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Online Carpooling Service Fined In Canada
TechDirt is reporting on a disappointing development out of Canada. An Ontario transportation board has fined PickupPal, a Web-based service for arranging carpools, because a local bus company complained of the competition. (TechCrunch apparently first broke the story.) "[The transportation board has] established a bunch of draconian rules that any user in Ontario must follow if it uses the service — including no crossing of municipal boundaries — meaning the service is only good within any particular city's limits. It's better than being shut down completely, and the service can still operate elsewhere around the world, but this is yet another case where we see regulations, that are supposedly put in place to improve things for consumers, do the exact opposite."
The US banking industry still has a lot of inane regulations.
In a truly free market, bad banks would fail and go under, and customers would move and insure their savings accordingly.
But most people in the US don't save anyway, so who really cares?
So, for example, some people think that the reason they didn't implement direct democracy is because they didn't have the practical means to disseminate information, vote, etc. This is not true. The American founders didn't WANT direct democracy, because historically that had inevitably DESTROYED the tyranny of the RULING CLASS. They wanted educated, worldly men FROM THE RULING CLASS LIKE THEMSELVES to make the decisions ... but they ENTICED the people BY ALLOWING THEM to choose WHICH OF THE PREAPPROVED, educated, worldly men FROM THE RULING CLASS made those decisions.
Fixed that for you.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
OH NO! Not an "unlicensed" service! Imagine that, people offering a service to other people without the governments permission. What a nightmare. I mean, clearly nothing good could ever come of people voluntarily interacting without checking with the almighty omnipotent omniscient State. /SARCASM
So any old mass murderer can drive a taxi can they ?
Well, either that mass murderer is out of jail and has served his time (which if the case, it probably wasn't _mass_ murder), or he was never convicted of the murders he committed in the first place. In the first case, I'm just riding from point A to point B with the man. Is he suddenly going to drive the car into a building to kill me (and himself)? Is he going to take his gun and shoot me? This is such a weird complaint. And if he was never committed, well, who's to say none of the current taxi drivers that are licensed aren't mass murderers?
How about known paedophiles taking your kids to school ?
Pedophiles are currently tracked by the government, I wouldn't put my kids in the car with someone I didn't know about. And once again, the taxi industry can still regulate itself! They will find themselves most successful when they can filter the so-called mass murderers and pedophiles themselves instead of relying on the government to do it for them.
Why are there so many pseudo 14 year olds on this site recently ?
Wow, great argument.
I would imagine that if you enquire into the issue and dig right back to the beginning of the regulation, you will find that the public demanded some oversight of these private companies. Now ill-educated fools who think they have the answer to life itself (because they are 14 years and nearly 6 months old) are complaining about things that "we, the people" asked for.
Now I don't have the time currently to research this but it would be interesting. And most regulation is never demanded by the people, it's brought on wholly from government officials themselves who either want to exercise more control over an industry or dominate it all together.
If you're not 14 years old, start acting like it.
What?
Shut down the FAA, let the airlines self regulate.
Great example, look at what the FAA has done to the airline industry in just the last seven years.
Shut down welfare, turn all the streets into a ghetto.
Ghettos are aplenty across the United States and welfare already exists for these people. It would be better to wean them off welfare and instead allow the local governments and communities work towards progress.
Shut down medicare, let the disease spread.
What disease? Alzheimer's? Lung cancer? Various other old people diseases? Now I am for ending Medicare but not to let the disease spread. I'm not even going to get into this one at the moment.
You actually have enough space to just say "fuck it" pack your shit together and live in the woods.
Yes, I could say that but I would rather not watch my beloved country destroy itself.
But no, you'd rather run the country (badly) from your armchair while taking a large advantage from all the benefits bestowed by the things you want to get rid of.
I also do not take full advantage of hardly anything I'm paying my taxes for. Social Security? Nope. Medicare? Nope. Medicaid? Nope. Public transportation? Nope, I set up my own carpool. The list goes on and on.
The reason Bush got in was because there are millions of people who think like he does. If you think that's good, I'm sorry for your descendants.
Do you really think Bush got in because people think like him? Bush got in because he lied and convinced people they thought like him. In 2000, Bush said that the USA should not be a nation builder. Look what happened to that.
I didn't mean to pick on Bush, he is in illustrious company. But let's face it, he is the poster boy for WTF ?
Agreed, also great post in the Half Life 2 article about drugs. You had me really thinking about that one.
Reviewing just the first hour of video games.