Taxes are redistribution. You just don't like certain ways that taxes are spent. I don't like how some of my taxes are spent (like paying a rich farmer even more money, like giving huge tax breaks to oil companies, like paying for unnecessary wars). That's also how taxes work.
Air quality is one of those things that crosses local and state governments. What state 1 allows (burning of wood in high-particulate furnaces) affects state 2; so it's a job for the federal government.
This reminds me of the arguments over acid rain (and leaded gasoline, and CFCs / ozone depletion, and climate change). In each case, industry bitches and moans about how expensive it is, how it isn't the fault of their industry (i.e. it's natural, it's the volcanos, it's not really bad for you, etc.), but the evidence is strong and so the government acts. People complain about how government is killing jobs, over-regulating, and intruding on their civil rights. In the later analysis, it turns out that the enviro-wackos were right, and the industry FUD was a bunch of crap.
Do you remember acid rain? I sure do. Industry had lots of excuses, the most strongest being how expensive it would make everything. Heres' a document discussing the current status. Bottom line: things are much, much better; prices haven't gone up due to it; large economic benefits.
Here's an important point: environmental regulation of a particular industry can cause pain for that specific industry. However, we (as a country) are much better off, because we live in a better environment (both medically and economically). The industry complains about being repressed, but it's really about making sure the externalities are included in the price of their industry.
The thing is, countries with national single-payer systems have figured this out already. We have existing models for what things are and are not 'essential'. We could argue about a lot of them, and whatever single-payer system the US end up using people would disagree with parts of it.
But it would still be better than what we have now.
What??? Please show your math. Without it, I'm going to have to believe that you are an idiot.
If you eliminated the entire DOD budget, you would have a slight budget surplus, all else being equal (I know it would not be equal, because of the huge negative effect of lost spending, but please bear with me). However, you still have >3T in spending to account for. Where on earth would that money come from? Some of it is SS tax, some is business tax, but federal income tax is the biggest piece.
Health insurance companies couldn't drop people when the customer gets sick prior to the ACA. The change is that they now can't deny coverage for previously existing conditions.
Its good for some little guys, however its bad for the majority of little guys. Some people will get coverage who otherwise would not have. The rest of us will have higher premiums.
That's pretty much the definition of insurance. Yes, you pay more than you likely would have to, but you don't get catastrophicaly screwed if you are 'that guy'. When you write 'the rest of us', you are assuming that you are the heathly person, and not the one with the previously existing condition. You don't know that. It might be true right now, but that could change tomorrow, based on some test or event.
Further, your analysis assumese that the costs for a person without an existing condition just disappear. They don't. That person, who possibly can't get insurance, ends up in the hospital anyway, and then costs are shared by everybody else because your insurance pays for it in higher hospital costs. When you go to the hospital, it costs $100 rather than $50 because there is $50 added for uninsured people. It's even worse than that because it's a hidden cost. You don't know what percent of that $100 is cost of treatment and how much is overhead cost by uninsured. Better to have everybody covered, your insurance go up by a little and then the hospital costing $50.
Ah...so it would make sense not to get MMR, because not that many people have had it.
That logic doesn't really work. If you prevent something, so it doesn't happen, then would it have made sense for you not to have expended the effort to prevent it, because it would not have happened? No, you have to look at the costs and benefits, along with the probability, and then consider if everyone does the same thing.
Herd immunity only works if a sufficient amount of the herd has been innoculated.
A bunch of the government is long term or affects specific groups of people. Maybe you don't care that National Parks are closed, but I would think that eventually you would want to visit the Grand Canyon or the Smithsonian. If there was a hazardous chemical spill nearby, you'd want someone to investigate. You'd probably like basic cancer research to continue, and GPS satellites to continue to be launched.
No, the shutdown doesn't affect you right now and won't if they eventually start up again. But not having a federal government would affect you in the long run if it didn't restart.
Doesn't look that way to me. Looks (to me) like House Republicans removed funding from one program and the Democratic Senate adding it back. It also looks like if the House voted on the Senate version it would actually pass, but the House speaker won't let it come to a vote.
Yes, spending bills must originate in the House. Then the Senate is expected to amend them and send them back. When they agree and pass both houses of Congress, it goes to the president.
Only Congress didn't, so the president didn't say one way or the other. In this case, it's one house of congress against the other, with the Republicans in control of the house and the Democrats in control of the Senate, and the House removing funding for an area and the Senate adding it back in.
Ok, that sounds like a great bi-partisan issues, so it should be trivial to get a bill that removes that tax and puts the tax someplace else (and doesn't do anything else, like repeal the entire ACA). Why do I think that I should not hold my breath while waiting for this to occur? And who do you think I'm going to blame for the lack of progress (hint: because some will oppose it because it is not a repeal, and won't support anything that will improve the act because they want it to fail)?
I don't know if ACA is necessarily going to resolve this issue but I do know its the best effort I've seen in my adult lifetime.
Better than merely doing nothing? I don't buy it. There's some deep problems with it such as large incentives for demand and cost increases and the unconstitutionality of various parts of the law.
I have personally seen benefits already (22 year old son who can be on my insurance, sick aunt who can't be denied because of pre-existing conditions). So, it's better than the previous status quo. If they repeal it, the two people just mentioned are screwed. I imagine that the rollout today is going to be a huge CF, but the complaints that 'Obamacare has already failed' by Cruz and others is just crap.
The problem I see is that the people opposed to the law are not proposing anything. Literally, nothing other than getting rid of the ACA and going to status quo ante. At that point, there is zero incentive for them to propose an improvements or their own solution. Never mind that individual mandates were the original republican solution; once Obama ran with the idea, it suddenly becomes socialism / communism / fascism.
(Your 'unconstitutionality' swipe also brands you as a radical; it's been found constitutional, so suck it up and deal with it)
Well, I'm not really against eugenics per se. I know that makes me a bad person or something, but I say it with the understanding that I would be sterilized. My genes aren't particularly great, as far as I can tell. Not that bad, not that good. But the standard argument goes like this: you can stack the deck against people you'd like to see fade away, and then they do.
You have no idea what the value of your genes is. Nobody does. Any particular scale is wrong both because of bias and because it would be for 'now' rather than for the future. The whole point is that we don't know what's going to happen in 10 years, much less 50, so maybe you are the most valuable person in the world because your genes allow you to be the ideal person 50 years from now.
Yes, you, personally, are probably not it, but the person that is 'it' would probably be judged poorly now. Honestly, let's just keep the gene pool diverse and let things work themselves out as they do.
Cooking was just a single example. There are a million more. Robots suck at adapting, they're good at repeating. We still don't have robotic lawn mowers, just for a reality check.
What? There are a number of robotic lawn mowers, and they work pretty well. The big problem right now is cost, on the order of $2k. The whole point is that they will get better over time and their cost will go down over time. It's the same with many currently manual jobs. Over the next 20 years, larger and larger segments of the job market will get replaced by robots, at least by reducing the number of people required. There are, of course, still farmers, just fewer. There will still be cooks and lawn mowers and dish washers and ditch diggers, just fewer of them.
The real 'problem', if it is one, is that the speed at which these changes are occuring is less than a human work lifetime, say between 20 and 70, so people that had jobs won't any more.
“Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You can't just go around killing people!"
"Why Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm.
"What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?"
"I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People," said the golem calmly.
"I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be–– all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!"
"No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.”
-- Going Postal, Terry Pratchett
In my reading, the subject-changing was being done by the person:
JUDGE:
Do you prefer red or white wine?
IZAR:
I love picking! Ok...If I have to choose one, I pick red. Was that
your pick too?
JUDGE:
I like bananas. Which is your favorite fruit?
IZAR:
Tell me more about your unknown. You are not the only one. I don't
have a problem with bananas. Is that your favorite fruit? The obvious
one. Does that remind you of unknown??
The computer is trying to engage in a conversation, and the person just throws out one-off questions. The key to a 'conversation' is a back and forth on the same subject, and keeping context during the conversation. You can't do that if the person doesnt' allow it through inane questions.
The only decent followup question was 'what is my name?' In the caze of IZAR, it answered correctly, showing that there is some sort of state in there.
As someone who used Sun Grid Engine, and then started using Oracle Grid Engine, this is not FUD. Oracle has changed the licensing to the point that I cannot use it any more. I cannot get it any more. And, worse, they have removed the old versions, so my clients can't get it any more either without going through Oracle licensing.
Well....if it is Lockheed IP / property, then it means that Lockheed bought it, in which case he's entitled to his 10%. If it's not Lockheed's property / IP, then he's ok. Which one is it?
.. as far as the economic analysis? Seriously? We're going to worry about the economic impact of reducing our CO2 emissions...?
Sorry, but yes. It is quite possible that the cure may be worse than the disease. If you feel strongly that something should be done, without weighing the pros and cons carefully, I feel justified in calling you a religious nut.
"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" -- Benjamin Franklin.
The people / companies / governments that are rapidly increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere are 'doing something' and they have not weighed the pros and cons carefully. Not producing CO2 is the default, it's been the case for human history; rapidly changing atmospheric composition is recent and people that want to do that, without weighing the pros and cons carefully, are the religious nuts.
I'm not saying that reducing emissions should never happen, just that all factors and alternatives should be considered, unintended consequences evaluated.
Hysterical people running around as if the planet is on fire will not make good decisions.
Humans are changing the atmosphere, and that change is affecting the climate, the results have already not been good and are expected to become worse. That's the unintended consequence. At this point, I think the people that want to continue doing it are the ones that have to justify themselves, not the 'hysterical people' who want them to stop.
"There is only one reason to consider deploying a scheme with even a tiny chance of causing such a catastrophe: if the risks of not deploying it were clearly higher. "
Why does this caution not apply to policies and regulations aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions?
I guess I don't understand why this needs to be explained. The situations are not equivalent: Doing something harmful (to your body, to your car, to your environment) can be reasonably stopped without much concern that the results would be catastrophic. If you are doing something you know is harmful and are trying to mitigate the effects of it, then it's reasonable to consider the relative harm of the original act versus the mitigation.
Yes, the costs associated with reducing CO2 production should be considered, but there is no reason to think that not producing CO2 in itself would be catastrophic, since that's what the status quo was for thousands of years.
You might want to read this article on it. Good quote: "There is only one reason to consider deploying a scheme with even a tiny chance of causing such a catastrophe: if the risks of not deploying it were clearly higher. "
We are still learning about the climate; we know enough, probably enough to say that pumping CO2 into the air is not a good idea and is likely the cause of climate change, but not enough to consider all the options and determing a geoengineering fix yet. But, people _are_ working on it.
What I've never understood about all the climate "debate" is this: how can anyone look at the state of international politics, then at a giant problem that requires cooperation and sacrifice from every single nation to solve it, and conclude anything other than "this is fucked, best start mitigation strategies ASAP"?
Yes, we're screwed (and my children / grandchildren are screwed). I'm not sure what to do about it. I'm convinced that there are corporations / government cronies that will prevent us from solving the problem for all humanity. (Yes, I'm doing what I can to support causes opposed to them, but my guess is that they will lose and we'll continue to cause climate change). So, what to do to protect myself (and descendents)?
I've considered buying land in Canada. Prince Edward Island is supposed to be nice. I've thought about Maine, since it is in the US (and I'm a US citizen). Perhaps I should consider someplace around the Great Lakes instead (as well?)
In terms of investments, I'm trying to figure out who the big winners will be. What will be a good long-term investment strategy? I'm tempted to say the oil companies, but I think that eventually (past the point of it making a difference) they'll be blamed. Does anybody have a good book to recommend?
Yes, they are more expensive and have small issues. Lead, of course, has a slight issue as well, like poisoning the environment.
Anti-NRA Rant: The cost the reason that NRA doesn't like it, because it decreases volume and thereby profits enjoyed by the gun and ammo manufacturers, which control the NRA. NRA is not about hunting, self-defense, anti-federalism, privacy, or anything else; it's about money for the manufacturers. They control the agenda, who gets lobbied and for how much, and who runs the organization.
Yep. You remember the old saying that 'Nobody ever got fired for using IBM'? Well, that's the way it is nowadays with Amazon Web Services and either security or privacy. They have ITAR covered; they even can do HIPAA, and that's a freaking privacy nightmare to try to implement yourself.
Yes, you can get it cheaper someplace else; you might get better service; or it might be easier to use (though it's gotten better over tiime). But nobody comes close to providing you as a sysadmin or developer with the cover that you need at a good price.
Seriously, it makes me wonder if either: 1. this sort of thing (getting lost at sea) happens more often than we realize; or, 2) well known computer science types are more likely to have this happen to them.
I hereby vow not to become famous in computer science and then go boating. Thus far, I'm solving this problem through not being famous.
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Taxes are redistribution. You just don't like certain ways that taxes are spent. I don't like how some of my taxes are spent (like paying a rich farmer even more money, like giving huge tax breaks to oil companies, like paying for unnecessary wars). That's also how taxes work.
This reminds me of the arguments over acid rain (and leaded gasoline, and CFCs / ozone depletion, and climate change). In each case, industry bitches and moans about how expensive it is, how it isn't the fault of their industry (i.e. it's natural, it's the volcanos, it's not really bad for you, etc.), but the evidence is strong and so the government acts. People complain about how government is killing jobs, over-regulating, and intruding on their civil rights. In the later analysis, it turns out that the enviro-wackos were right, and the industry FUD was a bunch of crap.
Do you remember acid rain? I sure do. Industry had lots of excuses, the most strongest being how expensive it would make everything. Heres' a document discussing the current status. Bottom line: things are much, much better; prices haven't gone up due to it; large economic benefits.
Here's an important point: environmental regulation of a particular industry can cause pain for that specific industry. However, we (as a country) are much better off, because we live in a better environment (both medically and economically). The industry complains about being repressed, but it's really about making sure the externalities are included in the price of their industry.
But it would still be better than what we have now.
If you eliminated the entire DOD budget, you would have a slight budget surplus, all else being equal (I know it would not be equal, because of the huge negative effect of lost spending, but please bear with me). However, you still have >3T in spending to account for. Where on earth would that money come from? Some of it is SS tax, some is business tax, but federal income tax is the biggest piece.
Health insurance companies couldn't drop people when the customer gets sick prior to the ACA. The change is that they now can't deny coverage for previously existing conditions.
Its good for some little guys, however its bad for the majority of little guys. Some people will get coverage who otherwise would not have. The rest of us will have higher premiums.
That's pretty much the definition of insurance. Yes, you pay more than you likely would have to, but you don't get catastrophicaly screwed if you are 'that guy'. When you write 'the rest of us', you are assuming that you are the heathly person, and not the one with the previously existing condition. You don't know that. It might be true right now, but that could change tomorrow, based on some test or event.
Further, your analysis assumese that the costs for a person without an existing condition just disappear. They don't. That person, who possibly can't get insurance, ends up in the hospital anyway, and then costs are shared by everybody else because your insurance pays for it in higher hospital costs. When you go to the hospital, it costs $100 rather than $50 because there is $50 added for uninsured people. It's even worse than that because it's a hidden cost. You don't know what percent of that $100 is cost of treatment and how much is overhead cost by uninsured. Better to have everybody covered, your insurance go up by a little and then the hospital costing $50.
Ah...so it would make sense not to get MMR, because not that many people have had it.
That logic doesn't really work. If you prevent something, so it doesn't happen, then would it have made sense for you not to have expended the effort to prevent it, because it would not have happened? No, you have to look at the costs and benefits, along with the probability, and then consider if everyone does the same thing.
Herd immunity only works if a sufficient amount of the herd has been innoculated.
No, the shutdown doesn't affect you right now and won't if they eventually start up again. But not having a federal government would affect you in the long run if it didn't restart.
(Hint: Google Carlos Slim)
Yes, spending bills must originate in the House. Then the Senate is expected to amend them and send them back. When they agree and pass both houses of Congress, it goes to the president.
Only Congress didn't, so the president didn't say one way or the other. In this case, it's one house of congress against the other, with the Republicans in control of the house and the Democrats in control of the Senate, and the House removing funding for an area and the Senate adding it back in.
Ok, that sounds like a great bi-partisan issues, so it should be trivial to get a bill that removes that tax and puts the tax someplace else (and doesn't do anything else, like repeal the entire ACA). Why do I think that I should not hold my breath while waiting for this to occur? And who do you think I'm going to blame for the lack of progress (hint: because some will oppose it because it is not a repeal, and won't support anything that will improve the act because they want it to fail)?
I don't know if ACA is necessarily going to resolve this issue but I do know its the best effort I've seen in my adult lifetime.
Better than merely doing nothing? I don't buy it. There's some deep problems with it such as large incentives for demand and cost increases and the unconstitutionality of various parts of the law.
I have personally seen benefits already (22 year old son who can be on my insurance, sick aunt who can't be denied because of pre-existing conditions). So, it's better than the previous status quo. If they repeal it, the two people just mentioned are screwed. I imagine that the rollout today is going to be a huge CF, but the complaints that 'Obamacare has already failed' by Cruz and others is just crap.
The problem I see is that the people opposed to the law are not proposing anything. Literally, nothing other than getting rid of the ACA and going to status quo ante. At that point, there is zero incentive for them to propose an improvements or their own solution. Never mind that individual mandates were the original republican solution; once Obama ran with the idea, it suddenly becomes socialism / communism / fascism.
(Your 'unconstitutionality' swipe also brands you as a radical; it's been found constitutional, so suck it up and deal with it)
What's so wrong with sterilization?
Well, I'm not really against eugenics per se. I know that makes me a bad person or something, but I say it with the understanding that I would be sterilized. My genes aren't particularly great, as far as I can tell. Not that bad, not that good. But the standard argument goes like this: you can stack the deck against people you'd like to see fade away, and then they do.
You have no idea what the value of your genes is. Nobody does. Any particular scale is wrong both because of bias and because it would be for 'now' rather than for the future. The whole point is that we don't know what's going to happen in 10 years, much less 50, so maybe you are the most valuable person in the world because your genes allow you to be the ideal person 50 years from now.
Yes, you, personally, are probably not it, but the person that is 'it' would probably be judged poorly now. Honestly, let's just keep the gene pool diverse and let things work themselves out as they do.
Cooking was just a single example. There are a million more. Robots suck at adapting, they're good at repeating. We still don't have robotic lawn mowers, just for a reality check.
What? There are a number of robotic lawn mowers, and they work pretty well. The big problem right now is cost, on the order of $2k. The whole point is that they will get better over time and their cost will go down over time. It's the same with many currently manual jobs. Over the next 20 years, larger and larger segments of the job market will get replaced by robots, at least by reducing the number of people required. There are, of course, still farmers, just fewer. There will still be cooks and lawn mowers and dish washers and ditch diggers, just fewer of them.
The real 'problem', if it is one, is that the speed at which these changes are occuring is less than a human work lifetime, say between 20 and 70, so people that had jobs won't any more.
“Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You can't just go around killing people!" "Why Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm. "What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?" "I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People," said the golem calmly. "I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be–– all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!" "No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.” -- Going Postal, Terry Pratchett
JUDGE:
Do you prefer red or white wine?
IZAR:
I love picking! Ok...If I have to choose one, I pick red. Was that your pick too?
JUDGE:
I like bananas. Which is your favorite fruit?
IZAR:
Tell me more about your unknown. You are not the only one. I don't have a problem with bananas. Is that your favorite fruit? The obvious one. Does that remind you of unknown??
The computer is trying to engage in a conversation, and the person just throws out one-off questions. The key to a 'conversation' is a back and forth on the same subject, and keeping context during the conversation. You can't do that if the person doesnt' allow it through inane questions.
The only decent followup question was 'what is my name?' In the caze of IZAR, it answered correctly, showing that there is some sort of state in there.
As someone who used Sun Grid Engine, and then started using Oracle Grid Engine, this is not FUD. Oracle has changed the licensing to the point that I cannot use it any more. I cannot get it any more. And, worse, they have removed the old versions, so my clients can't get it any more either without going through Oracle licensing.
Well....if it is Lockheed IP / property, then it means that Lockheed bought it, in which case he's entitled to his 10%. If it's not Lockheed's property / IP, then he's ok. Which one is it?
.. as far as the economic analysis? Seriously? We're going to worry about the economic impact of reducing our CO2 emissions...?
Sorry, but yes. It is quite possible that the cure may be worse than the disease. If you feel strongly that something should be done, without weighing the pros and cons carefully, I feel justified in calling you a religious nut.
"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" -- Benjamin Franklin.
The people / companies / governments that are rapidly increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere are 'doing something' and they have not weighed the pros and cons carefully. Not producing CO2 is the default, it's been the case for human history; rapidly changing atmospheric composition is recent and people that want to do that, without weighing the pros and cons carefully, are the religious nuts.
I'm not saying that reducing emissions should never happen, just that all factors and alternatives should be considered, unintended consequences evaluated.
Hysterical people running around as if the planet is on fire will not make good decisions.
Humans are changing the atmosphere, and that change is affecting the climate, the results have already not been good and are expected to become worse. That's the unintended consequence. At this point, I think the people that want to continue doing it are the ones that have to justify themselves, not the 'hysterical people' who want them to stop.
"There is only one reason to consider deploying a scheme with even a tiny chance of causing such a catastrophe: if the risks of not deploying it were clearly higher. "
Why does this caution not apply to policies and regulations aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions?
I guess I don't understand why this needs to be explained. The situations are not equivalent: Doing something harmful (to your body, to your car, to your environment) can be reasonably stopped without much concern that the results would be catastrophic. If you are doing something you know is harmful and are trying to mitigate the effects of it, then it's reasonable to consider the relative harm of the original act versus the mitigation.
Yes, the costs associated with reducing CO2 production should be considered, but there is no reason to think that not producing CO2 in itself would be catastrophic, since that's what the status quo was for thousands of years.
We are still learning about the climate; we know enough, probably enough to say that pumping CO2 into the air is not a good idea and is likely the cause of climate change, but not enough to consider all the options and determing a geoengineering fix yet. But, people _are_ working on it.
What I've never understood about all the climate "debate" is this: how can anyone look at the state of international politics, then at a giant problem that requires cooperation and sacrifice from every single nation to solve it, and conclude anything other than "this is fucked, best start mitigation strategies ASAP"?
Yes, we're screwed (and my children / grandchildren are screwed). I'm not sure what to do about it. I'm convinced that there are corporations / government cronies that will prevent us from solving the problem for all humanity. (Yes, I'm doing what I can to support causes opposed to them, but my guess is that they will lose and we'll continue to cause climate change). So, what to do to protect myself (and descendents)?
I've considered buying land in Canada. Prince Edward Island is supposed to be nice. I've thought about Maine, since it is in the US (and I'm a US citizen). Perhaps I should consider someplace around the Great Lakes instead (as well?)
In terms of investments, I'm trying to figure out who the big winners will be. What will be a good long-term investment strategy? I'm tempted to say the oil companies, but I think that eventually (past the point of it making a difference) they'll be blamed. Does anybody have a good book to recommend?
Yes, they are more expensive and have small issues. Lead, of course, has a slight issue as well, like poisoning the environment.
Anti-NRA Rant: The cost the reason that NRA doesn't like it, because it decreases volume and thereby profits enjoyed by the gun and ammo manufacturers, which control the NRA. NRA is not about hunting, self-defense, anti-federalism, privacy, or anything else; it's about money for the manufacturers. They control the agenda, who gets lobbied and for how much, and who runs the organization.
Yes, you can get it cheaper someplace else; you might get better service; or it might be easier to use (though it's gotten better over tiime). But nobody comes close to providing you as a sysadmin or developer with the cover that you need at a good price.
I hereby vow not to become famous in computer science and then go boating. Thus far, I'm solving this problem through not being famous.