Ever heard of that treasonous document that starts out "When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."?
It goes on to say: "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
The signers of the Declaration of Independence and the people who fought for the Colonies independence were committing treason.
Indeed, the 2nd Amendment self-state purpose is to allow the citizens to preserve their freedom from a despotic federal government that was being formed by the same document. Rather, the government being formed could become despotic and need to be thrown off, and the the 2nd provides the basis for that.
This is pretty clear from various Founder's explanations, e.g. Alexander Hamliton "[I]f circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude[, ] that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow-citizens."
The Framers had *just* completed an armed (and treasonous) insurrection of their own, and were keenly aware of the fact that any government they might form could (and probably would) become despotic. The 2nd at least put a floor under the people's ability to fight back against that potential.
Recall that the Founders had just won a war where the people's arms played a key part in overthrowing the despotic government they had lived under--because they had arms they were able to stand up to the British Army. The Founders often expressed their concern that the new government they were founding could itself become despotic (despite the check-and-balances they were building in), and in particular were fundamentally against a standing army. A standing army could be used to oppress the people, but only if the people were not similarly armed. If the people were armed as the standing army, they would easily be able to outnumber any such regular army, and thus the presences of an armed populace--the militia--served as a deterrent to despotic government. So rather than equating the militia to the National Guard, the stated purpose of the militia is specifically to be able to fight the federal government (and its army) to preserve the free state, should it ever come to that.
I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people except for a few public officials. George Mason
Madison: "The means of defence against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people."
Noah Webster: "Before a standing army can rule the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States."
Alexander Hamilton: "[I]f circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude[, ] that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow-citizens."
Theodore Sedgwick: "[it is] a chimerical idea to suppose that a country like this could ever be enslaved. . . Is it possible. . . that an army could be raised for the purpose of enslaving themselves or their brethren? or, if raised whether they could subdue a nation of freemen, who know how to prize liberty and who have arms in their hands?"
When a person or company tries to get out of a situation, by finding a loophole to get through, or coming up with some kind of bullshit excuse. Much like a hamster tries anything to escape its cage.
A story by David Moser... This Is the Title of This Story, Which Is Also Found Several Times in the Story Itself
This is the first sentence of this story. This is the second sentence. This is the title of this story, which is also found several times in the story itself. This sentence is questioning the intrinsic value of the first two sentences. This sentence is to inform you, in case you haven't already realized it, that this is a self-referential story, that is, a story containing sentences that refer to their own structure and function. This is a sentence that provides an ending to the first paragraph.
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great lawyers to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great teachers to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great CEOs to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great parents to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great ax-murderers to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great plumbers to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great piano-tuners to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great cricketers to be born here" "with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great chicken-feather-pluckers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great [insert job title here] to be born here"
The net result of all these laws is to raise profits for car dealers. State legislatures may be willing to do this because dealers represent an identifiable source of state employment and tax revenue (Canis and Platzer, 2009, pp. 4–12), while even large manufacturers can site manufacturing plants only in a limited number of states. The result is that new car dealers have an advantage over auto manufacturers when it comes to political leverage in state legislatures, and thus states enact laws that extract rent from manufacturers and redistribute it to franchise dealers.
Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe delivered on his promise to billionaire Michael Bloomberg this week. The Democrat proposed the restoration of the state’s limitation on handgun sales to one a month, plus mandatory background checks on buyers — enforced by a police presence.
Of course, Michael Bloomberg, corporate mogul and billionaire, funded Mr. McAuliffe to the tune of millions. Nothing liek a bought-and-paid-for politician to do your bidding.
The FCC was formed by the Communications Act of 1934 to replace the radio regulation functions of the Federal Radio Commission.
The Communications Act of 1934 is a United States federal law, signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 19, 1934. I believe FDR was a Democrat. The law was passed by the 73rd Congress. Both chambers had a Democratic majority. Dems in the Senate enjoyed a 60-35 majority, while over in the House thing were even rosier with Dems holding about 312 seats to Republicans 115 or so (counts varied slightly over time).
by 50 years or more, and reflect the situations surrounding the time in which they were passed. One can hardly expect an existing dealership system to use legal means, especially those existing laws, to protect their interests. This ought to be obvious even if one disagrees with the premise of the laws. And by the way, these laws were passed in all states over decades of time, usually in response to some bad action by the manufacturers (such as forcing dealerships to accept cars they did order, so manufactures could offload dead inventory, or not reimbursing dealerships for warranty repairs).
You cannot simply point at today's lackey Republicans as the source for these laws, nor claim them to be "anti-Tesla" anymore than 50-year-old telecom laws are "anti-Google".
A far better resource than the source in the original posting is
This is an analysis predating Tesla's trouble by a bit, focusing on the government-sanctioned decimation of dealerships through the TARP process, circa 2010, and includes a nice history of franchise protection laws.
For example:
The regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer he regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer opportunism early in the twentieth century. According to Surowiecki (2006), in 1920, Henry Ford took advantage of its established dealer network by forcing dealers to buy inventories of new cars that they were unlikely to sell. The reason that the company could “force” dealers to take the cars was that they had all made important investments in their facilities and reputation. Thus they had sunk costs that could be expropriated. Ford and General Motors used the same strategy again during the Great Depression. These episodes demonstrated to policymakers that the franchisor, with its greater information and financial resources, might exploit investments made by the franchisees. Federal regulation followed these periods.
The starting point for auto franchise regulation is the 1956 federal act generally known as the Automobile Dealer’s Day in Court Act (ADDICA), which provides that a car dealer may recover damages if its manufacturer fails to act in good faith in complying with the terms of the franchise agreement, including on issues of allocation of vehicles to dealers, or matters of termination, cancellation, or transfer of the franchise. However, by the time the ADDICA was enacted, 20 states had already passed auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer relationships.
All states require that car dealers be licensed. Even 30 years ago, 44 states had such a requirement. This regulation prevents the manufacturer from retailing cars through other means. In particular, this regulation has been a major impediment to the development of Internet distribution of new cars.
How hard is it to make toolbars dockable on the side? My monitors are just about tall enough to display 8.5x11" sheet in 1:1 (not quite, with about 10.75" of vertical display area). But using Word means giving up nearly 1.75" at the top and nearly 0.5" at the bottom. I know I can make the ribbon hideable.
Chrome, Adobe Reader eat up top & bottom space too.
In a DUI case, the prosecution withheld the video evidence. Since a suite of other charges (something like 12 additional charges) had been added to the DUI--resisting, assault on officer,...--the video was possibly exculpatory. When the defense lawyer pointed out that prosecution had not turned over the dash cam video as requested, the judge stopped proceedings and ordered the prosecution to produce the tape. He was mad, too, you could tell. IIRC, he said 24 hours or you'll be in contempt and we'll have a mistrial. Jury was dismissed until the tape was located.
When we came back, the tape was played. *Somehow* the tape showed the cops driving up to the scene, then 20 minutes of snow, then magically cleared back to normal video showing the tow truck removing the accused's car.
Because of that tape being withheld and then magically showing nothing for the duration of the event in question (erased? disconnected?), when we deliberated, the first thing we did was ignore all the tacked on charges. We considered and convicted on the DUI based only on the fact that the wreck happened and the BAC test was positive. Because of the prosecution and police actions with the tape, we basically ignored every word of testimony from officers on the scene and never considered a single charge except the original DUI.
As it turned out, we found out in sentencing that it was the 8th DUI for the guy, and the judge expressed his opinion that we had done exactly right in finding as we did for the other charges. He had words for the prosecution that were probably pretty damning for a judge not on a TV show.
What this law would have done is to make online retailers subject to *different* rules than a physical store.
It would make an online retailer demand information about the buyer so that the online retailer can act as a remote proxy tax collector based on where the items are shipped, not where the seller is physically located.
A B&M one in another state is not going to be forced to do the same thing when visitors from some other state make a purchase (which they might take home and might evade their local use taxes).
The issue boils down to: Can a state force a retailer based in another state, with no point-of-presence in the taxing state, to act as a proxy tax collector?
Imagine for one moment a shopping mall full of retailers. These stores sit just across the border from you in another state, but since your house is only a few minutes drive, easily accessible. Further, the neighboring state has a *much* lower sales tax than yours--let's even say they have zero sales tax (as a few states do).
Your state is frustrated that so many of its border-dwelling residents chose to make all their purchases across the border, thus avoiding sales taxes my state perceives as being owed to my state and depriving local retailers of business. Your state has instituted a "use tax," equivalent to the sales tax, that taxpayers are supposed to report and pay for any items imported into the state. But it seems almost no one is paying it!
Your state goes to retailers across the border and *demands* that they collect and remit sales taxes to your state. The stores, recognizing the problems they will face, such as now requiring all purchasers to submit ID and proof of residence and question them as to where the goods they are buying will end up--not to mention additional operating expense and liability for any incorrect tax filings that might occur--wisely tell your state to take a flying leap. Your state has no jurisdictional authority to impose its force on these retailers.
The problem here is simply that states cannot get their own citizens to pay taxes due (use taxes) and are trying to force out-of-state businesses to act as tax collectors for them. Think about it, is your state entitled to force a Wal-Mart or a mom-n-pop store lying just across the border in another state to collect your state's sales taxes? No way! Why should they get to force some other out-of-state business to do so?
Chances are if your state has a sales tax, it has an equivalent use tax. You are supposed to pay the use tax on goods purchased from out-of-state and imported into your state. So if you didn't cheat on your taxes, the local stores would not be at a disadvantage.
Imagine a store in a state with 0% sales-tax, say, Delaware. Further assume it is close to the border with a state that has a high sales tax, like, hmm, Maryland which is considering a 7% rate. By reputation and the lure of 0% sales tax (by virtue of evading their own local use tax), people from the neighboring state make the short trip to buy their wares. Being a brick-and-mortar store, they charge all their customers the local sales tax rate (0%). They do not care nor ask where their customers are from, there is no question *at all* where the transaction takes place.
The store decides to create a website to allow their loyal customers (and hopefully new customers) to buy things online and have them mailed to them. Under this proposed rule, the store not only have to treat their online customers differently from their in-store customers, but have to comply with 10,000 different tax regimes?
The issue here is that Maryland would and should have zero chance of enforcing its will on Delaware business to force them to act as proxy tax collectors for Maryland's use taxes--the taxes being evaded by Marylanders--even if hoards of Marylanders rolled into Delaware every day to stock up. It is the Marylanders who are violating Maryland's use tax laws. Why is it the responsibility of a store in Delaware to enforce Maryland's use tax laws?
There's no practical difference between Marylanders driving to Delaware to shop compared to Marylanders ordering from a store in Delaware and having the loot delivered.
How is it fair to force a store in Delaware to be a tax collector for a California municipality? And without *any* compensation for the favor, not to mention the overhead of tallying and remitting taxes to all those difference jurisdictions, *plus* the inherent liability should they god forbid make a mistake in their forced servitude as proxy tax collector. I'm sure California would have no problem shutting down a Delaware store for failure to comply with California's tax code.
overturn a veto. It would obviously take a few Democrats who have come to come to believe they fucked up when they first voted for it. Republicans will not hold enough seats to overturn a veto by themselves, that's true enough. Depending on how the La. runoff (and Ak...did they declare a winner yet?), GOP could have 54 seats. There are 2 "independents" who are Democrats in all but name. It is very unlikely but not totally unthinkable that 6 Dems or independents could support overturning a veto on at least some parts of Obamacare.
One thing first. "I find your boogeyman treatment of art and artists to be highly distasteful. Whatever caricature you've dreamt up is not representative of the majority of people receiving food stamps." I have no problem with art and artists, I have a problem with the particular people documented in the Salon article "Hipsters on food stamps: They're young, they're broke, and they pay for organic salmon with government subsidies. Got a problem with that?" and people like them. They are an example of exactly the kind of people who paint the program with an ugly brush--I think pretty much everyone is down with the idea that we need to be sure no one starves and that the foodstamp program has worthy aspects--with their unmitigated sense of entitlement display when they host gourmet dinner parties (with wine tasting) paid for by their foodstamps.
On the other hand, if you're a graduate student in poetry, you had to know going in that the chances of you making a living off your poetry are slim. You chose a singularly unpractical major, spent years and probably 10's of thousands of taxpayer subsidized dollars going to school and essentially planned to depend on welfare. And I'm supposed to respect you for that?
Your argument for foodstamps supporting the very foundation of our economy can be made for military spending as well (even when we're not fighting a war). When we spend $700B annually on defense spending, we're paying wages to military personnel (about $150B), and many enlisted personnel learn a viable trade for life after the military (e.g. motor pool, so it's a jobs training program too) and those wages get spent in the economy to buy food and other stuff. We create high-paying engineering jobs to develop technologies that reduce the risk to our personnel in a fire-fight, developments in aircraft, radar systems, communications networks (ever heard of DARPA?), the folks who really invented the internet), etc. all flow down in the civilian world--and many of those jobs are restricted to US citizens (can't be outsourced to China!). Those engineers and their managers and the investors who receive dividends from their shares all buy stuff in the economy too. The military spends about $3B annually just on family housing and about $70B on military construction. The $135B spent on procurement of aircraft, tanks, guns,... are all providing good, high-paying manufacturing jobs too. The military spends about $200B in operations, buying stuff like fuel, electricity, food, materials and materiel. All that flows back into the economy too.
It's a fair question to ask: are we getting what we need from that military spending? Could we spend less and get the same results? Do we need everything we're spending on? Should some military programs be cut? Are the secondary and nth-order effects worth what we're spending for directly?
Why should I be excoriated for wondering the same things about the $1T of anti-poverty spending in general and foodstamp program in particular?
Rabbit is about $7-9/lb, rabbit tenderloin is about $16/lb (beef tenderloin is about $10/lb). You can buy rabbit at upscale stores like Whole Foods.
It's not the cost of rabbit versus something else, it's the sense of entitlement "I'm a foodie and not going do the 'living on ramen noodles' thing". There are plenty of people working hard to get ahead and living on ramen noodles, but this guy turns his nose up as if such a thing is simply beneath him and he is entitled to his rabbit, raw honey, fresh-squeezed juices, gourmet ice cream, Japanese eggplant, mint chutney and fresh turmeric and all at someone else's expense!
Ever loaned money to a friend or relative and have that person not pay you back? You start to notice that they always seem to be able to buy a new car, or a new TV, or go on a vacation, but can't manage to pay you back and will tell you at length every excuse why they can't? That resentment tends to build.
If you've temporarily fallen on hard times and cannot afford food, I'm happy to fund basic nutrition so you don't starve. If you want gourmet ice cream and fresh-squeezed juice with your rabbit and mint chutney, get a job where you can buy it yourself. When I'm clipping coupons and frequenting Costco and you're dropping your EBT card at Whole Foods for fresh meat, it's kinda like that deadbeat relative.
The key word in your statement is "practical". The unemployment rate for computer scientists is about 4.5% (i.e. below the normal "full employment line of 5%). The unemployment rate for Art & Design is about 12.5%, Interior Design is over 14%, Social Work is nearly 12% and the among the various "Culture" majors unemployment is over 21%. One of my Swiftian solutions for the student loan "crisis" is setting the interest rate for your loan so that it matches the unemployment rate for your major. Why subsidize more Gender Studies majors who will be wholly unable to get a job when they graduate? Go to community college and get a welding or plumbing certificate. P.S. one study estimates that by 2020 the welding trade will be about 300,000 workers short. Welders can go to school for 9 months and be virtually guaranteed of getting a job with starting pay of about $40K, and some welders in certain industries make 6 figures. Think any of those Baltimore kitschy, sketchy, artsy hipsters will take up welding when they can get by on foodstamps and a part-time blogging career?
Also, you can in fact use foodstamps at restaurants, at least in some states. In Arizona, California, Michigan and Florida foostamps can be used at restaraunts. In California, for example, you can use your SNAP card at Burger King, Pizza Hut, KFC, Dominos, Subway, El Pollo Loco, Wendy's, Denny's, Carl's Junior, Del Taco, and a host of smaller chains and local establishments.
What programs did we have the dropped the poverty rate from over 30% down to about 18% in the 15 years before the war on poverty? In the 5 years after the war on poverty started, when we started the big social programs, that rate fell a bit further, down from 18% to about 15%. Since then it has wobbled between about 13% and about 15%.
"We've had the War on Poverty for roughly fifty years now, and poverty went down considerably at the beginning"
Actually, it went down on pretty much the exact same slope it had been trending on since the end of WW II. Between 1945 and 1965, the poverty rate went from around 32% to around 18%. In the first five years of the war on poverty that trend continued--the question is whether it would have continued without the war on poverty--and has remained more-or-less steady for the last 45 years. On the other hand, spending on means-tested benefits programs has skyrocketed to nearly $1T per year. Are we seeing $1T per year of goodness coming out of that spending? Are we making progress in the war on poverty? Are there better ways to spend that $1T?
I don't question that these programs help some people, I question that we're helping more than we're hurting. It seems every "advancement" simply removes more of the negative consequences and stigma of being on welfare and/or simply doles out more cash. We've systematically removed all the incentives to getting out of the programs and indeed provide numerous disincentives to getting out of the programs.
I question whether we still have a "safety net" or are actively trying to convert it to a hammock.
No, real life. Search for that phrase an you'll find the news reports with video and everything.
"And I'm not talking just free condoms... I'm talking the pill, IUDs, for women, RISUG type tech for men, no co-pays, no exceptions for the church. As a society we should be making that available to everyone. I'm not going to force men and women not to have children -- the slippery slope once you start deciding who can and who can't have kids is just too great. But unwanted pregnancy should be eliminated from the first world."
Why involve employers, churches, etc. at all? That's where Obamacare went wrong. If that's what you want, then put together a government program that provides these directly. It is 100% a mistake to try to force employers and churches to be proxy social workers. I'm also not going to tell people not to have kids. But I would be pretty willing to tell people who come to me with their hand extended for benefits: "No more kids while on benefits. Birth control will be provided to you free of charge. If you have a kid while on benefits, you can chose to either put the kid up for adoption where it will be raised outside the cycle of poverty or leave the program." Draconian and unworkable maybe, but so was Swift's idea for dealing with children.
"the homeless drunks and addicts? I don't know what the solution is, but blaming them for it is just silly."
I don't blame them, but clearly what we're doing hasn't done jack to fix the problem either and it is naive to think if we just do more of the same (and I mean more $$$ thrown down the same programs) it will get better.
I'm not sure there are good solutions, and I'm not saying I have them. I am saying that *nothing* we've been doing for the last 50 years and $22T+ seems to have done anything to really impact the problem either. I am saying that simply doing more of the same doesn't seem like a great idea. I am saying that giving people more and more benefits with less and less effort or consequences on their part seems to be misguided at best.
Perhaps it is worth considering making semi-permanent birth control a requirement of benefits. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to ask that the people who are in a hole and who "need" help to at least stop making it worse by adding more mouths. Perhaps it is worth considering reducing UI payments for the long-term unemployed--study after study shows a nearly magical capacity for the long-term unemployed to find a job right before their UI payments stop. Perhaps we need to rethink a program that lets hipster art majors sit around hoping to make millions with their blog while feeling entitled to gourmet food...'Mak, 31, grew up in Westchester, graduated from the University of Chicago and toiled in publishing in New York during his 20s before moving to Baltimore last year with a meager part-time blogging job and prospects for little else. About half of his friends in Baltimore have been getting food stamps since the economy toppled, so he decided to give it a try; to his delight, he qualified for $200 a month. “I’m sort of a foodie, and I’m not going to do the ‘living off ramen’ thing,” he said, fondly remembering a recent meal he’d prepared of roasted rabbit with butter, tarragon and sweet potatoes.'
Of course, it doesn't help that people have a mental where "hope that one of these benevolent corporate overlords will by some mistake share their wealth with me". Perhaps I'm just a sick twisted person, but I see the world where "I hope to develop skills that someone is willing to pay me for" leads to a job, provided I can put myself in front of employers who are looking for people with those skills. I might have to learn new skills, or move to a new place but if that's what it takes. Lots of folks seem to think they're *entitled* to a $80k job, or at least the level of lifestyle it brings.
"the job market in this country is so far removed from anything that our animal instincts can recognize as contributing to our survival that it just beats most of us down into depressed wage slaves" Again, I know I only see those around, and most of my friends are well-paid engineers, but I have friends and family who are schoolbus drivers, teachers, entrepreneur shop owners (iPhone repair, appliances), accountants, welders, truck drivers. While everyone is always unhappy about something at work, none of them are "depressed wage slaves" and for the most part appreciate their employer as something more than a feudal lord squashing the serfs.
Slashdot Mirror
Ever heard of that treasonous document that starts out "When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."?
It goes on to say: "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
The signers of the Declaration of Independence and the people who fought for the Colonies independence were committing treason.
Indeed, the 2nd Amendment self-state purpose is to allow the citizens to preserve their freedom from a despotic federal government that was being formed by the same document. Rather, the government being formed could become despotic and need to be thrown off, and the the 2nd provides the basis for that.
This is pretty clear from various Founder's explanations, e.g. Alexander Hamliton "[I]f circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude[, ] that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow-citizens."
The Framers had *just* completed an armed (and treasonous) insurrection of their own, and were keenly aware of the fact that any government they might form could (and probably would) become despotic. The 2nd at least put a floor under the people's ability to fight back against that potential.
The Revolutionary War?
"2) It takes too long to make. You go and buy one in ten minutes."
Bought a gun recently? Even with CCW license to speed the process, it takes a lot longer than 10 minutes.
Recall that the Founders had just won a war where the people's arms played a key part in overthrowing the despotic government they had lived under--because they had arms they were able to stand up to the British Army. The Founders often expressed their concern that the new government they were founding could itself become despotic (despite the check-and-balances they were building in), and in particular were fundamentally against a standing army. A standing army could be used to oppress the people, but only if the people were not similarly armed. If the people were armed as the standing army, they would easily be able to outnumber any such regular army, and thus the presences of an armed populace--the militia--served as a deterrent to despotic government. So rather than equating the militia to the National Guard, the stated purpose of the militia is specifically to be able to fight the federal government (and its army) to preserve the free state, should it ever come to that.
I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people except for a few public officials.
George Mason
Madison: "The means of defence against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people."
Noah Webster: "Before a standing army can rule the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States."
Alexander Hamilton: "[I]f circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude[, ] that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow-citizens."
Theodore Sedgwick: "[it is] a chimerical idea to suppose that a country like this could ever be enslaved. . . Is it possible. . . that an army could be raised for the purpose of enslaving themselves or their brethren? or, if raised whether they could subdue a nation of freemen, who know how to prize liberty and who have arms in their hands?"
hamstering
When a person or company tries to get out of a situation, by finding a loophole to get through, or coming up with some kind of bullshit excuse.
Much like a hamster tries anything to escape its cage.
For some reason, this post reminded me of this:
A story by David Moser...
This Is the Title of This Story, Which Is Also Found Several Times in the Story Itself
This is the first sentence of this story. This is the second sentence. This is the title of this story, which is also found several times in the story itself. This sentence is questioning the intrinsic value of the first two sentences. This sentence is to inform you, in case you haven't already realized it, that this is a self-referential story, that is, a story containing sentences that refer to their own structure and function. This is a sentence that provides an ending to the first paragraph.
[http://consc.net/misc/moser.html]
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great lawyers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great teachers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great CEOs to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great parents to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great ax-murderers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great plumbers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great piano-tuners to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great cricketers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great chicken-feather-pluckers to be born here"
"with only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. can only expect about 5% of great [insert job title here] to be born here"
And creating majority-minority districts to satisfy the DOJ is never called gerrymandering?
A terrific point from that journal article...
The net result of all these laws is to raise profits for car dealers. State legislatures may be willing to do this because dealers represent an identifiable source of state employment and tax revenue (Canis and Platzer, 2009, pp. 4–12), while even large manufacturers can site manufacturing plants only in a limited number of states. The result is that new car dealers have an advantage over auto manufacturers when it comes to political leverage in state legislatures, and thus states enact laws that extract rent from manufacturers and redistribute it to franchise dealers.
Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe delivered on his promise to billionaire Michael Bloomberg this week. The Democrat proposed the restoration of the state’s limitation on handgun sales to one a month, plus mandatory background checks on buyers — enforced by a police presence.
Of course, Michael Bloomberg, corporate mogul and billionaire, funded Mr. McAuliffe to the tune of millions. Nothing liek a bought-and-paid-for politician to do your bidding.
The FCC was formed by the Communications Act of 1934 to replace the radio regulation functions of the Federal Radio Commission.
The Communications Act of 1934 is a United States federal law, signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 19, 1934. I believe FDR was a Democrat. The law was passed by the 73rd Congress. Both chambers had a Democratic majority. Dems in the Senate enjoyed a 60-35 majority, while over in the House thing were even rosier with Dems holding about 312 seats to Republicans 115 or so (counts varied slightly over time).
by 50 years or more, and reflect the situations surrounding the time in which they were passed. One can hardly expect an existing dealership system to use legal means, especially those existing laws, to protect their interests. This ought to be obvious even if one disagrees with the premise of the laws. And by the way, these laws were passed in all states over decades of time, usually in response to some bad action by the manufacturers (such as forcing dealerships to accept cars they did order, so manufactures could offload dead inventory, or not reimbursing dealerships for warranty repairs).
You cannot simply point at today's lackey Republicans as the source for these laws, nor claim them to be "anti-Tesla" anymore than 50-year-old telecom laws are "anti-Google".
A far better resource than the source in the original posting is
http://faculty.som.yale.edu/Fi...
This is an analysis predating Tesla's trouble by a bit, focusing on the government-sanctioned decimation of dealerships through the TARP process, circa 2010, and includes a nice history of franchise protection laws.
For example:
The regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer he regulation of auto franchises arose as a response to car manufacturer
opportunism early in the twentieth century. According to Surowiecki (2006), in 1920, Henry Ford took advantage of its established dealer network by forcing
dealers to buy inventories of new cars that they were unlikely to sell. The reason that the company could “force” dealers to take the cars was that they had all made important investments in their facilities and reputation. Thus they had sunk costs that could be expropriated. Ford and General Motors used the same strategy again during the Great Depression. These episodes demonstrated to policymakers that the franchisor, with its greater information and financial resources, might exploit investments made by the franchisees. Federal regulation followed these periods.
The starting point for auto franchise regulation is the 1956 federal act generally known as the Automobile Dealer’s Day in Court Act (ADDICA), which
provides that a car dealer may recover damages if its manufacturer fails to act in good faith in complying with the terms of the franchise agreement, including on
issues of allocation of vehicles to dealers, or matters of termination, cancellation, or transfer of the franchise. However, by the time the ADDICA was enacted, 20 states had already passed auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer auto franchise laws. Today, every state has a law governing car manufacturer/dealer relationships.
All states require that car dealers be licensed. Even 30 years ago, 44 states had such a requirement. This regulation prevents the manufacturer from retailing cars through other means. In particular, this regulation has been a major impediment to the development of Internet distribution of new cars.
bent on keeping the world in a Stone Age sort of existence. And then they blew up those ancient Buddha statues. The Taliban, that is.
Pretty much felt the same way about Greenpeace, and now they've defiled the Nazca lines. I'm for the same treatment for them that we gave the Taliban.
How hard is it to make toolbars dockable on the side? My monitors are just about tall enough to display 8.5x11" sheet in 1:1 (not quite, with about 10.75" of vertical display area). But using Word means giving up nearly 1.75" at the top and nearly 0.5" at the bottom. I know I can make the ribbon hideable.
Chrome, Adobe Reader eat up top & bottom space too.
Let me move all that stuff off to one side!
nm
In a DUI case, the prosecution withheld the video evidence. Since a suite of other charges (something like 12 additional charges) had been added to the DUI--resisting, assault on officer, ...--the video was possibly exculpatory. When the defense lawyer pointed out that prosecution had not turned over the dash cam video as requested, the judge stopped proceedings and ordered the prosecution to produce the tape. He was mad, too, you could tell. IIRC, he said 24 hours or you'll be in contempt and we'll have a mistrial. Jury was dismissed until the tape was located.
When we came back, the tape was played. *Somehow* the tape showed the cops driving up to the scene, then 20 minutes of snow, then magically cleared back to normal video showing the tow truck removing the accused's car.
Because of that tape being withheld and then magically showing nothing for the duration of the event in question (erased? disconnected?), when we deliberated, the first thing we did was ignore all the tacked on charges. We considered and convicted on the DUI based only on the fact that the wreck happened and the BAC test was positive. Because of the prosecution and police actions with the tape, we basically ignored every word of testimony from officers on the scene and never considered a single charge except the original DUI.
As it turned out, we found out in sentencing that it was the 8th DUI for the guy, and the judge expressed his opinion that we had done exactly right in finding as we did for the other charges. He had words for the prosecution that were probably pretty damning for a judge not on a TV show.
Also, on creating a "level playing field"...
What this law would have done is to make online retailers subject to *different* rules than a physical store.
It would make an online retailer demand information about the buyer so that the online retailer can act as a remote proxy tax collector based on where the items are shipped, not where the seller is physically located.
A B&M one in another state is not going to be forced to do the same thing when visitors from some other state make a purchase (which they might take home and might evade their local use taxes).
The issue boils down to: Can a state force a retailer based in another state, with no point-of-presence in the taxing state, to act as a proxy tax collector?
Imagine for one moment a shopping mall full of retailers. These stores sit just across the border from you in another state, but since your house is only a few minutes drive, easily accessible. Further, the neighboring state has a *much* lower sales tax than yours--let's even say they have zero sales tax (as a few states do).
Your state is frustrated that so many of its border-dwelling residents chose to make all their purchases across the border, thus avoiding sales taxes my state perceives as being owed to my state and depriving local retailers of business. Your state has instituted a "use tax," equivalent to the sales tax, that taxpayers are supposed to report and pay for any items imported into the state. But it seems almost no one is paying it!
Your state goes to retailers across the border and *demands* that they collect and remit sales taxes to your state. The stores, recognizing the problems they will face, such as now requiring all purchasers to submit ID and proof of residence and question them as to where the goods they are buying will end up--not to mention additional operating expense and liability for any incorrect tax filings that might occur--wisely tell your state to take a flying leap. Your state has no jurisdictional authority to impose its force on these retailers.
The problem here is simply that states cannot get their own citizens to pay taxes due (use taxes) and are trying to force out-of-state businesses to act as tax collectors for them. Think about it, is your state entitled to force a Wal-Mart or a mom-n-pop store lying just across the border in another state to collect your state's sales taxes? No way! Why should they get to force some other out-of-state business to do so?
Chances are if your state has a sales tax, it has an equivalent use tax. You are supposed to pay the use tax on goods purchased from out-of-state and imported into your state. So if you didn't cheat on your taxes, the local stores would not be at a disadvantage.
Imagine a store in a state with 0% sales-tax, say, Delaware. Further assume it is close to the border with a state that has a high sales tax, like, hmm, Maryland which is considering a 7% rate. By reputation and the lure of 0% sales tax (by virtue of evading their own local use tax), people from the neighboring state make the short trip to buy their wares. Being a brick-and-mortar store, they charge all their customers the local sales tax rate (0%). They do not care nor ask where their customers are from, there is no question *at all* where the transaction takes place.
The store decides to create a website to allow their loyal customers (and hopefully new customers) to buy things online and have them mailed to them. Under this proposed rule, the store not only have to treat their online customers differently from their in-store customers, but have to comply with 10,000 different tax regimes?
The issue here is that Maryland would and should have zero chance of enforcing its will on Delaware business to force them to act as proxy tax collectors for Maryland's use taxes--the taxes being evaded by Marylanders--even if hoards of Marylanders rolled into Delaware every day to stock up. It is the Marylanders who are violating Maryland's use tax laws. Why is it the responsibility of a store in Delaware to enforce Maryland's use tax laws?
There's no practical difference between Marylanders driving to Delaware to shop compared to Marylanders ordering from a store in Delaware and having the loot delivered.
How is it fair to force a store in Delaware to be a tax collector for a California municipality? And without *any* compensation for the favor, not to mention the overhead of tallying and remitting taxes to all those difference jurisdictions, *plus* the inherent liability should they god forbid make a mistake in their forced servitude as proxy tax collector. I'm sure California would have no problem shutting down a Delaware store for failure to comply with California's tax code.
overturn a veto. It would obviously take a few Democrats who have come to come to believe they fucked up when they first voted for it. Republicans will not hold enough seats to overturn a veto by themselves, that's true enough. Depending on how the La. runoff (and Ak...did they declare a winner yet?), GOP could have 54 seats. There are 2 "independents" who are Democrats in all but name. It is very unlikely but not totally unthinkable that 6 Dems or independents could support overturning a veto on at least some parts of Obamacare.
One thing first. "I find your boogeyman treatment of art and artists to be highly distasteful. Whatever caricature you've dreamt up is not representative of the majority of people receiving food stamps." I have no problem with art and artists, I have a problem with the particular people documented in the Salon article "Hipsters on food stamps: They're young, they're broke, and they pay for organic salmon with government subsidies. Got a problem with that?" and people like them. They are an example of exactly the kind of people who paint the program with an ugly brush--I think pretty much everyone is down with the idea that we need to be sure no one starves and that the foodstamp program has worthy aspects--with their unmitigated sense of entitlement display when they host gourmet dinner parties (with wine tasting) paid for by their foodstamps.
On the other hand, if you're a graduate student in poetry, you had to know going in that the chances of you making a living off your poetry are slim. You chose a singularly unpractical major, spent years and probably 10's of thousands of taxpayer subsidized dollars going to school and essentially planned to depend on welfare. And I'm supposed to respect you for that?
Your argument for foodstamps supporting the very foundation of our economy can be made for military spending as well (even when we're not fighting a war). When we spend $700B annually on defense spending, we're paying wages to military personnel (about $150B), and many enlisted personnel learn a viable trade for life after the military (e.g. motor pool, so it's a jobs training program too) and those wages get spent in the economy to buy food and other stuff. We create high-paying engineering jobs to develop technologies that reduce the risk to our personnel in a fire-fight, developments in aircraft, radar systems, communications networks (ever heard of DARPA?), the folks who really invented the internet), etc. all flow down in the civilian world--and many of those jobs are restricted to US citizens (can't be outsourced to China!). Those engineers and their managers and the investors who receive dividends from their shares all buy stuff in the economy too. The military spends about $3B annually just on family housing and about $70B on military construction. The $135B spent on procurement of aircraft, tanks, guns, ... are all providing good, high-paying manufacturing jobs too. The military spends about $200B in operations, buying stuff like fuel, electricity, food, materials and materiel. All that flows back into the economy too.
It's a fair question to ask: are we getting what we need from that military spending? Could we spend less and get the same results? Do we need everything we're spending on? Should some military programs be cut? Are the secondary and nth-order effects worth what we're spending for directly?
Why should I be excoriated for wondering the same things about the $1T of anti-poverty spending in general and foodstamp program in particular?
Rabbit is about $7-9/lb, rabbit tenderloin is about $16/lb (beef tenderloin is about $10/lb). You can buy rabbit at upscale stores like Whole Foods.
It's not the cost of rabbit versus something else, it's the sense of entitlement "I'm a foodie and not going do the 'living on ramen noodles' thing". There are plenty of people working hard to get ahead and living on ramen noodles, but this guy turns his nose up as if such a thing is simply beneath him and he is entitled to his rabbit, raw honey, fresh-squeezed juices, gourmet ice cream, Japanese eggplant, mint chutney and fresh turmeric and all at someone else's expense!
Ever loaned money to a friend or relative and have that person not pay you back? You start to notice that they always seem to be able to buy a new car, or a new TV, or go on a vacation, but can't manage to pay you back and will tell you at length every excuse why they can't? That resentment tends to build.
If you've temporarily fallen on hard times and cannot afford food, I'm happy to fund basic nutrition so you don't starve. If you want gourmet ice cream and fresh-squeezed juice with your rabbit and mint chutney, get a job where you can buy it yourself. When I'm clipping coupons and frequenting Costco and you're dropping your EBT card at Whole Foods for fresh meat, it's kinda like that deadbeat relative.
The key word in your statement is "practical". The unemployment rate for computer scientists is about 4.5% (i.e. below the normal "full employment line of 5%). The unemployment rate for Art & Design is about 12.5%, Interior Design is over 14%, Social Work is nearly 12% and the among the various "Culture" majors unemployment is over 21%. One of my Swiftian solutions for the student loan "crisis" is setting the interest rate for your loan so that it matches the unemployment rate for your major. Why subsidize more Gender Studies majors who will be wholly unable to get a job when they graduate? Go to community college and get a welding or plumbing certificate. P.S. one study estimates that by 2020 the welding trade will be about 300,000 workers short. Welders can go to school for 9 months and be virtually guaranteed of getting a job with starting pay of about $40K, and some welders in certain industries make 6 figures. Think any of those Baltimore kitschy, sketchy, artsy hipsters will take up welding when they can get by on foodstamps and a part-time blogging career?
Also, you can in fact use foodstamps at restaurants, at least in some states. In Arizona, California, Michigan and Florida foostamps can be used at restaraunts. In California, for example, you can use your SNAP card at Burger King, Pizza Hut, KFC, Dominos, Subway, El Pollo Loco, Wendy's, Denny's, Carl's Junior, Del Taco, and a host of smaller chains and local establishments.
What programs did we have the dropped the poverty rate from over 30% down to about 18% in the 15 years before the war on poverty? In the 5 years after the war on poverty started, when we started the big social programs, that rate fell a bit further, down from 18% to about 15%. Since then it has wobbled between about 13% and about 15%.
"We've had the War on Poverty for roughly fifty years now, and poverty went down considerably at the beginning"
Actually, it went down on pretty much the exact same slope it had been trending on since the end of WW II. Between 1945 and 1965, the poverty rate went from around 32% to around 18%. In the first five years of the war on poverty that trend continued--the question is whether it would have continued without the war on poverty--and has remained more-or-less steady for the last 45 years. On the other hand, spending on means-tested benefits programs has skyrocketed to nearly $1T per year. Are we seeing $1T per year of goodness coming out of that spending? Are we making progress in the war on poverty? Are there better ways to spend that $1T?
I don't question that these programs help some people, I question that we're helping more than we're hurting. It seems every "advancement" simply removes more of the negative consequences and stigma of being on welfare and/or simply doles out more cash. We've systematically removed all the incentives to getting out of the programs and indeed provide numerous disincentives to getting out of the programs.
I question whether we still have a "safety net" or are actively trying to convert it to a hammock.
"The Idiocracy phenomena, right? :)
No, real life. Search for that phrase an you'll find the news reports with video and everything.
"And I'm not talking just free condoms... I'm talking the pill, IUDs, for women, RISUG type tech for men, no co-pays, no exceptions for the church. As a society we should be making that available to everyone. I'm not going to force men and women not to have children -- the slippery slope once you start deciding who can and who can't have kids is just too great. But unwanted pregnancy should be eliminated from the first world."
Why involve employers, churches, etc. at all? That's where Obamacare went wrong. If that's what you want, then put together a government program that provides these directly. It is 100% a mistake to try to force employers and churches to be proxy social workers. I'm also not going to tell people not to have kids. But I would be pretty willing to tell people who come to me with their hand extended for benefits: "No more kids while on benefits. Birth control will be provided to you free of charge. If you have a kid while on benefits, you can chose to either put the kid up for adoption where it will be raised outside the cycle of poverty or leave the program." Draconian and unworkable maybe, but so was Swift's idea for dealing with children.
"the homeless drunks and addicts? I don't know what the solution is, but blaming them for it is just silly."
I don't blame them, but clearly what we're doing hasn't done jack to fix the problem either and it is naive to think if we just do more of the same (and I mean more $$$ thrown down the same programs) it will get better.
I'm not sure there are good solutions, and I'm not saying I have them. I am saying that *nothing* we've been doing for the last 50 years and $22T+ seems to have done anything to really impact the problem either. I am saying that simply doing more of the same doesn't seem like a great idea. I am saying that giving people more and more benefits with less and less effort or consequences on their part seems to be misguided at best.
Perhaps it is worth considering making semi-permanent birth control a requirement of benefits. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to ask that the people who are in a hole and who "need" help to at least stop making it worse by adding more mouths. Perhaps it is worth considering reducing UI payments for the long-term unemployed--study after study shows a nearly magical capacity for the long-term unemployed to find a job right before their UI payments stop. Perhaps we need to rethink a program that lets hipster art majors sit around hoping to make millions with their blog while feeling entitled to gourmet food...'Mak, 31, grew up in Westchester, graduated from the University of Chicago and toiled in publishing in New York during his 20s before moving to Baltimore last year with a meager part-time blogging job and prospects for little else. About half of his friends in Baltimore have been getting food stamps since the economy toppled, so he decided to give it a try; to his delight, he qualified for $200 a month. “I’m sort of a foodie, and I’m not going to do the ‘living off ramen’ thing,” he said, fondly remembering a recent meal he’d prepared of roasted rabbit with butter, tarragon and sweet potatoes.'
Of course, it doesn't help that people have a mental where "hope that one of these benevolent corporate overlords will by some mistake share their wealth with me". Perhaps I'm just a sick twisted person, but I see the world where "I hope to develop skills that someone is willing to pay me for" leads to a job, provided I can put myself in front of employers who are looking for people with those skills. I might have to learn new skills, or move to a new place but if that's what it takes. Lots of folks seem to think they're *entitled* to a $80k job, or at least the level of lifestyle it brings.
"the job market in this country is so far removed from anything that our animal instincts can recognize as contributing to our survival that it just beats most of us down into depressed wage slaves" Again, I know I only see those around, and most of my friends are well-paid engineers, but I have friends and family who are schoolbus drivers, teachers, entrepreneur shop owners (iPhone repair, appliances), accountants, welders, truck drivers. While everyone is always unhappy about something at work, none of them are "depressed wage slaves" and for the most part appreciate their employer as something more than a feudal lord squashing the serfs.