Slashdot Mirror
3G Spectrum - Off Limits After Attacks
Casey writes: "MSNBC is reporting that due to the recent attacks, potential 3G spectrum currently held by the military has been placed off-limits for the foreseeable future -- with no replacement on the table. The FCC says that it might remove the current "spectrum cap" restrictions, allowing bigger cellular companies to gobble up smaller ones just for their spectrum. Expect to see a lot of consolidation if this goes through."
Gobble them up, I could use the break on my cell bill.
Home of the ever growing giant monopolistic corporations. Yay.
-NeoTomba
Reflected by the general government it seems -
Monopolies good.
"Blake is an idealist, Jenna. He cannot afford to think." - Kerr Avon, Star One, Blakes 7
I have not only been disturbed by the lack of congresional integrity when it comes to civil-liberties, but now the basking of big buisness in all the cash and exemptions they need to further maul the little guy into oblivion.
1) One cheap fares airline has already gone under, the big aitlines are looking to get 15-20 billion dollars in cash, loans, and tax filing delays.
2) The removal of spectrum limits would mean that the mnopoly that phone companies once had on land lines will now be easly avalilbe in the wireless market ( much more lucrative ).
3) The sudden depresion of most markets will drive many of the little guys out of buisness.
Please post more example too, I'de like to collect more.
I remember seeing an article on Wired talking about an USAF spectrum available to 3g services. It isn't the original contended Army/Navy bandwidth. Anyone know if this applies to the UTMS bandwidth as well?
slinted
Finally, maybe I'll be able to get one cell phone and one plan that will let me travel more than 1/2 hour in any direction without incurring roaming charges. I'm sick of always living on the edge of a "home area" because the next county over is some other cell company's territory. Sprint PCS already just about does it for me, but their customer support is crap. If they could get better coverage, I'd ignore the customer support problems. :)
The whole 3G spectrum debate has been a weird strawman for the lack of comprehensive spectrum policy in the U.S., as opposed to the agreements by which most of the rest of the world now operates.
Because of poor allocation of scarce resources back when analog devices needed huge bandwidth to transmit, the actual usage across the military bands isn't uniform, comprehensive, or necessary. But it would cost upwards of ten billion dollars according to several reports issued by the military itself, the FCC, and the spectrum offices at the NTIA, among many other agencies.
Another issue: the military has to use an entirely different set of frequencies when deploying missions abroad. Outside the U.S., in the next couple years, there will be millions of people using the various 2.x GHz bands that the military uses here. (Most of the domestic uses are for fixed radios and dishes, but still...)
The answer for 3G is probably to make current bands more efficient. On the flip side, though, the military has ever more telemetry, requiring even more bandwidth.
Back and forth, back and forth...it may be too late to fix this comprehensively.
Freelance tech journalist for the Economist, MIT Technology Review, Macworld, and others
It seems to me that if everyone on the plane had 3G phones with video. The attacks of Sep. 11th could have been thwarted earlier.
You better believe that the attacks stopped because of the plane going down in a field. We didn't know at the time, but the terrorists sure did. They new that it went down because the word was out. The word may have gotten out faster if we had a better communications network.
There go some more of our rights.
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin, 1759.
As if having cell networks three years behind the rest of the world wasn't bad enough...
Well, you may shout about your right to have guns, or how you don't want security cameras on your streets, but at least we've got GSM phones that actually *work*! They're pretty cheap, and they work all over Europe too.
If anyone has any dual or quad Pentium Pro mpotherboards, please email me at destroyahx@hotmail.com.
mods: i know this is OT, but it's very important.
thanks!
Which part has you confused?
If the people on the plane that went down at the Pentagon had 3G phones, or some other better communication device, maybe they would have figured out that they were being used as a suicide bomb and overtaken the hijackers.
Maybe not, but hell, it is worth a chance.
This story doesn't have any credible source cited other than an analyst at the Yankee group. Companies like Yankee, PC Data and Jupiter group pay their analysts based on how often they can get quoted. Basically, publishing companies call them up when they need a quote for a story they've conjured up.
'Yankee Group'
'Hi, this is Bob from ZDNet. We are writing a story on eBooks, can you make up a quote for us?'
'How about "The eBook platform will be on the rise as consumers continue to look for convenience in reading materials. Dmitri will burn in hell."
'Thanks!'
I can already imagine that the government will be
re-inserting the previous, larger error back into
GPS satellites after what happened last tuesday...
It's really too bad so many great consumer products
go by the wayside because we live in a world where
crazies just might exploit convenient technology
to blow something new up.
A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God.
One more reason to move to Europe, I suppose...
Many of the spectrum correction bits that Clinton allowed released to the public may go back to encrypted mode, too, since they can be used for accurate attacks.
...
Wouldn't want to be a pilot near Afghanistan right now - might have to switch to visual especially if the radar jamming is activated.
After all, we just sent down a whole mess of our ESWBs from here, and they're not there for the sunshine
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
What kind of corporate stooge are you, vain enough to rewrite a holy book so that it conforms to your self-serving values?
Don't forget that you read an English translation from ~500 years ago from the Hebrew of ~3K years ago, which is not likely to be the same Hebrew that is spoken today. The right thing to do in this case is to take the work as a whole, not to let the entire meaning rest on a single word. It's a spiritual guide, not a chunk of source code!
Let's auction permanent ownership of spectrum. Nothing will ever happen to make it better to be able to re-assign frequencies."
</sarcasm>
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Need? Hardly the word I'd use - more like want. And they'll likely get it. The real question we should be asking would center on why *Corporate* people don't have to play by the same rules as *REAL* people. If I were to make the same demands I expect the roar of laughter to see me out of the building. So why is business allowed to act immorally, and even expected to..?
1) One cheap fares airline has already gone under, the big aitlines are looking to get 15-20 billion dollars in cash, loans, and tax filing delays.
Not sure if you are referring to ALL or just the US ones, but we have the same BS happening here in Canada. Air Canada seems to expect that the taxpayers should bail them out of their own lack of planning. Not to be too sarcastic, but remind me again- who decides on security measure in/around airports and on airplanes..?! Their lack of intelligence in decision making and they expect us to bail them out.. thems some big balls indeed..
We are in a WAR. You have no right to complain about this. During a war your liberties get curtailed. GET OVER IT. We need a police state to battle terrorism (and that includes intellectual property terrorism as well). If you disagree with the government then you are a nutcase and need to be locked in prison.
i know that alot of us have been looking forward to 3g advances and such forth. but uh the man did say we would have to put up with some changes until this mess is over with. personally i think what happened on 9-11 has changed american and the world in ways we can't even imagine. we are in for a long haul of trouble ahead and i am beginning to have doubts as to wether or not our generation will ever see peace again.
-
We are the American government, we say "Freedom and Justice to all!!!"
30 mins later:
We are the American government, we have shut down all borders and banned planes from flying. We have turned off the cell-phone networks and established checkpoints across the country. We have installed Carnivor boxes in all the big ISPs to monitor your email. We want to ensure all encryption software has back doors. Oh good, now we can do all this, and do it quicker because people will believe that it will help prevent terrorism, not only that but we can rush the SSSCA law through the system, and stop assigning bandwidth for mobile phones, We believe in justice, but under the circumstances lets just go and kill Bin Laden, and, just for good faith, we'll promise not to blow the Taliban and half of Afghanistan away if they give him up first.
Even though it was very much our fault for not realising that sooner or later someone would put hijacking, and suicide bombing together to produce a weapon, and we should have improved security on planes, lets just forget that for a second and GOD BLESS AMERICA, sorry, got carried away there an.. GOD SAVE AMERICA, sorry, no more i promise. Oh, and 'cause we don't want to take the retaliation all for our selves, lets make sure they use the All-for-one-one-for-all section of the UN treaty and drag all the other countries into it.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
All the major US and European wireless carriers are cash-poor and ladened with debt after the previous rounds of spectrum license auctions.
Stock swaps would also be unfavorable to Gobblers and Gobblees. Gobblers would face a dillution of share value, and (like most telecom corps.) have depressed share prices that won't leverage much. The Gobblee probably views its spectrum license as its most liquid asset, and won't settle for depressed shares.
Information wants to be Free. Useful Information will cost you.
Forbes magazine had an article last month, showing just how consolidation would help the industry, and the consumers in the US.
Basically, there are too many companies, chasing too many incompatible technologies.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
You may wanna clarify that you're in Canada.
:)
I like my Fido GSM service
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
The article says that the military "may" and that industry analysts "expect". Well I find this hard to believe being that 3G tests are being conducted currently (meaning that licenses for the spectrum are already out there). I doubt that the US govt is going to cap an entire industry (in this case wireless). Also, think about CALEA and the potential that 3G allows... I'm really pretty much doubting this article alltogether.
What the Torah says now is what the Torah has always said.
You must be referring to that corporation known as Christianity. It was Christian scholars who misstranslated from the original Hebrew and mistakenly used "kill" instead of "murder". The Old Testimate of the Christian bible is a rewrite of portions of the Torah. It is incomplete and incorrect.-- Will program for bandwidth
why do we have the FCC? all they seem to do lately is facilitate consolidation of media. I thought the point of the fcc was to keep media and communications chanels as open and spread out as possible.
just look at the mess that has happend once media companies asset cap was removed. we have sony, ATW, etc. now they have the muscle to not only give use only one POV,they are getting the power to limit fair use.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
I don't see why 3G phones would have made a difference here, they already knew the WTC planes had crashed.
Barbara Olson was on the phone with her husband and she was in the plane that crashed in the Pentagon.
- sigs are for wimps.
If you disagree with the government then you are a nutcase and need to be locked in prison.
That statement pretty neatly summarizes why we need to be ever-vigilant for our freedoms, not just against foreign terrorists but also against idots like this.
Hey Mr. "We're at War", what changed Sept. 11? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. The World Trade Center was attacked FIRST in '93! The USS Cole was just put back in the water. Since when is an attack on a warship net an attack on our military?
The revolution will NOT be televised.
There is an interesting article in the October issue of Red Herring about the bureaucratic nightmare that wireless companies face in trying to develop "next-generation wireless networks." I just thought you all would like to know.
Most industrialized nations with our type of technological infrastructures are years ahead of us in wireless technology. My opinion is that the stranglehold on potential 3g spectrums is part of the reason why the technological bust happened. Back in the late 90's (seems like a million years ago) when everyone was happy and rich (except me), wireless devices were supposed to be the next "big thing." Now they're all but a curiousity for most Americans where in Japan and Sweden they're a necessity. I think the tech sector would come around if the current administration opened more of these specrums up (but they'd have to get through the DOD first) for development. Something tells me, however, after September 11th, they'll be hell bent on preventing these technologies from spreading too quickly lest they be employed by terrorism.com.
There are fringe groups out there getting paranoid about this even as we speak.
Conspiracy theories implicate every moneyed interest imaginable. Sadly , some of these may even be true.
Time to stock up the old Y2K bunker. Get them while they're cheap
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
The real question we should be asking would center on why *Corporate* people don't have to play by the same rules as *REAL* people. If I were to make the same demands I expect the roar of laughter to see me out of the building. So why is business allowed to act immorally, and even expected to..?
I'm not certain exactly what you're referring to, but if it's the airlines' demands, let me explain:
The airline business is a VERY low margin and low cashflow business. That means that, though they make billions in revenues, the airlines don't clear that much actual profit (relative to their revenues) and always have very little cash on hand.
When an event such as the attacks on the WTC takes place and the government puts restrictions on air travel (i.e. the FAA forces all flights to be grounded) and overall safety is at risk (i.e. evidence that more attacks could be planned makes it a good decision to keep flights grounded), the airlines do everything they can to keep going. If these events cause them to run out of the tiny amount of cash they currently have, they're going to ask the government for help, and the government is probably going to give it to them.
Why? Becuase if they go under, you are going to suffer. You are going to have to take the train, bus, car, mule, whatever. That will cause a massive destabilization of our business infrastructure, and will hurt our economy even further. It's the government's job to protect (and guide) the economy to recovery, so don't complain when they do that job.
Large corporations, such as the airlines, that are centerpieces to the economy will get preferential treatment by the government because lack of such treatment has major consequences on the country's well-being.
On the other hand, one person's need for preferential treatment isn't going to mean a damn thing to the overall economy, so you won't get any help.
nlh
Ferrari and other exotic car rentals in New York
The pope spoke on Sunday 16 September: May the Blessed Virgin bring comfort and hope to those who suffer on account of the tragic attack of the terrorists, that last week seriously harmed the beloved American people. To all the children of this great Nation I direct my heartbroken and heartfelt consideration. May Mary welcome the dead, console the survivors, support those families who are particularly tried, help all to resist the temptation to hatred and violence, and to dedicate themselves to the service of justice and peace. May the Virgin Mary nourish in the hearts of all young persons, above all, high human and spiritual ideals and the necessary perseverance to achieve them. May She remind them of the primacy of eternal values, especially in these difficult moments, so that in their daily engagements and activities they may ever continue to be turned toward God and to his kingdom of solidarity and peace.
It may not, but at the same time, the more communication the better. G3 or otherwise, if our network was better, and more people had phones, maybe the pentagon plane would have been averted. I dobut the secone wtc plane, since it was only 18 min after the first one.. anyway, my point is.
The better the network, the more people that will be on it, and therefore the more opportunities. Maybe Barbara was the only one. By the time the Jimmy Glick on the 4th plane voted with the other male passengers, there were several people getting the same story from their phones.
Again, it may not have helped much, but it certainly could have.
Actually in the US, the FAA is responsible for creating security policies. The airlines only pay for it.
The reality is that the US economy would shrink dramatically if the airlines were to disappear, as every sector of the economy is somewhat dependant on air travel. (I fly around half the country working for a funeral home company, if that gives you any perspective.) A smaller economy means a smaller tax base, so airline aid will likely actually have a negative associated cost. Although the principle of capitalism is that private industry takes care of its own problems, there come times when pragmatic decisions have to be made.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
is that AT&T Wireless removing choice of Long Distance/International Carrier.
Why does this matter ?
Well I used to get 10c/Minute to the UK using Sprint as my wireless long distance carrier. Now its $1.50 courtesy of AT&T.
I'm only staying with them because my cell phone number is so important to me (everyone has it rather than my home number).
Winton
It is too bad that the role of cell phones was given so much attention. It would have been better for that to have been kept quite. Eventually, terrorists would have figured it out on the own, of course, so in the long run it makes no difference, but in the short run, it could mean a few hundred lives saved.
One of the more amusing things about the recent [I'm loath to call it this] dot com bull and subsequent bear market is just how wrong the analysts were. On the upswing, all the analysts and pundits threw their words and weight behind the dumbest ideas (remember "push"?). They touted the most foolish buisiness plans. They devoted all of their attention to the shinyest doodad out there, and utterly ignored the real changes that were happening in plain sight. On the downswing, despite obvious (and historically, emperically and numerically proven) indications a year ahead of time that the economy was going to slow, there was not a peep from the analyst community that things weren't going as well as they seemed. Sure, there was hype and doomsaying, but there always is. No one wanted to stick their neck out and say that the party might be slowing down, and that it might be getting time to find your date and go home. Just think - if the analyst community had been more clearheaded and more honest, we might have had a dot com slowdown, instead of a meltdown, when it did come. There are consiquences when you deny reality, and that's not a matter of opinion.
In spite of the suggestions and all the tests that I have made, I have not cavato a spider from the hole.
There's not much money in moving people around, but we need to move people around to make other parts of the economy function.
It's in areas like this where Libertarian economic theory falls down; sometimes subsidies are necessary. It might be robbing Peter to pay Paul, but psychologically, it doesn't seem that way to the average guy. And nine-tenths of econ is really mass psychologogy.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
Get you airport station and your DSL together and "say no to telcos"
Suck Spectrum Evil Doers!
Well, given that Japan has just rolled out their first phase 3G network, and I don't believe that Sweden has even begun, I think that you're off base.
It's not the lack of high-bandwidth connectivity that's slowing down US adoption of wireless technology. DoCoMo seems to do pretty well on 2G tech.
I think that there are many factors that contribute to slower-than-we'd-like adoption of wireless services, and that the cries of "we're waiting for 3G" are largely bogus. Waiting for what? Streaming video? Somehow I don't think that's the killer wireless app, anymore than videophones killed my telephone.
Invisible Agent
This post is a mirror; when a monkey stares in, no hacker gazes out.
The airline business is a VERY low margin and low cashflow business. That means that, though they make billions in revenues, the airlines don't clear that much actual profit
The computer manufacturers have very low margins , the grocery stores have very low margin.
WTF: a business is profitable or not.
The problem is not the most businesses are not profitable: the problem is that people are greedy - the only thing that satisfies them is the .com era day-to-day valuations.
Profitable is not enough. Businesses have to be VERY profitable.
Why?
Tell me something folks:
Is every slimeball in the world going to crawl out from under their rocks this month and use the WTC attacks as an excuse to fuck someone in the ass? Because I for one am getting really tired of it, really fast. It's disrespectful in the extreme to those who died.
It's a toss-up as to who I hate more: the fanatical monsters who killed thousands, or the opportunistic bastards trying to profit off horror and sorrow.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
You contradict yourself. You say they are low cashflow then you say they make billions in revenue (in a manner that implies that is a large revenue). If you have $12 billion in revenue and $11.9 billion in costs, then you are a high cashflow, low profit operation. Compare that with someone who has $500 million in revenue and $$450 million in costs. They are low cashflow (relatively speaking) and high (relative) profit.
They are different operations. The high cashflow, low profit operation can make a significant relative increase in profit simply by agressively getting accounts receivable settled and coincidentally delaying accounts payable as long as possible; this allows non-trivial income from interest on the held cashflow.
We, the little people, do not benefit by having the governemnt tax/rob us to bail out airlines.
You state that the airlines will collapse if we don't bail them out. So what? They go broke, their planes are auctioned off for pennies or dimes on the dollar.
The result? Dozens of new airlines, without the debtr of the previous airlines. People who own those old airlines stocks end up holding the bag - the way their supposed to.
That said, I think the government _should_ be responsible for all economic losses it directly causes. If they "detain" you for looking like a suspect, and your not, they should pay your lost wages, and any associated expenses - hotel and new airfare if you were "detained" away from home.
That individual liberty would be extended to the ground floor employees of the airlines - the pilots, ticket agents, cabin crew and mechanics who lost their opportunity to work directly due to the effective (and/or literal) grounding of flights for a week and a half.
But the governemtn should NOT continue to pay for the airlines which lose money due to a drop in consumer confidence in air travel. Flights will be reduced by half, its been speculated, for the next six months or more. We the American people should certainly NOT have to cover those expenses.
We already pay for those things through unemployment taxes. We are certainly not going to get a bonus check from ground freight and rail companies which will gainn market share from this incident.
No corporation should have any greater right or priviledge than any individual, real live human being.
If the gov't pays for the rebuilding of the WTC, the owners of that property win, not the people. The WTC area will be redevloped regardless of tax incentives. If the gov't wants to compensate the owners or the city, they should buy the land at its now VACANT value and build on it. If billions of our tax dollarsare going to be spent building a tower that generates tens of millions in rental income annually, I expect a direct cut of that money.
If we are taxed $20,000,000,000.00, I expect to get something in return that I would not have gotten if I was not taxed that $20,000,000,000.00. Saying the economic prosperity generated by the tower would benefit me is beside the point. We the people gain that no matter who rebuilds it.
Well, if they start taking cell phones, and only have knives, we know to attack....
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
Sorry, dude.
Iraq is "Bablyon". Iran is "Persia".
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
You are correct: I misspoke. Airlines are a low-margin, _high_ cashflow business, but that cash is on hand for a very small amount of time and, hence, runs out quickly.
nlh
Ferrari and other exotic car rentals in New York
The strange thing about this is that I had to give a presentation about 3G just last week, the day of the attacks. This information would have made my point more effectively.
The computer manufacturers have very low margins , the grocery stores have very low margin.
.com era day-to-day valuations.
WTF: a business is profitable or not.
Your statements are foolish and ignorant. If the U.S. were struck with an EMP that disabled the nations computer infrastructure and then the government tied the hands of the manufacturers for a certain amount of time, you can damn well be sure there would be a bail-out package to get our systems back up and running. Likewise with a biological attack on our food supply.
The problem is not the most businesses are not profitable: the problem is that people are greedy - the only thing that satisfies them is the
This statement is baseless. For better or for worse, greed drives capitalism, and without either you'd be sucking trash from a disposal outlet for dinner. If you'd rather live in a country that lacks a stable government, economy, or has wealth to speak of, I heartily encourage you to move to Afghanistan oh, say, right about a week from now.
Ferrari and other exotic car rentals in New York
Oh, also...airlines aren't the only ones getting help:
? tag=nbs
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-7240474.html
Ferrari and other exotic car rentals in New York
(SARCASTIC)
This is a non-issue, just take some spectrum from all those ham radio geeks. All they do is screw up my TV reception, anyway. Not like they do any emergency services or storm tracking or anything...
(/SARCASTIC)
Click here to read the highly controversial views of Rickard Oberg, creator of the free EJB container, JBoss. Tell me if you want to use his code again.
I'm not sure what definitions you're working with, but in the US at least, cashflow refers to the cash profit produced after all operating expenses but before interest and taxes. It's basically one measure of profitability. You are correct that operations that have a lot of revenue have the opportunity to manage into a substantial negative working capital position by lowering their accounts receivable and inventory and stretching their payables, but I don't think that airlines can typically do that, since they need to carry a pretty good inventory of parts, and their two main costs, fuel and labor, can't be stretched that far.
heidi wall is not my sister
but she has cute feet too
yummy more feet to suck on!!
mmmmmm why cant i get an index of that directorie????? i want more of those pix damnit!!
While the spectrum is still military, it has a chance of being fairly reallocated. In the current corporate-friendly environment, the frequencies would just go to abusive, customer-hating monopolies. And then it would be very hard to ever pry those frequencies back from them.
The internet has made us more sophisticated about the potential division between content and transmission. I believe that the radio spectrum should only be licensed to common carriers who offer to carry raw data in a non-discriminatory manner, without bundling any other services.
What we need is high-speed wireless internet. Given that, services like voice telephony can be provided in a highly competitive environment. So can many other innovative services we haven't thought of yet.
Ever notice how hated most telecom providers are? Notice how they keep customers at arms length via "call centers" and IVR? They are near-monopolies, using government granted resources like spectrum to achieve a closed market in which they can harm the purchaser. Let's put an end to this junk by giving the spectrum to common-carrier ISP's. If we did this across the whole spectrum, it would cause a massive shift in power away from huge corporations and towards small businesses and citizens.
Sheesh - even Qualcomm admits that 3G handsets will only achieve over 500kbps when stationary - next to a base station.
3G is a lie. And it's getting farther and farther away every day. Too bad Ricochet is dead and 802.11 sucks so badly when it comes to range, roaming and security.
cash and exemptions they need to further maul the little guy into oblivion.
Let's see how long small airlines could survive without the big corporations who drive down prices for the whole industry through enabling suppliers to take advantage of economies of scale, shall we? Suddenly that $50 part might cost $500 if there were too few buyers...
Not to be too sarcastic, but remind me again- who decides on security measure in/around airports and on airplanes..?! Their lack of intelligence in decision making and they expect us to bail them out.. thems some big balls indeed..
Uhhh, that would be government regulators? Appointed by, you guessed it, the taxpayer and their elected representatives.
Hrm. My copies of the founding documents must be incomplete. The pages where it details that part of the governments job are missing.
I don't suppose you could paste up your copies?
"No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
--James Madison
Hrm. You claim it falls down here, but fail to state how. There is no point made describing the supposed weakness in this area, just a claim. Thus I find it difficult if not impossible to respond. Please expand on this thought if you would.
"No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
--James Madison
I imagine that next time, potential terrorists will have to be prepared to kill essentially all passengers on the plane in order to accomplish their goals. Cell phones or no, most people aren't going to sit still for another hijacking after this.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Yeah, horns are usually associated with leaders. Sometimes wings are considered "directions to move" or for a beast or country the direction it conquers. Did Persia under Sargon move west, south and north?
One could suppose the one he goat was Rome or Greece, since in many ways they were the same country. Alexander the Great defeated Sargon and his empire, and was a "single horn" or leader. From what I understand he conquered regions but never really occupied them, hence he never "touched the ground".
But then I'm not sure which four governments game from the fall of Alexanders Empire, (four horns growing when the first was broken) but the one horn that grew out of that was even until the kingdom of God or coming of Christ.
Anyway, I'd still have to review this longer before I put my name to it but thats my take.
Louis Armstrong, trumpet player and Jazz pioneer, died yesterday morning in his Los Angeles home. He was 71. Armstrong's last performance was at James Madison University's Convocation Center on March 24, 2001, where he played to a standing room only 5,000. Armstrong was helped off the stage by his wife of 20 years, and he later told a reporter for the campus newspaper "I don't know how much longer I can do this. This may be one of my last shows." His final song was his biggest hit, Hello Dolly! He is survived by his wife, 3 children and 6 grandchildren.
The problem with too many companies, and too many technologies, is that roaming and "nationwide plans" are fraught with problems.
I'm not advocating a single company controlling it all. Or even a single unified technology necessarily. But Consolidating down, so there are a few large nationwide carriers would go a long ways towards making the system work alot better.
Realistically, there are 3 major long distance providers, and look at the price cutting that has gone on in that market since the 80's.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
Certainly. Libertarians (as I understand the political philosophy) believe that government should only fund very specific things: security (internal and external) and justice (making sure that property disputes are settled and that criminal offenses are punished). Any services the government does provide must not be monopolies; anyone should be allowed to perform them and the government should be funded based on the fees it collects for its services.
Subsidies, bail-outs, what have you, are completely opposed in all the Libertarian theory that I've heard. It's seen as taking money by force from people (via the government's ability to punish) to fund failing businesses. Those businesses which are going to fail, should fail. Thinking like this led Congress to end the Amtrack subsidies, and is the reason why there is vocal opposition to farm subsidies and other "corporate welfare."
Thing is, there are some businesses where people will just not pay up front the necessary costs for the service. Some of them (dot-coms come to mind) are spurious, and should fail. But airlines and other mass transit systems are vastly necessary. They are the grease in the gears of an economy, moving people and stuffs around. Because it's necessary, the government, in moments of need by the industry and sanity by the government, steps in to provide necessary funding.
Of course, it's horribly inefficient for the government to redistribute funds, but people aren't willing to pay the costs up-front. It's psychological, really. Libertarian philosophy tends to think that people are completely rational (as well as economic genuises). Clearly, this is not so. So sometimes we need to do things the inefficient way, just because it can't be done any other way. It's not theft, just reality.
Did I misstate anything about Libertarianism?
-jon
Remember Amalek.
there are more - here's a nice page of them. I ought to compile a list of modern day ones, but I'm sure someone's allready done it. Just Google for it.
In spite of the suggestions and all the tests that I have made, I have not cavato a spider from the hole.
Actually, it is recorded in the Babylonian Talmud in several places that the Torah scrolls that they had at that time (~2000 yrs ago) were not exact copies.
While you have expanded your comments you have not really said why the economy would fail if some of these companies went under. Nor have you offered proof that they would fail w/out government subsidies.
Do I think they would? Probably. But as long as there is a need, someone is going to try and provide it. Because if people need it there is money to be made there. It's the foundation of how a free market economy works.
Part of the problem the airlines have is the increased cost of complying with FAA regulations. W/out that you increase profitability. Which I'm sure makes a lot of people cringe in fear. People think w/out the FAA planes would use substandard parts and crash all the time. Baloney. Airlines make money off their customers. If they kill them all where would they be? It's not in their best interest. And if they kill their existing customer base they are going to have a hard time drawing new customers. So, the ones who have poor safety records/etc will go out of business and get swallowed up by better companies.
With this, I think prices would go down. Quality of travel might too. You might have more cramped spaces. You might have no meal on a long flight or no in-flight movie if you are cheap. But that's each travellers choice.
If it was still too high, sure, the airlines would be in trouble. If the cost of air travel is more than it's worth they should be. In which case people would use other methods until someone came up with a cheaper method.
A free market economy is strong and works very well. Where it falls apart is when Govts start meddling with it.
Libertarian philosophy tends to think that people are completely rational (as well as economic genuises). Clearly, this is not so. So sometimes we need to do things the inefficient way, just because it can't be done any other way. It's not theft, just reality.
People who believe in a free market understand what motivates people. It's obvious from observing the world. And that's why a free market works so well. It doesn't require anything special from the people who participate in it. You just have to be human.
Did I misstate anything about Libertarianism?
In general what we are really talking about here is free market economics. It's not just libertarians who agree with that, so it might be a good idea to call it what it is. Libertarians are a diverse lot, and some might agree or disagree with your stated position of the party platform so I'll stay away from commenting on that here.
"No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
--James Madison
You say if airlines go under, we are going to suffer. I doubt that this will happen. Those who will suffer will be shareholders and bondholders, who will lose equity in the bankruptcy proceedings. Do you really think airlines will stop flying? No, they will be forced to become more efficient.
Do you know how many airlines have declared bankruptcy in the past 25 years? Over 130, and Continental did it twice. Hey wait, isn't Continental still around? You mean a company can go thru bankruptcy and still do business after? Yes, and hundreds of companies do every year. I say let 'em go belly up. Maybe they will all become more like Southwest, an airline who actually makes money.
damn!! I was looking forward to fast internet on my cell phone. Looks like now I'm stuck with the same old, slow connections as before.
We seldom regret saying too little but often regret saying too much.
What!?!? You don't want the market to shake itself out. High Speed Trains would be more economical. Also, terrorist hijacking trains can't crash them into buildings easily.