If only we could explain what causes this upheaval of the status quo that lead to social and cultural issues. Surely it's the not automation taking jobs while still supplying a net gain in resources! That would never explain why the masses have shit jobs, yet the nation can still support the dole.
A guaranteed income,
Welfare, housing assistance, charity. It's rough, but the basics are provided for if you go out and get them.
mass joblessness,
Underemployment. College grads are flipping burgers.
and strict population controls
China did it. But yeah, it's really not a problem for first-worlders. Asimov didn't see that coming.
would all have much, much larger effects on the world we live in
You're using the term "would have" like these things didn't come to pass.
I remember that post where someone categorized all the programming languages into the different religions. C was Judism, C++ was Christiantiy, Islam was Java, and he went on from there with a short explanation for how they were similar. Funny stuff.
But I like the flavor of it if not the content. Using a fire and brimestone style of preaching when handing out typical programming advice makes it interesting.
Verily I say unto thee, in the 1,388,683,865th second of our lord Unix, that when problems arise from the mired deep and dwell amongst the trembling users that ye shall get to yon source, blessed be it's revisions, and from the source ye shall see what troubles you.
Git ye to the source! Worship not at the closed cathedral of the proprietary, but walk amongst your fellows in the open Bazaar. Sleep not on the most holy of release days but rise early and release yon source often. And as the sun rises and falls ye shall release the next day and the day after. Often shall thee release least the curse of sleep lie your project low into the depths of hibernation and behind the veil of life.
One and only one task shall your program perform, and perform well, for the many headed feature hydra is a dark beast, ever creeping, ever crossing, never shall it's requirements sleep.
War not with the water buffalo for theirs is an enlightened path. Holy ones to be revered. Freely ranging over the plains, unyoked by the licenses of yore.
And war not amongst yourselves. The emancipated emacs and the virtuous vi can co-exist in peace and unity. Lay down your flames and live in harmony.
(Hmmmm... I should probably stay away from the term "Unity" now that it's that horrible thing in Ubuntu. Seriously, fuck those guys.)
and definitely the case of NSA surveillance wouldn't be all that different.
What? Imagine if Ron Paul was elected. Do you imagine that he would have supported and backed the NSA's illegal spying? Do you think the US president is powerless when it comes to the policy of one of this executive departments? Because he was/is the sort that didn't give a damn about "existing geopolitical realities". That's one of the reasons he lost the election.
National political leaders (presidents, prime ministers, whatever) are amazingly limited in what they really can do.
Well, yes, there is a large list of options which fall under the category of "fucking stupid" and we have a very large system advisers, consultants, lobbyists, and voters dedicated to steering the president away from such options. It doesn't always work. But the US president has a lot of soft power as well as some very serious hard power.
And, when those leaders fail to live up to what is expected (often unreasonably) by those who elected them, the backlash can be ferocious.
I dunno, it's kinda gone down like I expected. As that coward pointed out we got a REAL GOOD taste of the sort of shenanigans Obama would pull when get voted to give the telcom companies retroactive immunity to all the illegal spying they helped with. That really lowered my expectations of the guy. By then though, it was down to him or McCain (And his crazy nut-job of a VP choice).
Still though, count how many nations we unilaterally, pre-emptivly invaded and occupied? Eh?
So far so good. Although that bullshit with Syria was kind of a black mark. At home we've had a slow if stable recovery from an almost complete meltdown. I'm not a huge fan of the healthcare law, but all in all things aren't that bad.
As far as "ferocity", the almost near stream of vile hatred spewing from the conservatives over the last decade has pretty much made me jaded to it. You can only call "wolf" so many times.
For my part, I still find it hard to take the likes of Google seriously as a defender of privacy. Their recent CEO said terrible things:
"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place,"
Yup, Slashdot always likes to drag out this old horse and give it a few beatings.
Look at the whole quote:
Schmidt was asked, "People are treating Google like their most trusted friend. Should they be?" He replied: "I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place. But if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines, including Google, do retain this information for some time. And it’s important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that information could be made available to the authorities."
Take that as a not too subtle hint that the cops are searching through all your data and he's compelled to let them. Legally, he has to. He's reminding people that you can't really trust him. That's a fantastically good stance to have for a company when it comes to Internet privacy. Really, if you didn't read that as "Guys, the cop is standing RIGHT over my shoulder, be cool" then you really suck at reading comprehension. If all you can store in that little head of yours is the bolded section of the quote, and everything just kinda slips away, then politics might not be for you.
Yeah, wtf. I could understand some people not being aware of their surroundings at the start of the speech. Who knows what came before this guy took the stage. And maybe a lot of people are drinking heavily. But once you get past the point where the guy is emotionally sobbing out the lines of eulogy about his dead friend and how the horrible the world is there's just no appropriate reason to be laughing.
Ok, ok, I guess he announces that he's pulling quotes from "the great poet Walt Kelly", and people laugh in that pause. I found that really odd, but I didn't know that he's the guy who wrote a political/philosophical comic called Pogo. It's like referring to Bill Watterson as a "great poet". (Which hey, HE IS, but he wrote comics).
But all those other points? When people laugh and APPLAUSE about how "Doug was the real thing". Dude, that's just wrong. And it.... man... it makes it look like the world really IS circling the drain.
Yeah, I'm with you there. I'd even say that a free society is the sort of thing that keeps people from using these scary new technologies to usher in the apocalypse. I mean, if I was a subjugated to the sort of shenanigans you might find in Glorious Arvastroka, then I might try tearing it all down. I mean, the french revolution had some HORRIFYING repercussions, but in the long run it was probably a good idea.
because we won't be able to turn on a dime from a free society to a totalitarian one once those threats become real.
I dunno man, if 9/11 is any indicator, with a sufficient catastrophe it looks like the powers that be can do whateverthefuck they feel like in the immediate aftermath. And then they can do some truly unreasonable things in the following months. And they've got significant leeway for about a decade. Now, eventually people start to come back to their senses and demand the rule of law be respected, but holy shit does it take a long time.
I'm bitching that you hae no actual arguments to present
Oh my! Well then. Allow me to point out my past arguments:
[bitching about how little roads cost and how grandparent has a bad argument
ARGUMENT #1) The government does quite a lot. "He drove on public roads" is a metaphor for all the things the government does for the public good. It includes providing safety, law, a fair system that keeps Walmart from enslaving you, regulators that keep Monsanto from dooming us all in plagues, the FDA keeps factories from dumping toxic sludge into rivers, and it keeps the banks from simply stealing all your money.
[Bitching about how thin a slice of the pie "all that other stuff" accounts for]
ARGUMENT #2) Well if you look at it that way, the feds also take a very thin slice of your income. Taxes aren't that bad.
[Bububut that seems unfair! We rich dicks are a MINORITY!]
ARGUMENT #3) Yeah, dude. It's a progressive tax. Name me a place that doesn't have a progressive tax? ARGUMENT #4) Our constitution specifically states that the government has the power to do this. ARGUMENT #5) If you're unhappy with being the wealthy group of people in the most powerful nation, you're never going to be happy, no matter how you're taxed. ARGUMENT #6) The method in which the wealthy make their wealth is often (but not always) at the detriment of those less wealthy than them. They got that money from somewhere. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. The Gini index is rising. ARGUMENT #7) There seems to be no way to justify the income of the super-wealthy. They can not possibly have helped or advanced society so much as to justify this massive inbalance in wealth.
So there you have it. A pretty good list of arguments for why your statements are wrong. A list you've so far blithely ignored. Well, I guess you did try to have a counter-argument for #1 (by erroneously lumping social security into the pie chart), but after that you just whined that it doesn't seem fair to tax rich dicks.
BRAND NEW ARGUMENT #8) Whoa! Holy shit, how did I miss this one. You're getting confused on the definition of "minority group". It's a sociological term. And frankly, those guys suck at math. Yes, there are less rich guys than poor guys, the rich are in the minority. But the term "minority group" has a differentmeaningthan that. It means the used and abused subset of a populace, not necessarily the ones there are less of. That's how black people were still a minority group in the south after they were freed. You're using the casual term overlap and abusing it.
You were taught that "progressive taxation is good",
Yes, because a progressive tax IS GOOD. At least it's a hell of a lot better than any other alternative tried so far. A flat tax, or even the dystopia of a regressive tax, seems to accumulate ALL the wealth to a small subset at the top who always abuse that wealth and use their power to stay in power.
and "Walmart is bad"
Whoa now. Walmart is POWERFUL, not necessarily bad. And as a corporation you can trust them to try and get as much money as they can in any way they can. And like a strong dog, it needs to have a leash on it. It's like radiation; dangerous, powerful, potentially useful, and it needs to be properly handled OR IT'LL FUCKING KILL YOU.
and the other lessons schools teach
Pft, is that a jab at education? Are you fighting against education now?
Why is it OK to hurt group A and not group B?
Because group A is "hurting"(in your sense of the word) group B in the ludicrously imbalanced system that is the fre
The rich is a minority group - it's just one you're clearly comfortable with hurting
...With taxes. They have an excess of money, so it's not so bad if they have a little less.
The strong guy carries more. You don't give the heavy pack to the weak sickly guy.
Furthermore, the REASON that the wealthy have such money (often) has a large amount to do with abusing those less fortunate than themselves. Now, there are a lot of wealthy people who earned their pretty penny by making the world a better place. But stock brokers? Do you think the little guy has any hope of actually competing with the big players that move money in the stock market? How about the kids of rich dicks? Do you think they're all wealthy because they're all good productive people? Take a look at the super-wealthy and tell me that their contributions to society warrant that sort of excess. Does the Mom&Pop shop really have a hope of competing with Walmart (And walmart gets a lot of their profit by playing hardball with the sellers, they sell shelfspace, wtf). I know it's not a zero-sum game, but with the Gini index going up in the USA, it certainly looks like the rich are making bank on the backs of the poor.
For the same process, you like it when it [taxes] the rich but hate it if it [taxes] the Jews?
Yeah, a rule that taxes the rich sounds ok. A jew tax sounds like a horrible idea. Duh.
History shows that governments that try to implement a fair system promote greater prosperity. I'm ok with giving the government the power to shoot the bad guys. You know, like having a military. And yeah, I'd be pretty upset if they came and shot me. If only we had some sort of system that makes sure it's done fairly. Some way for everyone to weigh in on the subject. If only.
(Seriously though, you're bitching about progressive tax systems. Are you fucking kidding me? Name me somewhere decent that doesn't have progressive taxes.)
Thanks. It's certainly a pain in the ass to drag the backwards, close-minded, fearful, hate-mongers who think there's an underground war with the "overwhelming number" of radicalized muslims into modern society. It's a sort of day-by-day struggle.
... with your progressive free-thinking dare-I-say liberally minded philosophy, which actually turns out to mean more backwards, oppressive and dare I say it [politically correct] monoculture than most any alternatives.
Really? Is letting the gays marry really that oppressive? Is the Internet a "backwards" phenomena? Is it that bad to tolerate the Jews, Wiccans, Muslims, Buddhist, Jainist, Baptists, Mormons, Pastafarians, New-Agers, etc.etc.etc.?
politically correct monoculture.
Hey there, you've got a good point. A lot of those super-liberal nanny-state sorts want to try and steer culture. Not a good idea, although they've had some success against smokers. Fuck those left-wingers, they're pretty annoying. But compared to the WAR-MONGERING right-wingers who got hundreds of thousands of civilians KILLED in Iraq, they're really not that bad. Seriously, our crazies aren't nearly as bad as your crazies.
So, it sounds like you're OK with the government selecting one particular group of people to say "you're less deserving than others, we're going to take more of your stuff than we take from other groups".
The government will always be corrupt, so are you really OK with a corrupt government picking groups to punish?
As long as they're picking on the "haves" over the "have-nots" it really doesn't seem all that unfair. Really, you're bitching about a progressive tax system. WTF sort of first world nation DOESN'T have a progressive tax law? Even those complete nutters that want FAIRTAX(c) implimented argue that it's progressive. Only rich assholes argue for a flat tax. Seriously, get the fuck out of the medieval era.
Would you be OK with the government saying "you're part of group X, so you have to pay for insurance, but we'll keep the benefits of that insurance for the common good, not for you"? Serious question.
Serious answer: If group X is all the rich dicks making their money off of the back of employees too poor to afford said insurance (and nowhere near wealthy enough to afford the disruption that the insurance guards against)? FUCK YES. Have you ever heard of a social safety net? Listen if you're rich enough to feel the pressure of taxes, then you've got very little want to speak of and you're living the good life. If you're unhappy with that, then I don't believe you will EVER be happy.
If you're imagining that we're talking about some mythological government that is enforcing some crazy version of segregation or apartheid or something where the government is selectively abusing some set of minorities, you're clearly not talking about the USA. At least when it comes to taxation.
The director of the NSA openly soliciting for alternative ways to be effective and what does he get?
A pile on of cynical snarky comments.
No, the resounding reaction from Slashdot appears to be "GET A WARRANT", "STOP THE DRAGNET", and to stop the illegal wholesale spying on US citizens. Honestly and truly, that's not snark. I'm being serious here. He wants to do X but X is illegal. TOUGH SHIT.
But you're right. Alternatives are good. How about: 1) Accept some risk. No matter how much you strive for a 1984 panopticon, you'll never catch all the baddies. 2) Stop dicking around in foreign affairs. This doesn't help you directly Mr. Alexander, but you could sure point out that the terrorists that flew planes into the world trade towers were from an organization that was trained by the CIA to fight asymmetrical warfare. And we haven't felt the last repercussions of Iraq yet. 3) REQUEST that ISPs have a streamlined way to accept warrants and divert traffic to the authorities. While I'm against wholesale dragnets, I'm ok with judges giving out warrants where you can prove probable suspicion. For terrorist, all data in connection to the target could be gathered. This is the serious shit here that we pay you for. For other cases of, say, infringing IP law, selective warrants about what data would have to be handled, you know, selectively. And when you have that serious warrant, hell yeah, the ISPs should help you catch the bad guy. But I think that's the FBI's job, not the NSA's... 4) Clarify the position of the NSA as war-time crypto breakers.
You may *think* the NSA is doing what it's doing because it's power mad and seeking fascist control over everyone - and that actually IS a danger , is just as Snowden termed it- "turnkey fascism" but in fact we have no evidence that they've involved themselves in running interference in the mundane affairs of making money and political freedoms excepting where they thought it intersected in national security
That part I actually agree with you. RIGHT NOW, their corruption and abuse of this system has been limited to some minor domestic affairs. But if you give a cop a power and you have little to no oversight to how he uses it, you JUST KNOW that eventually it'll be abused. Come on, learn a little something from history.
Anyone anywhere including malcontents in this nation (the US) could start putting together a doomsday microbe or nanobot or virus
First off, nanobot ANYTHING is still science fiction. Cool field of study, but not quite there yet. Second, doomsday microbes/viruses? Really? Anyone anywhere could just start doing this? Today? Are you fucking with me? Sure sure, the right people could go cultivate anthrax or make sarin gas, or just a hell of a lot of traditional explosives. But DOOMSDAY devices? This isn't a comic book kid. Rather than boot-stomp everyone who has that capability, how about we treat them with respect and give them a good life so they don't feel like taking us all down in a blaze of glory?
Seriously, this sort of bullshit just kind of entirely negates your entire post. There's simply no need for the sort of radical changes you think we need to go through.
The amount of taxes that the federal government takes is a minor part of your income unless you're ludicrously wealthy. Even if you're super-wealthy, it really only reaches up to 35%. But hey, states and even cities take their cut too. If you're in the top 20% of the most powerful nation in the world, then you can just cry me a fucking river. If you're part of the bottom 80%, you pay less than 16.6% to the Feds.
But oh hey, let's selectively cut out defense because you just don't like talking about that, while including social security into the pie chart for some fucking reason. Oh yeah, That'll present a clear picture to show people that they're being tricked. Sure.
conducting an all-out but undercover war against a very real threat of an overwhelming number of radicalised muslims
Bwahahahahahahahaaaaaa! heh, ok, sorry, you lost me there. I was following you for a while and I was working on how the definition of "war" has changed over time, but then I hit this turd and I realized that you were simply beyong hope. Nothing I say to you will ever have any effect.
But yeah, we're in a bit of a culture war. There's these people out there that think we need to go be the world police. And not the nice sort that help you find lost kid's mommy, but the sort that brutally curb stomp you just for being black. They think you can rule a populace with tanks. They're ruled by their fear, and to that extent they have let the terrorist win. They fear foreigners, outsiders, their own government, their own neighbors, and pretty much anything that's different from them. It's a sort of natural response really, but one that I'd hope we as a species would have grown out of by now as it's very anti-social in today's society. And I really do mean anti-social. Their actions are undermining society. They're the sort of people that believe the NSA is doing good meaningful work and they're perfectly justified in breaking the law. You know, to save us from dem dar evil muslims. They're willing to throw out the rule of law in order to suckle that pacifier of security. Not that it actually makes them secure, but they FEEL more secure knowing the NSA is out there doing whatever it is they do. You know what? I really don't think the NSA is doing anything particularly nefarious with all that illegal spying they're doing. But once the rule of law is thrown out in the name of security, you're going to see ALL the crazies come to power and start abusing said power right and left. It'll be Hoover's FBI all over again.
So yeah, we have to stand up against these people that wrap themselves in the flag and claim holy righteousness. They'll doom us all and tear down the system of checks and balances that keep our society together. They're not doing it because they're evil, they honestly think they're saving the world, but they're just simply wrong.
With all that in mind, from the progressive free-thinking dare-I-say liberally minded sort, Fuck You.
Enemies. It's their job to crack enemy cyphers and provide military assistance. Spying on our allies is (usually) illegal per their law the same way that foreign powers spying on US citizens is illegal per our laws. Since we're allies we're SUPPOSED to respect each other's laws and do that whole extraditing thing when someone breaks the law. But then again, the head of the NSA was found to by lying to congress and nobody's charged him with anything. So I guess you could say the entire "rule of law" thing is kinda going down the shitter.
Members of congress, I've been tasked with fighting teen pregnancy. A very disrupting event that destabilizes our nation and induces undue mental, physical, and economic stress on our youths. I was given a $5 million dollar budget with the goal of a 5% reduction this year.
Now, some of you have questioned my methods. I say to you that if there is a better way of fighting teen pregnancy than shooting all teenagers on site, then let's hear it. If we can come up with a better way, we ought to put it on the table and argue our way through it.
Budget, time frame, method. You only get to chose two.
Seriously, if you have a reason to suspect someone, you go ask a judge for a warrant to go spy on them. He might give it to you. After that you can spy on them.
And let me make this perfectly clear:
WITHOUT THE WARRANT, SPYING ON THEM IS ILLEGAL.
And by and far spying on foreigners is ALSO ILLEGAL. At least, according to their laws. The same way that it's illegal for their citizens to spy on us according to our laws. Those laws are ignored when we are at war with them. Breaking the NAZI codes was a legit thing to do because we didn't give a flying fuck about their laws, you know, at the time. You're not supposed to treat US citizens like the enemy. We're at peace.
The amount of taxes needed to fund roads and regulate banks...
And keep the peace, and to keep that big ugly thug in check*, and to keep China from invading, and to keep Monsanto from creating weevils, and to stop Kraft from dumping their toxic waste into the river, and to make sure that your place of employment actually pays you, and to keep all those people with the power to do all those thing from being too powerful themselves. Hey, no joke, it costs money to keep it all running smoothly. (And yeah, they could be doing a lot better job of it)
You could say that the magical and mystical FREE MARKET could take care of all that. But we've been there. We've tried that. The 1880's called and the robber barons want their company towns back. And there are some things for which the free market just doesn't work. Like where there are natural monopolies or right-of-way issues.
In short, the talking point about driving on public roads is a metaphor for civilization and all the good things that our government does. Claiming that the entire argument is strictly about roads is itself a strawman.
*Oh, wait, you already mentioned regulating banks, sorry about that redundancy.
So if the evil druglords of world started to trade fine art back and forth as a means of exchanging wealth, then the Feds would lock up all the artists? Carrying around art paraphernalia would be illegal in most states and barred from federal buildings?
controls us through the "utopia where the people are bribed into apathy/foolishness" (courtesy of MPAA/RIAA mafia + youtube and friends),
I don't think you're giving enough weight to the message that Aldous Huxley tried to impart. It's not just the big-name corporate time-killers that get people to waste their lives, it is every form of recreation. From minesweeper to every indie game to the big-name AAA console titles. From drinking with friends, to bars, to that beer culture that's pervasive in universities. Miley Cyrus distracts the masses, but you can't discount the effects of that little mp3 player blaring constantly.
Ever hear about how long it took someone to get the orb or Zot or the amulet of Yendor? Ever hear about YASD? Ever see those MASSIVE Minecraft creations. (And how they swore they did it in-game rather than using an editor).
The crux here is that it's all just a waste of time. But hey, it keeps people happy, so it's hard to say that these are all bad things. Trying to get rid of recreation is ballstothewalls tyrannical. I'd have to say that moderation is important. In all thing, balance.
#2 and #4, Orwell vs Huxley, aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, but they're certainly attacking society from different angles.
So... Corporocracy Totalitarian states in constant war A post-scarcity utopia that hinges on karma A utopia where the people are bribed into apathy/foolishness
And that demand would be fulfilled by Japanese, Korean, or possibly Chinese manufacturers who have their shit together rather than the decaying and bloated corpse that is Detroit. And it most certainly wouldn't be a situation where "startups fill the void".
Buying up GM's old plants? Why the hell would Nissan, Toyota, Kia, or SAIC want old and busted facilities with only wealthy union workers to hire in a state with strong union laws, in a country with a working EPA? Shipping costs aren't that much. And now that China has come online, all the parts that GO INTO the car are produced in China anyway, so you either ship the car over as a whole or ship it over in parts.
It would most certainly be an "end of the world of USA car manufacturing" scenario. Which is arguably already on it's way. Hey, you're looking at this problem from the perspective of small business vs big business. There's a LOT that can learned from that. But in this case it's a matter of INTERNATIONAL competition where the capabilities of the nation are involved and it has close ties to national security. As in, can we build tanks and planes and bombs sort of stuff. This is a little detail that people tend to ignore, but our civilan manufacturing plants are all viewed as emergency war-machine makers by the top brass and people that play the international politics game. That's less important with nukes on the table, but China desperately wants to be able to wave their dick around in the form of a fully capable military power.
Just so someone that isn't a coward responds to this: BULLSHIT if you think it boils down to something as simple as "priority". Because there are a lot of ways to do QoS. You're right that, in theory, QoS is a good idea. The problem is that it can be abused. Unless they do it in a fair way. And "fair" is a tough one. But I sure as shit know that if they start charging for priority then it's all going to go to hell. How is it any different than bribing the TV station to make your competitors shows staticy?
It's BLATANTLY breaking network neutrality. This guy is promoting the idea of a non-neutral Internet. Where it's no longer an open field where anyone and everyone can play ball, but a series of closed locked gates with a myriad of gatekeepers demanding their fees and having the power to decide what does and doesn't go through. I'm not some crazy idealist that believes the Internet is perfectly neutral. TCP is simply different than UDP. But it's certainly something we can strive for. And things like QoS have to have a very careful eye kept on them least some asshole thinks that all torrents are illegal, bitcoin is treason, porn doesn't belong on the Internet, Arkansas is stupid, or Starcraft is less important than Netflix because Netflix shelled out some cash.
Is prioritizing one kind of traffic logically the same as de-prioritizing all other traffic?
Yes, it pretty much is. Did you think it was otherwise? By definition, if something has priority over something else, that "something else" has lower priority.
And some REALLY valid points from my cowardly brothers here: 1) They don't have to charge extra to perform QoS. Which you sort of acknowledge. 2) While some applications don't mind latency and what they really care about is bandwidth, if the ISP have oversold their lines (of course they do), giving streaming priority can affect bandwidth. 3) It'd be nice if the ISPs were dumb pipes and no more than common carriers who can't inspect all of our packets.
Wheeler: "Netflix might say, "I'll pay in order to make sure that my subscriber might receive the best possible transmission of this movie."
Huh, that's funny. I though I ALREADY PAID the ISP to get the best possible transmission.
Oh, I'm sorry, you wanted to buy access to ALL of the Internet? You only bought basic Internet. That simply doesn't include Netflix. But it includes Youtube now that Google ponied up some cash. You need to pay the premium rate to get Netflixs. Plus an extra surcharge for Wikipedia because they said something nasty about us once.
Slashdot Mirror
If only we could explain what causes this upheaval of the status quo that lead to social and cultural issues. Surely it's the not automation taking jobs while still supplying a net gain in resources! That would never explain why the masses have shit jobs, yet the nation can still support the dole.
A guaranteed income,
Welfare, housing assistance, charity. It's rough, but the basics are provided for if you go out and get them.
mass joblessness,
Underemployment. College grads are flipping burgers.
and strict population controls
China did it. But yeah, it's really not a problem for first-worlders. Asimov didn't see that coming.
would all have much, much larger effects on the world we live in
You're using the term "would have" like these things didn't come to pass.
I remember that post where someone categorized all the programming languages into the different religions. C was Judism, C++ was Christiantiy, Islam was Java, and he went on from there with a short explanation for how they were similar. Funny stuff.
But I like the flavor of it if not the content. Using a fire and brimestone style of preaching when handing out typical programming advice makes it interesting.
Verily I say unto thee, in the 1,388,683,865th second of our lord Unix, that when problems arise from the mired deep and dwell amongst the trembling users that ye shall get to yon source, blessed be it's revisions, and from the source ye shall see what troubles you.
Git ye to the source! Worship not at the closed cathedral of the proprietary, but walk amongst your fellows in the open Bazaar. Sleep not on the most holy of release days but rise early and release yon source often. And as the sun rises and falls ye shall release the next day and the day after. Often shall thee release least the curse of sleep lie your project low into the depths of hibernation and behind the veil of life.
One and only one task shall your program perform, and perform well, for the many headed feature hydra is a dark beast, ever creeping, ever crossing, never shall it's requirements sleep.
War not with the water buffalo for theirs is an enlightened path. Holy ones to be revered. Freely ranging over the plains, unyoked by the licenses of yore.
And war not amongst yourselves. The emancipated emacs and the virtuous vi can co-exist in peace and unity. Lay down your flames and live in harmony.
(Hmmmm... I should probably stay away from the term "Unity" now that it's that horrible thing in Ubuntu. Seriously, fuck those guys.)
and definitely the case of NSA surveillance wouldn't be all that different.
What? Imagine if Ron Paul was elected. Do you imagine that he would have supported and backed the NSA's illegal spying? Do you think the US president is powerless when it comes to the policy of one of this executive departments?
Because he was/is the sort that didn't give a damn about "existing geopolitical realities". That's one of the reasons he lost the election.
National political leaders (presidents, prime ministers, whatever) are amazingly limited in what they really can do.
Well, yes, there is a large list of options which fall under the category of "fucking stupid" and we have a very large system advisers, consultants, lobbyists, and voters dedicated to steering the president away from such options. It doesn't always work. But the US president has a lot of soft power as well as some very serious hard power.
And, when those leaders fail to live up to what is expected (often unreasonably) by those who elected them, the backlash can be ferocious.
I dunno, it's kinda gone down like I expected. As that coward pointed out we got a REAL GOOD taste of the sort of shenanigans Obama would pull when get voted to give the telcom companies retroactive immunity to all the illegal spying they helped with. That really lowered my expectations of the guy. By then though, it was down to him or McCain (And his crazy nut-job of a VP choice).
Still though, count how many nations we unilaterally, pre-emptivly invaded and occupied? Eh?
So far so good. Although that bullshit with Syria was kind of a black mark. At home we've had a slow if stable recovery from an almost complete meltdown. I'm not a huge fan of the healthcare law, but all in all things aren't that bad.
As far as "ferocity", the almost near stream of vile hatred spewing from the conservatives over the last decade has pretty much made me jaded to it. You can only call "wolf" so many times.
For my part, I still find it hard to take the likes of Google seriously as a defender of privacy. Their recent CEO said terrible things:
"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place,"
Yup, Slashdot always likes to drag out this old horse and give it a few beatings.
Look at the whole quote:
Schmidt was asked, "People are treating Google like their most trusted friend. Should they be?" He replied: "I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place. But if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines, including Google, do retain this information for some time. And it’s important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that information could be made available to the authorities."
Take that as a not too subtle hint that the cops are searching through all your data and he's compelled to let them. Legally, he has to. He's reminding people that you can't really trust him. That's a fantastically good stance to have for a company when it comes to Internet privacy.
Really, if you didn't read that as "Guys, the cop is standing RIGHT over my shoulder, be cool" then you really suck at reading comprehension. If all you can store in that little head of yours is the bolded section of the quote, and everything just kinda slips away, then politics might not be for you.
Yeah, wtf. I could understand some people not being aware of their surroundings at the start of the speech. Who knows what came before this guy took the stage. And maybe a lot of people are drinking heavily. But once you get past the point where the guy is emotionally sobbing out the lines of eulogy about his dead friend and how the horrible the world is there's just no appropriate reason to be laughing.
Ok, ok, I guess he announces that he's pulling quotes from "the great poet Walt Kelly", and people laugh in that pause. I found that really odd, but I didn't know that he's the guy who wrote a political/philosophical comic called Pogo. It's like referring to Bill Watterson as a "great poet". (Which hey, HE IS, but he wrote comics).
But all those other points? When people laugh and APPLAUSE about how "Doug was the real thing". Dude, that's just wrong. And it.... man... it makes it look like the world really IS circling the drain.
Yeah, I'm with you there. I'd even say that a free society is the sort of thing that keeps people from using these scary new technologies to usher in the apocalypse. I mean, if I was a subjugated to the sort of shenanigans you might find in Glorious Arvastroka, then I might try tearing it all down. I mean, the french revolution had some HORRIFYING repercussions, but in the long run it was probably a good idea.
because we won't be able to turn on a dime from a free society to a totalitarian one once those threats become real.
I dunno man, if 9/11 is any indicator, with a sufficient catastrophe it looks like the powers that be can do whateverthefuck they feel like in the immediate aftermath. And then they can do some truly unreasonable things in the following months. And they've got significant leeway for about a decade. Now, eventually people start to come back to their senses and demand the rule of law be respected, but holy shit does it take a long time.
I'm bitching that you hae no actual arguments to present
Oh my! Well then. Allow me to point out my past arguments:
[bitching about how little roads cost and how grandparent has a bad argument
ARGUMENT #1) The government does quite a lot. "He drove on public roads" is a metaphor for all the things the government does for the public good. It includes providing safety, law, a fair system that keeps Walmart from enslaving you, regulators that keep Monsanto from dooming us all in plagues, the FDA keeps factories from dumping toxic sludge into rivers, and it keeps the banks from simply stealing all your money.
[Bitching about how thin a slice of the pie "all that other stuff" accounts for]
ARGUMENT #2) Well if you look at it that way, the feds also take a very thin slice of your income. Taxes aren't that bad.
[Bububut that seems unfair! We rich dicks are a MINORITY!]
ARGUMENT #3) Yeah, dude. It's a progressive tax. Name me a place that doesn't have a progressive tax?
ARGUMENT #4) Our constitution specifically states that the government has the power to do this.
ARGUMENT #5) If you're unhappy with being the wealthy group of people in the most powerful nation, you're never going to be happy, no matter how you're taxed.
ARGUMENT #6) The method in which the wealthy make their wealth is often (but not always) at the detriment of those less wealthy than them. They got that money from somewhere. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. The Gini index is rising.
ARGUMENT #7) There seems to be no way to justify the income of the super-wealthy. They can not possibly have helped or advanced society so much as to justify this massive inbalance in wealth.
So there you have it. A pretty good list of arguments for why your statements are wrong. A list you've so far blithely ignored. Well, I guess you did try to have a counter-argument for #1 (by erroneously lumping social security into the pie chart), but after that you just whined that it doesn't seem fair to tax rich dicks.
BRAND NEW ARGUMENT #8) Whoa! Holy shit, how did I miss this one. You're getting confused on the definition of "minority group". It's a sociological term. And frankly, those guys suck at math. Yes, there are less rich guys than poor guys, the rich are in the minority. But the term "minority group" has a different meaning than that. It means the used and abused subset of a populace, not necessarily the ones there are less of. That's how black people were still a minority group in the south after they were freed. You're using the casual term overlap and abusing it.
You were taught that "progressive taxation is good",
Yes, because a progressive tax IS GOOD. At least it's a hell of a lot better than any other alternative tried so far. A flat tax, or even the dystopia of a regressive tax, seems to accumulate ALL the wealth to a small subset at the top who always abuse that wealth and use their power to stay in power.
and "Walmart is bad"
Whoa now. Walmart is POWERFUL, not necessarily bad. And as a corporation you can trust them to try and get as much money as they can in any way they can. And like a strong dog, it needs to have a leash on it. It's like radiation; dangerous, powerful, potentially useful, and it needs to be properly handled OR IT'LL FUCKING KILL YOU.
and the other lessons schools teach
Pft, is that a jab at education? Are you fighting against education now?
Why is it OK to hurt group A and not group B?
Because group A is "hurting"(in your sense of the word) group B in the ludicrously imbalanced system that is the fre
The rich is a minority group - it's just one you're clearly comfortable with hurting
...With taxes. They have an excess of money, so it's not so bad if they have a little less.
The strong guy carries more. You don't give the heavy pack to the weak sickly guy.
Furthermore, the REASON that the wealthy have such money (often) has a large amount to do with abusing those less fortunate than themselves. Now, there are a lot of wealthy people who earned their pretty penny by making the world a better place. But stock brokers? Do you think the little guy has any hope of actually competing with the big players that move money in the stock market? How about the kids of rich dicks? Do you think they're all wealthy because they're all good productive people? Take a look at the super-wealthy and tell me that their contributions to society warrant that sort of excess. Does the Mom&Pop shop really have a hope of competing with Walmart (And walmart gets a lot of their profit by playing hardball with the sellers, they sell shelfspace, wtf). I know it's not a zero-sum game, but with the Gini index going up in the USA, it certainly looks like the rich are making bank on the backs of the poor.
For the same process, you like it when it [taxes] the rich but hate it if it [taxes] the Jews?
Yeah, a rule that taxes the rich sounds ok. A jew tax sounds like a horrible idea. Duh.
History shows that governments that try to implement a fair system promote greater prosperity. I'm ok with giving the government the power to shoot the bad guys. You know, like having a military. And yeah, I'd be pretty upset if they came and shot me. If only we had some sort of system that makes sure it's done fairly. Some way for everyone to weigh in on the subject. If only.
(Seriously though, you're bitching about progressive tax systems. Are you fucking kidding me? Name me somewhere decent that doesn't have progressive taxes.)
Good luck..
Thanks. It's certainly a pain in the ass to drag the backwards, close-minded, fearful, hate-mongers who think there's an underground war with the "overwhelming number" of radicalized muslims into modern society. It's a sort of day-by-day struggle.
... with your progressive free-thinking dare-I-say liberally minded philosophy, which actually turns out to mean more backwards, oppressive and dare I say it [politically correct] monoculture than most any alternatives.
Really? Is letting the gays marry really that oppressive? Is the Internet a "backwards" phenomena? Is it that bad to tolerate the Jews, Wiccans, Muslims, Buddhist, Jainist, Baptists, Mormons, Pastafarians, New-Agers, etc.etc.etc.?
politically correct monoculture.
Hey there, you've got a good point. A lot of those super-liberal nanny-state sorts want to try and steer culture. Not a good idea, although they've had some success against smokers. Fuck those left-wingers, they're pretty annoying. But compared to the WAR-MONGERING right-wingers who got hundreds of thousands of civilians KILLED in Iraq, they're really not that bad. Seriously, our crazies aren't nearly as bad as your crazies.
So, it sounds like you're OK with the government selecting one particular group of people to say "you're less deserving than others, we're going to take more of your stuff than we take from other groups".
What what? Did you say "progressive tax"? Why I believe you did!
Does that seems like a safe sort of power to give the government?
The power to set taxes? Specifically for federal income taxes? Why yes, that DOES seem like the sort of power that governing bodies would normally have.
The government will always be corrupt, so are you really OK with a corrupt government picking groups to punish?
As long as they're picking on the "haves" over the "have-nots" it really doesn't seem all that unfair. Really, you're bitching about a progressive tax system. WTF sort of first world nation DOESN'T have a progressive tax law? Even those complete nutters that want FAIRTAX(c) implimented argue that it's progressive. Only rich assholes argue for a flat tax. Seriously, get the fuck out of the medieval era.
Would you be OK with the government saying "you're part of group X, so you have to pay for insurance, but we'll keep the benefits of that insurance for the common good, not for you"? Serious question.
Serious answer: If group X is all the rich dicks making their money off of the back of employees too poor to afford said insurance (and nowhere near wealthy enough to afford the disruption that the insurance guards against)? FUCK YES. Have you ever heard of a social safety net? Listen if you're rich enough to feel the pressure of taxes, then you've got very little want to speak of and you're living the good life. If you're unhappy with that, then I don't believe you will EVER be happy.
If you're imagining that we're talking about some mythological government that is enforcing some crazy version of segregation or apartheid or something where the government is selectively abusing some set of minorities, you're clearly not talking about the USA. At least when it comes to taxation.
The director of the NSA openly soliciting for alternative ways to be effective and what does he get?
A pile on of cynical snarky comments.
No, the resounding reaction from Slashdot appears to be "GET A WARRANT", "STOP THE DRAGNET", and to stop the illegal wholesale spying on US citizens. Honestly and truly, that's not snark. I'm being serious here. He wants to do X but X is illegal. TOUGH SHIT.
But you're right. Alternatives are good. How about:
1) Accept some risk. No matter how much you strive for a 1984 panopticon, you'll never catch all the baddies.
2) Stop dicking around in foreign affairs. This doesn't help you directly Mr. Alexander, but you could sure point out that the terrorists that flew planes into the world trade towers were from an organization that was trained by the CIA to fight asymmetrical warfare. And we haven't felt the last repercussions of Iraq yet.
3) REQUEST that ISPs have a streamlined way to accept warrants and divert traffic to the authorities. While I'm against wholesale dragnets, I'm ok with judges giving out warrants where you can prove probable suspicion. For terrorist, all data in connection to the target could be gathered. This is the serious shit here that we pay you for. For other cases of, say, infringing IP law, selective warrants about what data would have to be handled, you know, selectively. And when you have that serious warrant, hell yeah, the ISPs should help you catch the bad guy. But I think that's the FBI's job, not the NSA's...
4) Clarify the position of the NSA as war-time crypto breakers.
You may *think* the NSA is doing what it's doing because it's power mad and seeking fascist control over everyone - and that actually IS a danger , is just as Snowden termed it- "turnkey fascism" but in fact we have no evidence that they've involved themselves in running interference in the mundane affairs of making money and political freedoms excepting where they thought it intersected in national security
That part I actually agree with you. RIGHT NOW, their corruption and abuse of this system has been limited to some minor domestic affairs. But if you give a cop a power and you have little to no oversight to how he uses it, you JUST KNOW that eventually it'll be abused. Come on, learn a little something from history.
Anyone anywhere including malcontents in this nation (the US) could start putting together a doomsday microbe or nanobot or virus
First off, nanobot ANYTHING is still science fiction. Cool field of study, but not quite there yet.
Second, doomsday microbes/viruses? Really? Anyone anywhere could just start doing this? Today? Are you fucking with me? Sure sure, the right people could go cultivate anthrax or make sarin gas, or just a hell of a lot of traditional explosives. But DOOMSDAY devices? This isn't a comic book kid. Rather than boot-stomp everyone who has that capability, how about we treat them with respect and give them a good life so they don't feel like taking us all down in a blaze of glory?
Seriously, this sort of bullshit just kind of entirely negates your entire post. There's simply no need for the sort of radical changes you think we need to go through.
Pft, ok, sure. I can play that game.
The amount of taxes that the federal government takes is a minor part of your income unless you're ludicrously wealthy. Even if you're super-wealthy, it really only reaches up to 35%. But hey, states and even cities take their cut too. If you're in the top 20% of the most powerful nation in the world, then you can just cry me a fucking river. If you're part of the bottom 80%, you pay less than 16.6% to the Feds.
But oh hey, let's selectively cut out defense because you just don't like talking about that, while including social security into the pie chart for some fucking reason. Oh yeah, That'll present a clear picture to show people that they're being tricked. Sure.
conducting an all-out but undercover war against a very real threat of an overwhelming number of radicalised muslims
Bwahahahahahahahaaaaaa! heh, ok, sorry, you lost me there. I was following you for a while and I was working on how the definition of "war" has changed over time, but then I hit this turd and I realized that you were simply beyong hope. Nothing I say to you will ever have any effect.
But yeah, we're in a bit of a culture war. There's these people out there that think we need to go be the world police. And not the nice sort that help you find lost kid's mommy, but the sort that brutally curb stomp you just for being black. They think you can rule a populace with tanks. They're ruled by their fear, and to that extent they have let the terrorist win. They fear foreigners, outsiders, their own government, their own neighbors, and pretty much anything that's different from them. It's a sort of natural response really, but one that I'd hope we as a species would have grown out of by now as it's very anti-social in today's society.
And I really do mean anti-social. Their actions are undermining society. They're the sort of people that believe the NSA is doing good meaningful work and they're perfectly justified in breaking the law. You know, to save us from dem dar evil muslims. They're willing to throw out the rule of law in order to suckle that pacifier of security. Not that it actually makes them secure, but they FEEL more secure knowing the NSA is out there doing whatever it is they do.
You know what? I really don't think the NSA is doing anything particularly nefarious with all that illegal spying they're doing. But once the rule of law is thrown out in the name of security, you're going to see ALL the crazies come to power and start abusing said power right and left. It'll be Hoover's FBI all over again.
So yeah, we have to stand up against these people that wrap themselves in the flag and claim holy righteousness. They'll doom us all and tear down the system of checks and balances that keep our society together. They're not doing it because they're evil, they honestly think they're saving the world, but they're just simply wrong.
With all that in mind, from the progressive free-thinking dare-I-say liberally minded sort, Fuck You.
The NSA's job is to spy on
Enemies. It's their job to crack enemy cyphers and provide military assistance. Spying on our allies is (usually) illegal per their law the same way that foreign powers spying on US citizens is illegal per our laws. Since we're allies we're SUPPOSED to respect each other's laws and do that whole extraditing thing when someone breaks the law. But then again, the head of the NSA was found to by lying to congress and nobody's charged him with anything. So I guess you could say the entire "rule of law" thing is kinda going down the shitter.
Members of congress, I've been tasked with fighting teen pregnancy. A very disrupting event that destabilizes our nation and induces undue mental, physical, and economic stress on our youths. I was given a $5 million dollar budget with the goal of a 5% reduction this year.
Now, some of you have questioned my methods. I say to you that if there is a better way of fighting teen pregnancy than shooting all teenagers on site, then let's hear it. If we can come up with a better way, we ought to put it on the table and argue our way through it.
Budget, time frame, method. You only get to chose two.
Seriously, if you have a reason to suspect someone, you go ask a judge for a warrant to go spy on them. He might give it to you. After that you can spy on them.
And let me make this perfectly clear:
WITHOUT THE WARRANT, SPYING ON THEM IS ILLEGAL.
And by and far spying on foreigners is ALSO ILLEGAL. At least, according to their laws. The same way that it's illegal for their citizens to spy on us according to our laws. Those laws are ignored when we are at war with them. Breaking the NAZI codes was a legit thing to do because we didn't give a flying fuck about their laws, you know, at the time. You're not supposed to treat US citizens like the enemy. We're at peace.
The amount of taxes needed to fund roads and regulate banks...
And keep the peace, and to keep that big ugly thug in check*, and to keep China from invading, and to keep Monsanto from creating weevils, and to stop Kraft from dumping their toxic waste into the river, and to make sure that your place of employment actually pays you, and to keep all those people with the power to do all those thing from being too powerful themselves. Hey, no joke, it costs money to keep it all running smoothly. (And yeah, they could be doing a lot better job of it)
You could say that the magical and mystical FREE MARKET could take care of all that. But we've been there. We've tried that. The 1880's called and the robber barons want their company towns back. And there are some things for which the free market just doesn't work. Like where there are natural monopolies or right-of-way issues.
In short, the talking point about driving on public roads is a metaphor for civilization and all the good things that our government does. Claiming that the entire argument is strictly about roads is itself a strawman.
*Oh, wait, you already mentioned regulating banks, sorry about that redundancy.
So if the evil druglords of world started to trade fine art back and forth as a means of exchanging wealth, then the Feds would lock up all the artists? Carrying around art paraphernalia would be illegal in most states and barred from federal buildings?
That was brilliant and beautiful.
Why don't we include style tags with our posts more?
Aw bloody hell, I forgot about the drugs!
Soma was a big part of Brave New World. Any sort of recreational drug use also falls under the category of what Huxley was warning us about.
I can't believe I forgot about the sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll!
Whoa whoa whoa,
controls us through the "utopia where the people are bribed into apathy/foolishness" (courtesy of MPAA/RIAA mafia + youtube and friends),
I don't think you're giving enough weight to the message that Aldous Huxley tried to impart. It's not just the big-name corporate time-killers that get people to waste their lives, it is every form of recreation. From minesweeper to every indie game to the big-name AAA console titles. From drinking with friends, to bars, to that beer culture that's pervasive in universities. Miley Cyrus distracts the masses, but you can't discount the effects of that little mp3 player blaring constantly.
Ever hear about how long it took someone to get the orb or Zot or the amulet of Yendor? Ever hear about YASD? Ever see those MASSIVE Minecraft creations. (And how they swore they did it in-game rather than using an editor).
The crux here is that it's all just a waste of time. But hey, it keeps people happy, so it's hard to say that these are all bad things. Trying to get rid of recreation is ballstothewalls tyrannical. I'd have to say that moderation is important. In all thing, balance.
#2 and #4, Orwell vs Huxley, aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, but they're certainly attacking society from different angles.
So...
Corporocracy
Totalitarian states in constant war
A post-scarcity utopia that hinges on karma
A utopia where the people are bribed into apathy/foolishness
I'd go with Doctorow.
Right, sure, there's still demand.
And that demand would be fulfilled by Japanese, Korean, or possibly Chinese manufacturers who have their shit together rather than the decaying and bloated corpse that is Detroit. And it most certainly wouldn't be a situation where "startups fill the void".
Buying up GM's old plants? Why the hell would Nissan, Toyota, Kia, or SAIC want old and busted facilities with only wealthy union workers to hire in a state with strong union laws, in a country with a working EPA? Shipping costs aren't that much. And now that China has come online, all the parts that GO INTO the car are produced in China anyway, so you either ship the car over as a whole or ship it over in parts.
It would most certainly be an "end of the world of USA car manufacturing" scenario. Which is arguably already on it's way. Hey, you're looking at this problem from the perspective of small business vs big business. There's a LOT that can learned from that. But in this case it's a matter of INTERNATIONAL competition where the capabilities of the nation are involved and it has close ties to national security. As in, can we build tanks and planes and bombs sort of stuff. This is a little detail that people tend to ignore, but our civilan manufacturing plants are all viewed as emergency war-machine makers by the top brass and people that play the international politics game. That's less important with nukes on the table, but China desperately wants to be able to wave their dick around in the form of a fully capable military power.
You're just not looking at the big picture.
Just so someone that isn't a coward responds to this: BULLSHIT if you think it boils down to something as simple as "priority". Because there are a lot of ways to do QoS. You're right that, in theory, QoS is a good idea. The problem is that it can be abused. Unless they do it in a fair way. And "fair" is a tough one. But I sure as shit know that if they start charging for priority then it's all going to go to hell. How is it any different than bribing the TV station to make your competitors shows staticy?
It's BLATANTLY breaking network neutrality. This guy is promoting the idea of a non-neutral Internet. Where it's no longer an open field where anyone and everyone can play ball, but a series of closed locked gates with a myriad of gatekeepers demanding their fees and having the power to decide what does and doesn't go through. I'm not some crazy idealist that believes the Internet is perfectly neutral. TCP is simply different than UDP. But it's certainly something we can strive for. And things like QoS have to have a very careful eye kept on them least some asshole thinks that all torrents are illegal, bitcoin is treason, porn doesn't belong on the Internet, Arkansas is stupid, or Starcraft is less important than Netflix because Netflix shelled out some cash.
Is prioritizing one kind of traffic logically the same as de-prioritizing all other traffic?
Yes, it pretty much is. Did you think it was otherwise? By definition, if something has priority over something else, that "something else" has lower priority.
And some REALLY valid points from my cowardly brothers here:
1) They don't have to charge extra to perform QoS. Which you sort of acknowledge.
2) While some applications don't mind latency and what they really care about is bandwidth, if the ISP have oversold their lines (of course they do), giving streaming priority can affect bandwidth.
3) It'd be nice if the ISPs were dumb pipes and no more than common carriers who can't inspect all of our packets.
Wheeler: "Netflix might say, "I'll pay in order to make sure that my subscriber might receive the best possible transmission of this movie."
Huh, that's funny. I though I ALREADY PAID the ISP to get the best possible transmission.
Oh, I'm sorry, you wanted to buy access to ALL of the Internet? You only bought basic Internet. That simply doesn't include Netflix. But it includes Youtube now that Google ponied up some cash. You need to pay the premium rate to get Netflixs. Plus an extra surcharge for Wikipedia because they said something nasty about us once.