How about a tax scale that accounts for the current unemployment rate? Higher unemployment = higher taxes for corporations and rich, lower unemployment is lower taxes for corporations and the rich. Hell of an incentive to create jobs.
I don't think that would work how you think. Say your technology company is just getting by making a small profit but not at the point where you can afford to hire another worker to increase business. Now the real estate market blows up. That's OK, your not in that sector of business, so your still chugging along helping the economy. But wait, now your corporate taxes shoot up because nation-wide unemployment is higher and you have to lay people off while getting the same amount of work done in order to not go bankrupt? Repeat this story across the country and suddenly your looking at a tremendous feedback cycle of economy wreckage.
One person having a billion dollars in the bank isn't going to make Target's quarterly numbers
Keep in mind that everything with economics is more complicated then the first level. One billion dollars does not simply sit in a bank. It is loaned out to businesses, large and small that wish to start up or expand, and private individuals who wish to buy homes or cars. If you're an hourly worker for a dry-walling company shopping at target your probably paying for your goods with money that some rich person had "in the bank".
Internet is a harsh mistress. If you can't be thick-skinned, go find different way to spend your time. And posting on-line, to world at large, "look how miserable we are" is just whoring.
Society is a harsher mistress, if you can't follow it's rules, society will find a different way to spend your time. Generally, locked in a small windowless room. Basically the internet is society's bitch. When it was young, society made the internet do it's homework. Now society makes the internet follow it around wherever it's going holding it's papers and documents and everything else society can't be bothered with lugging around. Society even makes the internet come into the shitter, and dictate trivial messages to society's "friends". How you ever got the impression that the internet is a bad-ass that can take society on I'll never understand.
Americans dying on an American rocket or Russians dying on a Russian rocket is a tragedy but Americans dying on a Russian rocket or vice versa is a political and diplomatic nightmare that would seriously damage this planets space efforts for generations.
If the red states need the help, then give it to them. At the same time the people who live their or have that set of beliefs should realize this is what is keeping them fed.
The farms in those middle red states are what keep us all fed. The government subsidies keep the price of that food artificially low and stable. Fucks up developing third world farming but that's a topic for another day. The point is, while that money "goes" to the red states it goes to them to pay for food the blue states are eating too. So those farm subsidies are keeping us ALL fed, red states and blue. The subsidies aren't there because the red state farms need help and wellfare, they're there because the cities need to not have large uncertainty in the food supply and price levels that could lead to sudden food shortages and starvation. The government is picking up a good piece of your dinner check and you're complaining that the restaurant is getting paid.
So this is the last generation that will know how to tie even basic knots.
*sigh*
One would assume everyone isn't going to stop rock climbing, sailing, boating, joining the Boy Scouts, tying Christmas trees to their car roofs, and having kinky sex all at once. WTF would they do on the weekends?
I'm confused how you bring benefits for "Corporate America" into an argument which is most clearly "online corporate america" vs "brick and mortar corporate America". In either case, the tax itself get collected from the consumer, so at the end of the day it's really more of a State Government vs an easy way for people to cheat on their state taxes thing.
One could as easily say the blue states price of food is pushed down by subsidies so that they can afford to eat AND live in the cities. Who is in more trouble if the food market goes topsy-turvey, the guy living on land full of food he grows or the guy who can't afford it and has no space to grow it? It's bad for everyone, but I'd rather be surrounded by food I can't sell then have none and be unable to purchase it. We're all connected, and it's stupid to be stuffing your face with government bought food while you complain that the farmer got a "hand out" from the government for it.
hat is, you believe that it's fine that the people whose job it is to impartially and accurately record the evidence against you are also the same people whose job the next day is to argue as pointedly as possible that you are guilty? That's quite a conflict of interest.
That's an alignment of interest, not a conflict. The group who records and gathers evidence then presents the evidence. There's no conflict between those two duties, both parties are interested in getting convictions on the person they gathered evidence on. It would be a conflict if the same people who gather the evidence also decide on whether the evidence is good enough to convict. That's why the judge and jury are completely separate.
Our country is under no obligation to buy or sell goods with any other country. And if a country is in the view of many of our citizens "stealing" or misusing our goods and services why should we continue to do so if they aren't willing to address the problem? Your not entitled to our business and your not entitled to our goods. Both are given because it is mutually beneficial. If giving you those can be exchanged for something beneficial to my fellow citizens then it is my countries officials very duty to negotiate for those terms. Sometimes that might just be the good will of the Swedish youth. Other times they can shove their goodwill up their collective ass and give us cold hard cash if they want to do business, or GTFO if all they want to do is steal our content.
If Sweden cares more about pirating software then they do about US goods and market being open to them then good on em, that's their right as a sovereign country and no one can stop them. But don't cry foul when we decide to use our same rights as a sovereign country to decide not to do business with you.
pressuring other countries to change their laws completely disrespects their sovereignty.
No it doesn't, not in the least. Especially when your dealing with international issues, such as respecting international copyright laws. Like it or not, countries are connected. Diplomats are going to argue for their countries point of view, and if a country wants to keep any connections to the outside world (even America) they are going to have to compromise on some of the things they want.
If I'm a citizen of X and the diplomat of Y says "we're not going to help you with problem 2 if you don't deal with problem 1" my sovereignty is not being disrespected. I'm simply given a choice as to whether I value the help with problem 2 over my personal stance on problem 1. In fact, I'd say it's an affront to nation Y's sovereignty to demand that they provide help with problem 2 irregardless of any of their wants or needs.
It's the US that's forcing countries to accept its military bases, not the other way around.
That's actually very false. US Military bases are huge boons to the native economy, provide training and coordination with allied countries, gives them political leverage both with us and other nations, and strengthens their defense on our dime. The last couple times we've looked at closing some bases the countries have requested we stay and provided benefits in order to convince us. That's not the case across the board of course, but it is when talking about places like SK and Germany for sure.
Now I know you lack for reading comprehension. For starters, Russia is not Tunisia. And secondly those stories are about Russian Security forces cracking down on political groups under the auspices of "piracy". There's not a whole lot Microsoft can do if gun wielding Russian Security Forces want to break down your door and throw out a lame piracy excuse to do it despite the fact that you have genuine windows and the documentation to prove it. It's fucking Russia, they don't care. I stopped reading your examples when you got to the point where your pointing out Microsoft raising money for Tsunami victims via retweets. Yea, that's def proof positive of Microsoft knowingly and specifically helping the Government of Tunisia to spy on their citizens. Give me a break.
More like a machine gun that only shoots you in the arm or leg. That's would be ok to carry around right?
I'm confused as to whether you're drastically underestimating the danger of a firearm or wildly overestimating the danger of a laser. Getting shot in the leg is not equivalent to a burn from holding your leg perfectly still while someone points a laser at you. You can not negate the danger of a firearm by closing your eyes or wearing protective glasses. Perhaps a more apt analogy would be a BB gun with a great range and fire rate, but extremely small and light projectiles. If they hit someone's eye they are going to do damage, and if you keep shooting something in exactly the same spot it'll do damage. Not a perfect analogy mind you, but a lot closer to the real danger presented here.
Yeah it's like an easily concealed fully-automatic machine gun that can fire continuously for one to two hours till the battery runs out, with an "effective range" of up to 149 metres....
1. The cable specifically mentions Microsoft knew the Tunisian government would misuse the training.
No, it doesn't. It says: "Post questions whether this will expand GOT capacity to monitor its own citizens."
"Post" is not Microsoft, it is a self-reference to the diplomatic post or station which is writing the cable. Furthermore, it doesn't even say they KNOW what Tunisia will do, it says they question. For example, I might question whether you are incapable of reading comprehension, but I don't know it.
I think you brig out a good point here: "Providing a huge protected market mainly through the defense department"
I'm much more comfortable with paying for technology to be developed to meet a demand by a customer (in this case the military) then I am with a bunch of subsidies being paid to a company and saying "Good Luck finding customers!". In one case there's a shit load of guys with guns with very strict needs that are going to hold the company accountable to research and produce something of value for them. Once they do, it gets proven in the field and it's easier to bring civilian customers on board. In the other case it seems like we're just shoveling money off on a company and hoping a market develops and a demand comes up on it's own and at the end of the day we don't even get any sort of product out of it.
"Narus does not comment on potential business ventures," a Narus spokeswoman said in a statement. "There have been no sales or deployments of Narus technology in Libya."
Narus - USA - Nothing
Amesys - France - Eagle Technology to observe Network Traffic and read peoples emails
VASTech - South Africa - Zebra Survellience Product - tools to tap and log phone calls
ZTE - China - un-described monitoring tools and deals with security forces according to "insiders"
I'm thinking they trust wikileaks to protect them (the leaker) with anonymity not bystanders mentioned in the document as well as trust them to be able to have the resources for wide dissemination and to fight any lawsuits over the release.
No this is a huge issue for Wikileaks. They got most of their documents from people on the inside who needed and WANTED the ASSURANCE that some of what they were handing wikileaks would be redacted, like operative names, and informant information. They wanted it to be a RESPONSIBLE release of information, one that doesn't have to be OK'd by the very people it would embarrass.
Are you sure you're not just making up values you want wikileaks to represent in a perfect world and then pretending that they're in their mission statement? I seem to remember Wikileaks being cajoled into redacting information after a bunch of bad press (warranted or not) from their release of Manning's documents who clearly didn't care what was released and what wasn't. While they've decided to try to be more responsible and redact it's in no way their core value and the reason sources "trust" them. That's like saying everyone completely trusts Bob the bartender because he doesn't drink after we had that intervention for him last week and he joined AA!
Slashdot Mirror
How about a tax scale that accounts for the current unemployment rate? Higher unemployment = higher taxes for corporations and rich, lower unemployment is lower taxes for corporations and the rich. Hell of an incentive to create jobs.
I don't think that would work how you think. Say your technology company is just getting by making a small profit but not at the point where you can afford to hire another worker to increase business. Now the real estate market blows up. That's OK, your not in that sector of business, so your still chugging along helping the economy. But wait, now your corporate taxes shoot up because nation-wide unemployment is higher and you have to lay people off while getting the same amount of work done in order to not go bankrupt? Repeat this story across the country and suddenly your looking at a tremendous feedback cycle of economy wreckage.
One person having a billion dollars in the bank isn't going to make Target's quarterly numbers
Keep in mind that everything with economics is more complicated then the first level. One billion dollars does not simply sit in a bank. It is loaned out to businesses, large and small that wish to start up or expand, and private individuals who wish to buy homes or cars. If you're an hourly worker for a dry-walling company shopping at target your probably paying for your goods with money that some rich person had "in the bank".
Internet is a harsh mistress. If you can't be thick-skinned, go find different way to spend your time. And posting on-line, to world at large, "look how miserable we are" is just whoring.
Society is a harsher mistress, if you can't follow it's rules, society will find a different way to spend your time. Generally, locked in a small windowless room. Basically the internet is society's bitch. When it was young, society made the internet do it's homework. Now society makes the internet follow it around wherever it's going holding it's papers and documents and everything else society can't be bothered with lugging around. Society even makes the internet come into the shitter, and dictate trivial messages to society's "friends". How you ever got the impression that the internet is a bad-ass that can take society on I'll never understand.
Americans dying on an American rocket or Russians dying on a Russian rocket is a tragedy but Americans dying on a Russian rocket or vice versa is a political and diplomatic nightmare that would seriously damage this planets space efforts for generations.
Right, as opposed to when cargo is at stake. No Russians were on board the rocket, so where are you getting the comparison to Russian lives?
If the red states need the help, then give it to them. At the same time the people who live their or have that set of beliefs should realize this is what is keeping them fed.
The farms in those middle red states are what keep us all fed. The government subsidies keep the price of that food artificially low and stable. Fucks up developing third world farming but that's a topic for another day. The point is, while that money "goes" to the red states it goes to them to pay for food the blue states are eating too. So those farm subsidies are keeping us ALL fed, red states and blue. The subsidies aren't there because the red state farms need help and wellfare, they're there because the cities need to not have large uncertainty in the food supply and price levels that could lead to sudden food shortages and starvation. The government is picking up a good piece of your dinner check and you're complaining that the restaurant is getting paid.
So this is the last generation that will know how to tie even basic knots. *sigh*
One would assume everyone isn't going to stop rock climbing, sailing, boating, joining the Boy Scouts, tying Christmas trees to their car roofs, and having kinky sex all at once. WTF would they do on the weekends?
My guess is that they have a better plan up their sleeve.
Presumably they're thinking Congress will do something before the 1 year wait is over.
If Amazon's business plan is counting on Congress doing anything in a 1 year time span I'd start selling any stock I own in them.
I'm confused how you bring benefits for "Corporate America" into an argument which is most clearly "online corporate america" vs "brick and mortar corporate America". In either case, the tax itself get collected from the consumer, so at the end of the day it's really more of a State Government vs an easy way for people to cheat on their state taxes thing.
One could as easily say the blue states price of food is pushed down by subsidies so that they can afford to eat AND live in the cities. Who is in more trouble if the food market goes topsy-turvey, the guy living on land full of food he grows or the guy who can't afford it and has no space to grow it? It's bad for everyone, but I'd rather be surrounded by food I can't sell then have none and be unable to purchase it. We're all connected, and it's stupid to be stuffing your face with government bought food while you complain that the farmer got a "hand out" from the government for it.
hat is, you believe that it's fine that the people whose job it is to impartially and accurately record the evidence against you are also the same people whose job the next day is to argue as pointedly as possible that you are guilty? That's quite a conflict of interest.
That's an alignment of interest, not a conflict. The group who records and gathers evidence then presents the evidence. There's no conflict between those two duties, both parties are interested in getting convictions on the person they gathered evidence on. It would be a conflict if the same people who gather the evidence also decide on whether the evidence is good enough to convict. That's why the judge and jury are completely separate.
Our country is under no obligation to buy or sell goods with any other country. And if a country is in the view of many of our citizens "stealing" or misusing our goods and services why should we continue to do so if they aren't willing to address the problem? Your not entitled to our business and your not entitled to our goods. Both are given because it is mutually beneficial. If giving you those can be exchanged for something beneficial to my fellow citizens then it is my countries officials very duty to negotiate for those terms. Sometimes that might just be the good will of the Swedish youth. Other times they can shove their goodwill up their collective ass and give us cold hard cash if they want to do business, or GTFO if all they want to do is steal our content.
If Sweden cares more about pirating software then they do about US goods and market being open to them then good on em, that's their right as a sovereign country and no one can stop them. But don't cry foul when we decide to use our same rights as a sovereign country to decide not to do business with you.
pressuring other countries to change their laws completely disrespects their sovereignty.
No it doesn't, not in the least. Especially when your dealing with international issues, such as respecting international copyright laws. Like it or not, countries are connected. Diplomats are going to argue for their countries point of view, and if a country wants to keep any connections to the outside world (even America) they are going to have to compromise on some of the things they want.
If I'm a citizen of X and the diplomat of Y says "we're not going to help you with problem 2 if you don't deal with problem 1" my sovereignty is not being disrespected. I'm simply given a choice as to whether I value the help with problem 2 over my personal stance on problem 1. In fact, I'd say it's an affront to nation Y's sovereignty to demand that they provide help with problem 2 irregardless of any of their wants or needs.
It's the US that's forcing countries to accept its military bases, not the other way around.
That's actually very false. US Military bases are huge boons to the native economy, provide training and coordination with allied countries, gives them political leverage both with us and other nations, and strengthens their defense on our dime. The last couple times we've looked at closing some bases the countries have requested we stay and provided benefits in order to convince us. That's not the case across the board of course, but it is when talking about places like SK and Germany for sure.
Now I know you lack for reading comprehension. For starters, Russia is not Tunisia. And secondly those stories are about Russian Security forces cracking down on political groups under the auspices of "piracy". There's not a whole lot Microsoft can do if gun wielding Russian Security Forces want to break down your door and throw out a lame piracy excuse to do it despite the fact that you have genuine windows and the documentation to prove it. It's fucking Russia, they don't care. I stopped reading your examples when you got to the point where your pointing out Microsoft raising money for Tsunami victims via retweets. Yea, that's def proof positive of Microsoft knowingly and specifically helping the Government of Tunisia to spy on their citizens. Give me a break.
More like a machine gun that only shoots you in the arm or leg. That's would be ok to carry around right?
I'm confused as to whether you're drastically underestimating the danger of a firearm or wildly overestimating the danger of a laser. Getting shot in the leg is not equivalent to a burn from holding your leg perfectly still while someone points a laser at you. You can not negate the danger of a firearm by closing your eyes or wearing protective glasses. Perhaps a more apt analogy would be a BB gun with a great range and fire rate, but extremely small and light projectiles. If they hit someone's eye they are going to do damage, and if you keep shooting something in exactly the same spot it'll do damage. Not a perfect analogy mind you, but a lot closer to the real danger presented here.
Yeah it's like an easily concealed fully-automatic machine gun that can fire continuously for one to two hours till the battery runs out, with an "effective range" of up to 149 metres....
...It doesn't actually do direct lethal damage
Sooo...not like a machine gun at all then?
(i wonder for how many centuries would be eradicated famine from the planet with the banks bailout money)
Zero. You can't eat money and if you could the warlords would steal and horde it before it reached many of the starving people.
1. The cable specifically mentions Microsoft knew the Tunisian government would misuse the training.
No, it doesn't. It says: "Post questions whether this will expand GOT capacity to monitor its own citizens."
"Post" is not Microsoft, it is a self-reference to the diplomatic post or station which is writing the cable. Furthermore, it doesn't even say they KNOW what Tunisia will do, it says they question. For example, I might question whether you are incapable of reading comprehension, but I don't know it.
I think you brig out a good point here: "Providing a huge protected market mainly through the defense department"
I'm much more comfortable with paying for technology to be developed to meet a demand by a customer (in this case the military) then I am with a bunch of subsidies being paid to a company and saying "Good Luck finding customers!". In one case there's a shit load of guys with guns with very strict needs that are going to hold the company accountable to research and produce something of value for them. Once they do, it gets proven in the field and it's easier to bring civilian customers on board. In the other case it seems like we're just shoveling money off on a company and hoping a market develops and a demand comes up on it's own and at the end of the day we don't even get any sort of product out of it.
How much sales tax goes to the federal government again? In addition there's several states that don't have a general sales tax.
"Narus does not comment on potential business ventures," a Narus spokeswoman said in a statement. "There have been no sales or deployments of Narus technology in Libya."
I'm thinking they trust wikileaks to protect them (the leaker) with anonymity not bystanders mentioned in the document as well as trust them to be able to have the resources for wide dissemination and to fight any lawsuits over the release.
No this is a huge issue for Wikileaks. They got most of their documents from people on the inside who needed and WANTED the ASSURANCE that some of what they were handing wikileaks would be redacted, like operative names, and informant information. They wanted it to be a RESPONSIBLE release of information, one that doesn't have to be OK'd by the very people it would embarrass.
Are you sure you're not just making up values you want wikileaks to represent in a perfect world and then pretending that they're in their mission statement? I seem to remember Wikileaks being cajoled into redacting information after a bunch of bad press (warranted or not) from their release of Manning's documents who clearly didn't care what was released and what wasn't. While they've decided to try to be more responsible and redact it's in no way their core value and the reason sources "trust" them. That's like saying everyone completely trusts Bob the bartender because he doesn't drink after we had that intervention for him last week and he joined AA!
Because the US Embassy in Australia doesn't produce and own TV shows?