps 300 feet from my house.

I'd rather be wireless at 128-250kbps all over L.A. and the Bay Area than 2-3mbps at coffee shops and my office.

are you talking about richochet? i've got it in the dallas area, and it works pretty good. easy to set up, although a little pricey for the speed. the good part is that it's service area spans everywhere in the city i go to, and i've never had a problem getting connected. easy to get setup too, i went to a local dealer, bought it, and had it running in less than 15 minutes.

My Novatel Wireless Merlin card and Ricochet subscription give my iPaq access to the entire internet at 128kbps anywhere I go at up to 70 m.p.h. in 14 major metro areas.

Think of the possibilities, indeed. This type of service already exists.

http://www.ricochet.com

That's not to say that having network access on a commuter train wouldn't be cool, but isn't that what the Ricochet is for?

--

But are wireless services THAT big of a deal? Of course I understand their usefulness for mobile users, that goes without saying. But what is the deal with people getting wireless service in the middle of a big city where they easily have several options for high bandwidth service. Why are people using wireless networks inside their house to just save a couple hours running wires.

Why are wireless services being billed as the wave of the future, when hopefully within 10 years there will be a fibre connection dropped into every house. Maybe my foresight is a bit foggy, but some things just don't seem to make a whole lot of sense to me.

If they're going bankrupt, then it means the market isn't there. Go look at this coverage map. Notice all the green area? Thats the area of the US that is most in need of wireless services, and with the unique nature of wireless services being able to cover a wide area with no more than a single antenna, it actually makes sense in those areas. But instead they've blown their capital on infrastructure in all the places where wireless services are needed the LEAST. Go figure.

Sure, wireless services have SOME demand in metropolitan areas. However, its not adaquate to keep the business solvant at this point, or perhaps they operate like all the other dotcoms and are doomed to bankruptcy because they don't understand the basic fundamentals of economics. My guess its something in between.

-Restil
restil@alignment.net

3G is the ISDN of wireless data. Highly touted, sounds good on paper, sucks in comparison to the other options.

Ricochet is faster, not dependent on FCC approval, and currently working. 3G is...well...coming soon...probably.

Yours truly,
Mr. X

...3G needs a bit more thought...

Well for one, Ricochet offers 128kbps on a handy little receiver small enough to piggyback on your laptop. Might not be as fast, but pretty damn cool.

Ricochet is going to cover 100 million people in the U.S. before the end of next year, and while it isn't as fast as 802.11, it is infinitely more reliable and designed by a company that has Paul Allen and WorldCom's blessing (and money).

http://www.ricochet.com It's a wide-area LAN that uses hundreds of Microcellular Digital radios (usually attached to light poles)arrayed around a city in a checkerboard pattern, with Wired Access Points directing the mesh network traffic onto tthe wired internet. It uses the 915Mhz and 2.4Ghz bands of free, unlicensed spectrum, so it avoids the billions of dollars of spectrum costs that the cellcos are going to have to pay for 3G...and here's the best part - it is available today at 128kbps, going to 256 and then 384kbps within the next two years.

Streaming media on a laptop, batman! I live in Santa Cruz and work in San Jose - but with my Ricochet modem (available in PC card form later this month) I can check my e-mail wirelessly from anywhere in the Bay Area - or Dallas - or Mahattan or anywhere else the network is eventually deployed. A co-worker of mine rode the ACE train from Fremont to work the other day, and stayed connected to the internet the whole time at 30-40kbps. The 128+kbps speeds (I've gotten as much as 250kbps at Stoddard's in Sunnyvale) are typical when you are stationary, but even 30kbps is usable for e-mail and light web use, turning the morning Caltrain or BART ride into productive time. It works with PCs and Macs, and with the USB support in the 2.4 kernel, porbably with Linux too (they've got a serial cable for the modem too, just in case).

The service isn't cheap, with prices at around $70.00 per month, but I think that we'll see that dropping over the next few months. For the convenience (and soon the ubiquity) of Ricochet, it's a small price to pay - plus, no tiny cell phone screens to squint at.

Some of you self-styled geeks should go check this out. It actually works and it is here today.

Another wireless option is the Ricochet modem. Service is available in several dozen cities in the USA -- higher price, higher data rate than some other devices.

ricochet.com I haven't used it personally, and it's not available everywhere, but for $70 a month it's supposed to give you access at up to 128k (up to of course). it allows you to use the service anywhere they have the antennas setup, which is in most major cities and most major airports. i think they also give you access to dial-up accounts for when you're in an area that doesn't have it yet. you'll have to go through a reseller to get it, but i've heard good things about it and may be getting it soon myself.
"Leave the gun, take the canoli."

if you're looking for wireless service, depending on what area of Dallas you live in you might want to look into ricochet. it's 128k for about $70 a month. you have to buy the modem too. i haven't gotten it yet, anyone have any experience good/bad with it?
"Leave the gun, take the canoli."

Does anyone remember Radiomodems

http://www.ricochet.com/