This is PRECISELY the behavior that should be encouraged, and why Bush's tax policies (eliminate double taxation on dividends) are spot-on. Dividends are GOOD. One of the main reasons for the stock market bubble and accounting fiascos like Enron was the tax incentives of companies and shareholders to move from dividend payments to "total return." Instead of seeking to maximize dividend payments, shareholders and corporate officers sought to maximize corporate earnings, inflating stock prices and thus their capital gains. The tax structure encouraged this because of the imbalance in taxation on dividends and capital gains. So you have the ungodly situation of value being measured in debt assumption. You get Enron.
This move by Microsoft is precisely the way we want to go. It's a Good Thing.
http://budor.com/investment/opinion.htm http:// www.cato.org/research/articles/niskanen-021 109.html http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/b g1640es.cf m http://www.upenn.edu/researchatpenn/article.php ?36 3&bus
Which raises another issue. Even if the phone spammers AREN'T trying to fiddle with the tones, if you can tell the telco they are, and get their phones cut off, more f'in power to ya man.
Why don't you read the post, instead of the ignorant ranting.
The attacks upon US forces are taking place in the Sunni belt where Saddam's loyal base was fixed. Try reading the news, period. You're really out of touch.
Allied officials now believe that a document recently found in Iraq detailing an 'emergency plan' for looting and sabotage in the wake of an invasion is probably authentic. It was prepared by the Iraqi intelligence service in January and marked 'top secret'. It outlined 11 kinds of sabotage, including burning government offices, cutting power and communication lines and attacking water purification plants.
What gives the document particular credence is that it appears to match exactly the growing chaos and large number of guerrilla attacks on coalition soldiers, oil facilities and power plants.
Another neighborhood this unit patrols divides evenly right down a main street - with slightly more posh houses on one side. On the "poorer" side, "they love us to death. You can't drink all the tea they offer us," Lt. Col. Haight says. But on the other side, full of Baath Party loyalists, it is "pretty anti-American."
Since you seem a bit thick, I'll spell it out: the affluent side of the street are affluent because Saddam showered them with money for their loyalty.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0701/p01s01-woiq.h tm l
Nice of you to be so dickless as to post anonymously too. Really shows how much you know.
A robot costs tens of millions of dollars, and in its lifetime does the amount of science a human on-planet could do in an hour. That's inefficient. Humans would cost approximately 20 billion dollars to get to Mars, but in a 3 month stay could potentially do centuries worth of robot-work.
Maybe your problem is that you're reading the BBC. When BBC's own reporters bitch that the news is slanted, hey, maybe they have an objectivity problem!
If you think BBC "imminent quagmire" reporting during the war doesn't bring into question it's reporting, then I have a bridge to sell you.
65% of polled Iraqis want the US to stay at least until a provisional government is elected. That's not "not wanted."
What we have now is the end of war mopup. No war just stops on a dime, everybody goes home and forgets it all happened. The areas of resistance are in the Sunni belt around Baghdad and Tikrit. The areas that benefited the most from Saddam's rule, and are sympathetic to hiding resisters and saboteurs. Most probably fedeyeen and former Republican Guard and Special Republican Guard. There are plenty of indications that this is so. It's been widely reported that there are former elements of the regime going around the Sunni belt paying people to take potshots at US troops. They take a shot, throw down their guns, and surrender. There's no great power providing support and weapons to the insurgency. It will starve once Saddam's money is ferretted out.
Actually, it's the exact opposite. The reason Britain lost India, was because it did not have the will or means to kill enough Indians to suppress the subcontinent. The areas of resistance in Iraq were untouched by the war - they are uncontested combatants. In WWII, the allies killed approximately 10% of the population of the Axis powers, and destroyed their populations will to resist. The problem of suppression isn't "did we kill too many?" but "did we kill enough?" The dilemma with US power is that it is not geared towards suppression of populations, nor are Americans willing to do what is necessary to forcibly suppress resisting populations. Our weapons and doctrine are specifically engineered to kill as FEW people as possible. The Russians, on the other hand, have the best doctrine. They still believe saturation bombing of urban centers is the way to win wars. Berlin certainly was pacified in 1945.
Problem with putting conventional warheads on ICBMs, is that the other nuclear powers get a little edgy when they get a launch detection. There's a bit too much ambiguity there to be safe, IMHO. All you need is some conscript farmboy in the Urals in a missile silo that didn't get the memo, and the next war is all sticks and stones, you know what I mean?:P
There's a US aircraft carrier within three days steam of any littoral point on the surface of the earth at any given time.
Problem is, once you get there, you need overfly rights from those pesky countries in the way. If your aircraft is in space, outside the national exclusionary zone, you can go wherever you please, and bomb the shit out of whomever you please, at will.
Human exploration of space can happen naturally in a few centuries, when the technology has caught up with human desires. Until then, let's not waste money on human explortation.
So said the King of Portugal, and got beat out on the ownership rights to two whole continents to Spain. Damn that Columbus!
Difference is, for a scenario like exploring Mars, humans are more efficient for the job. Robots are inefficient for the money and time spent - there is a very limited amount of science they can do. Humans can travel further, do more complex mechanical tasks, and exploit opportunities much better than a robot that requires 10 minutes to recieve a signal command to perform a simple action like "look over there."
Now it's the "all politicians are the same." In regards to a remark like this: We certainly don't have quite your flair for outright blatant corruption, though, and completely ignoring it even when it is right in your faces.
All politicians are the same. Difference is, ours get thrown out of office, pronto: aka Nixon. Yours stay in office decades.
And of course you'd have to attempt to impugn the intelligence of George Bush, a very tired and unintelligent remark by this date. Pretty stale considering he graduated from Yale and Harvard, and has managed to outwit his political opponents on both sides of the Atlantic thus far. What does that make them, vegetable intelligence?
Derek
Re:Learned Professionals?
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That's because the top 2% PAY more than everybody else, combined. Relative numbers v absolute numbers. The bane of every "progressive."
If you can't answer the charges, attack the person.
If the person is American, their beliefs are founded upon ignorance and the propaganda of their government. But of course I have a college degree in Anthropology and Philosophy, and:
And I just love how it's always the fault of "American media." I read 12 papers from all over the world, every day, print and electronic, from the New York Times to the Times of India. What's your excuse? Ever think that the manic biased BBC could account for the descrepency in YOUR thinking? Shock the very thought...you have the reading comprehension of an unripe grapefruit. I'll repeat the question for you: what's your excuse?
Derek
Re:Learned Professionals?
on
Working Hard?
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· Score: 1
Most of those "kickbacks" go to average Americans in the next to top 40% bracket. Making $40,000 a year to $125,000 a year. Oh yeah, soak the middle class and we'll call them rich for a campaign slogan.
Derek
Re:Learned Professionals?
on
Working Hard?
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· Score: 1
And our "progressive" tax scheme isn't a disincentive?
The "tax cuts for the rich" plan the Democratic party is always railing against benefits those making over $40,000 a year. That's rich to a Democrat. That same segment of the population making over $40,000 pays 80% of the taxes. Do the "average American" a favor, write your Congressman and demand tax relief if you're so concerned.
Example : what was going on in Florida last "election" ? I see alot of public intrest, true. Yet I do not see leg irons. Far from it.
It's called "voter tally that falls within the margin of error." There was no criminal wrongdoing involved. Like taking kickbacks, bribing judges, embezzlement, etc. Like the current Mayor of Paris cum Prez.
Pull your head out of your ass. The Bush administration IS doing the exact same thing. (Oh wait, maybe you already know this, but it would be *unpatriotic* for you to say so.
Oh really? Perhaps you could inform me of the criminal wrongdoing Bush has been charged with. Since of course European media is more "enlightened and objective" of course you'd have this information. Ahh, but you don't, because you have YOUR head up YOUR ass. Sorry thing is, you don't even know it. If President Bush was charged with official corruption and bribing judges to influence trials, and using his political party to ram legislation into law that allows Bush to jump judges that look like they'll actually be impartial... he could have a career in Europe. Like I said, that sort of thing doesn't happen on this side of the pond.
...I'm not sure what to think of all this really. I have no idea what skewed info has been disseminated through US media the last months, but this progressively arrogant and hostile attitude towards Europe (or the rest of the world for that matter) is really worrying me.
Maybe it's because you guys fail to realize how much things have changed since the end of the Cold War, and especially since September 11th. Europe is no longer the strategic albatross around our necks, but you just can't get over yourselves.
And I just love how it's always the fault of "American media." I read 12 papers from all over the world, every day, print and electronic, from the New York Times to the Times of India. What's your excuse? Ever think that the manic biased BBC could account for the descrepency in YOUR thinking? Shock the very thought!
Like I told the other guy, if any American politician were caught engaging in the kind of official corruption that is brushed off by European politicians, there would be a lynching. And if there was any dirt to be had, in our cut throat political arena, it would be public.
If George Bush was found to have engaged in the kind of official corruption Jacque Chirac or Berlusconi have, and was found to be manipulating the legislature through his cronies in order to make himself immune from prosecution or the acts not criminal, as both Chirac and Berlusconi have, he would be impeached. Quick. All my associates in Europe have to say is, "Eh, what's the big deal? What do you expect of a powerful man?" The kind of shenanigans that happens in Europe's capitals does NOT happen on this side of the pond. Not without someone ending up in leg irons.
Riiiight. Not quite the flair for blatant corruption. I'm sure Berlusconi and Chirac would just love to have you in court with them, you're a regular character star witness. Fact of the matter is, mate, European politicians are so blase corrupt and Europeans are so cynical, morally bankrupt, and jaded that you don't even expect any better. Unlike the US, where if such a level of official corruption were uncovered there would be plenty of grand juries and plenty of former politicians with a new taste for striped jumpsuits.
The reason you don't see any "evil, stupid, fascist European" posts is because that level of vitriol is reserved solely for the United States. Or Israel.
Nice of you to post anonymously though. No courage of your convictions. If only all of Europe could go around anonymously, the Continent might begin showing signs of having a sack.
LOL! Where are all the "evil, stupid, fascist European" posts? Ahhh, yes, only AMERICA is "evil, stupid, fascist" and out to get us. Only America has stupid patent and copyright laws and (Londoners cover your ears and ignore those cameras on the street corners) violate percieved rights. Whatta joke. Bunch of lamers.
You're wrong, man, wrong! It's THE MAN! They really secretly clock my driving speed wherever I go, and set the speed limits to the 85th percentile. THEY'RE OUT TO GET ME!! There are cameras everywhere, dude, I SEE EM!
The level of paranoia and disinformation I read on this freakin site just blows my mind.
That's because these firebrands don't understand the meaning of Mussolini's "corporatism." It didn't mean corporations running the State, it meant the subjugation of the economy through government "Corporations" or trade boards. Central planning, in other words. This is why the ordinary Italian had trouble getting bread: the mechanics of the economy had been distorted by government controls.
German fascism illustrates this quite well. Corporate officers served at the whim of the State; working hours, wages, pensions, and other benefits were government mandated; there were extensive price controls; production was planned by central party committee; the monetary system was centralized - interest was abolished and private bankers imprisoned. Industry and labor were directly regulated by the State through industry and labor boards modeled after Mussolini's fascist "corporations."
Slashdot Mirror
This is PRECISELY the behavior that should be encouraged, and why Bush's tax policies (eliminate double taxation on dividends) are spot-on. Dividends are GOOD. One of the main reasons for the stock market bubble and accounting fiascos like Enron was the tax incentives of companies and shareholders to move from dividend payments to "total return." Instead of seeking to maximize dividend payments, shareholders and corporate officers sought to maximize corporate earnings, inflating stock prices and thus their capital gains. The tax structure encouraged this because of the imbalance in taxation on dividends and capital gains. So you have the ungodly situation of value being measured in debt assumption. You get Enron.
/ www.cato.org/research/articles/niskanen-021 109.htmlb g1640es.cf mp ?36 3&bus
This move by Microsoft is precisely the way we want to go. It's a Good Thing.
http://budor.com/investment/opinion.htm
http:/
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/
http://www.upenn.edu/researchatpenn/article.ph
Derek
Which raises another issue. Even if the phone spammers AREN'T trying to fiddle with the tones, if you can tell the telco they are, and get their phones cut off, more f'in power to ya man.
Derek
Commerce clause of the Constitution, my friend.
Derek
Ask and you shall recieve:
0 56 .htm
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L19238
Poll by Iraqi institute: 51% of Baghdadis don't want US to leave until government set up
http://www.cbn.com/CBNNews/News/030620c.asp
Indirect link (couldn't google it up) referencing CBS poll of Baghdadis: 65% don't want US to leave until government set up
Derek
Why don't you read the post, instead of the ignorant ranting.
3 9, 987280,00.html
h tm l
The attacks upon US forces are taking place in the Sunni belt where Saddam's loyal base was fixed. Try reading the news, period. You're really out of touch.
Allied officials now believe that a document recently found in Iraq detailing an 'emergency plan' for looting and sabotage in the wake of an invasion is probably authentic. It was prepared by the Iraqi intelligence service in January and marked 'top secret'. It outlined 11 kinds of sabotage, including burning government offices, cutting power and communication lines and attacking water purification plants.
What gives the document particular credence is that it appears to match exactly the growing chaos and large number of guerrilla attacks on coalition soldiers, oil facilities and power plants.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,122
Another neighborhood this unit patrols divides evenly right down a main street - with slightly more posh houses on one side. On the "poorer" side, "they love us to death. You can't drink all the tea they offer us," Lt. Col. Haight says. But on the other side, full of Baath Party loyalists, it is "pretty anti-American."
Since you seem a bit thick, I'll spell it out: the affluent side of the street are affluent because Saddam showered them with money for their loyalty.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0701/p01s01-woiq.
Nice of you to be so dickless as to post anonymously too. Really shows how much you know.
Derek
A robot costs tens of millions of dollars, and in its lifetime does the amount of science a human on-planet could do in an hour. That's inefficient. Humans would cost approximately 20 billion dollars to get to Mars, but in a 3 month stay could potentially do centuries worth of robot-work.
Derek
Maybe your problem is that you're reading the BBC. When BBC's own reporters bitch that the news is slanted, hey, maybe they have an objectivity problem!
If you think BBC "imminent quagmire" reporting during the war doesn't bring into question it's reporting, then I have a bridge to sell you.
Derek
65% of polled Iraqis want the US to stay at least until a provisional government is elected. That's not "not wanted."
What we have now is the end of war mopup. No war just stops on a dime, everybody goes home and forgets it all happened. The areas of resistance are in the Sunni belt around Baghdad and Tikrit. The areas that benefited the most from Saddam's rule, and are sympathetic to hiding resisters and saboteurs. Most probably fedeyeen and former Republican Guard and Special Republican Guard. There are plenty of indications that this is so. It's been widely reported that there are former elements of the regime going around the Sunni belt paying people to take potshots at US troops. They take a shot, throw down their guns, and surrender. There's no great power providing support and weapons to the insurgency. It will starve once Saddam's money is ferretted out.
Derek
Actually, it's the exact opposite. The reason Britain lost India, was because it did not have the will or means to kill enough Indians to suppress the subcontinent. The areas of resistance in Iraq were untouched by the war - they are uncontested combatants. In WWII, the allies killed approximately 10% of the population of the Axis powers, and destroyed their populations will to resist. The problem of suppression isn't "did we kill too many?" but "did we kill enough?" The dilemma with US power is that it is not geared towards suppression of populations, nor are Americans willing to do what is necessary to forcibly suppress resisting populations. Our weapons and doctrine are specifically engineered to kill as FEW people as possible. The Russians, on the other hand, have the best doctrine. They still believe saturation bombing of urban centers is the way to win wars. Berlin certainly was pacified in 1945.
Problem with putting conventional warheads on ICBMs, is that the other nuclear powers get a little edgy when they get a launch detection. There's a bit too much ambiguity there to be safe, IMHO. All you need is some conscript farmboy in the Urals in a missile silo that didn't get the memo, and the next war is all sticks and stones, you know what I mean? :P
Derek
There's a US aircraft carrier within three days steam of any littoral point on the surface of the earth at any given time.
Problem is, once you get there, you need overfly rights from those pesky countries in the way. If your aircraft is in space, outside the national exclusionary zone, you can go wherever you please, and bomb the shit out of whomever you please, at will.
Derek
Wait... the parent got modded up as insightful, but Samrobb's got modded down as flamebait. Guess we see once again whose ox gets gored on Slashdot.
Derek
Human exploration of space can happen naturally in a few centuries, when the technology has caught up with human desires. Until then, let's not waste money on human explortation.
So said the King of Portugal, and got beat out on the ownership rights to two whole continents to Spain. Damn that Columbus!
Derek
Difference is, for a scenario like exploring Mars, humans are more efficient for the job. Robots are inefficient for the money and time spent - there is a very limited amount of science they can do. Humans can travel further, do more complex mechanical tasks, and exploit opportunities much better than a robot that requires 10 minutes to recieve a signal command to perform a simple action like "look over there."
Derek
Now it's the "all politicians are the same." In regards to a remark like this: We certainly don't have quite your flair for outright blatant corruption, though, and completely ignoring it even when it is right in your faces.
All politicians are the same. Difference is, ours get thrown out of office, pronto: aka Nixon. Yours stay in office decades.
And of course you'd have to attempt to impugn the intelligence of George Bush, a very tired and unintelligent remark by this date. Pretty stale considering he graduated from Yale and Harvard, and has managed to outwit his political opponents on both sides of the Atlantic thus far. What does that make them, vegetable intelligence?
Derek
That's because the top 2% PAY more than everybody else, combined. Relative numbers v absolute numbers. The bane of every "progressive."
Derek
Fallacy: Ad Hominem
...you have the reading comprehension of an unripe grapefruit. I'll repeat the question for you: what's your excuse?
If you can't answer the charges, attack the person.
If the person is American, their beliefs are founded upon ignorance and the propaganda of their government. But of course I have a college degree in Anthropology and Philosophy, and:
And I just love how it's always the fault of "American media." I read 12 papers from all over the world, every day, print and electronic, from the New York Times to the Times of India. What's your excuse? Ever think that the manic biased BBC could account for the descrepency in YOUR thinking? Shock the very thought
Derek
Most of those "kickbacks" go to average Americans in the next to top 40% bracket. Making $40,000 a year to $125,000 a year. Oh yeah, soak the middle class and we'll call them rich for a campaign slogan.
Derek
And our "progressive" tax scheme isn't a disincentive?
The "tax cuts for the rich" plan the Democratic party is always railing against benefits those making over $40,000 a year. That's rich to a Democrat. That same segment of the population making over $40,000 pays 80% of the taxes. Do the "average American" a favor, write your Congressman and demand tax relief if you're so concerned.
Derek
It's called "voter tally that falls within the margin of error." There was no criminal wrongdoing involved. Like taking kickbacks, bribing judges, embezzlement, etc. Like the current Mayor of Paris cum Prez.
Pull your head out of your ass. The Bush administration IS doing the exact same thing. (Oh wait, maybe you already know this, but it would be *unpatriotic* for you to say so.
Oh really? Perhaps you could inform me of the criminal wrongdoing Bush has been charged with. Since of course European media is more "enlightened and objective" of course you'd have this information. Ahh, but you don't, because you have YOUR head up YOUR ass. Sorry thing is, you don't even know it. If President Bush was charged with official corruption and bribing judges to influence trials, and using his political party to ram legislation into law that allows Bush to jump judges that look like they'll actually be impartial... he could have a career in Europe. Like I said, that sort of thing doesn't happen on this side of the pond.
Maybe it's because you guys fail to realize how much things have changed since the end of the Cold War, and especially since September 11th. Europe is no longer the strategic albatross around our necks, but you just can't get over yourselves.
And I just love how it's always the fault of "American media." I read 12 papers from all over the world, every day, print and electronic, from the New York Times to the Times of India. What's your excuse? Ever think that the manic biased BBC could account for the descrepency in YOUR thinking? Shock the very thought!
Derek
Ahhh, the "you too" fallacy.
Like I told the other guy, if any American politician were caught engaging in the kind of official corruption that is brushed off by European politicians, there would be a lynching. And if there was any dirt to be had, in our cut throat political arena, it would be public.
If George Bush was found to have engaged in the kind of official corruption Jacque Chirac or Berlusconi have, and was found to be manipulating the legislature through his cronies in order to make himself immune from prosecution or the acts not criminal, as both Chirac and Berlusconi have, he would be impeached. Quick. All my associates in Europe have to say is, "Eh, what's the big deal? What do you expect of a powerful man?" The kind of shenanigans that happens in Europe's capitals does NOT happen on this side of the pond. Not without someone ending up in leg irons.
Derek
Riiiight. Not quite the flair for blatant corruption. I'm sure Berlusconi and Chirac would just love to have you in court with them, you're a regular character star witness. Fact of the matter is, mate, European politicians are so blase corrupt and Europeans are so cynical, morally bankrupt, and jaded that you don't even expect any better. Unlike the US, where if such a level of official corruption were uncovered there would be plenty of grand juries and plenty of former politicians with a new taste for striped jumpsuits.
The reason you don't see any "evil, stupid, fascist European" posts is because that level of vitriol is reserved solely for the United States. Or Israel.
Nice of you to post anonymously though. No courage of your convictions. If only all of Europe could go around anonymously, the Continent might begin showing signs of having a sack.
Derek
LOL! Where are all the "evil, stupid, fascist European" posts? Ahhh, yes, only AMERICA is "evil, stupid, fascist" and out to get us. Only America has stupid patent and copyright laws and (Londoners cover your ears and ignore those cameras on the street corners) violate percieved rights. Whatta joke. Bunch of lamers.
Derek
You're wrong, man, wrong! It's THE MAN! They really secretly clock my driving speed wherever I go, and set the speed limits to the 85th percentile. THEY'RE OUT TO GET ME!! There are cameras everywhere, dude, I SEE EM!
The level of paranoia and disinformation I read on this freakin site just blows my mind.
Derek
That's because these firebrands don't understand the meaning of Mussolini's "corporatism." It didn't mean corporations running the State, it meant the subjugation of the economy through government "Corporations" or trade boards. Central planning, in other words. This is why the ordinary Italian had trouble getting bread: the mechanics of the economy had been distorted by government controls.
German fascism illustrates this quite well. Corporate officers served at the whim of the State; working hours, wages, pensions, and other benefits were government mandated; there were extensive price controls; production was planned by central party committee; the monetary system was centralized - interest was abolished and private bankers imprisoned. Industry and labor were directly regulated by the State through industry and labor boards modeled after Mussolini's fascist "corporations."
Derek