Can this actually be legal? Smoking is ( currently at least ) legal, so how can they penalize a smoker?
Because they can. Unless you're a member of a protected class, you can discriminate. For example, retirement homes. They can legally say no one under the age of 50 is allowed - that's what an attorney told me when I asked.
As I was told by the lawyer, people have this incorrect idea that all discrimination is illegal - it's not.
Well know protected classes: racial minorities, women are minorities even though they're 51% of the population, and old people.
If you're white, male, and under 40, you're pretty much screwed as far as anti discrimination laws are concerned.
(don't tell me how cutting taxes stimulates the economy and raises money and the laffer curve and supply side and fleeing jobs and all that... CA's economy has been "stimulated" in this manner for a generation, and it's still fucked.)
The problems that California have is the result of spending more that it earns. It's as simple as that. The economy was booming and tax revenues went through the roof because of it. Their tax policy, as far as income was concerned, wasn't too bad. Unfortunately, on April 15th in past years, the California legislature sees that huge pile of cash come in and they spent it thinking that California's boom will last forever. The Legislature, especially the liberal Democrats, have no clue about saving for the future or any clue that times do change and there are downturns in an economy.
Every time someone had some sort of project and regardless of its merits, they put money into it. Look now, when they want to cut spending, regardless of where, some special interest protests saying that they are important and the legislature needs to cut somewhere else.
If they had a responsible fiscal plan instead of spending every penny that came in they wouldn't be in this situation.
Laffer said that reducing taxes stimulates the economy as long as government reduces spending to match inflows. The California legislature was too stupid to realize that and they were too beholden to the special interests that always have their hands out for government money.
They might as well release "Steve Ballmer's Excrement Beta 4 - Now With More Cherry Flavoring!"
You know, this being the internet and everything, I'm sure Slashdot is going to be getting hits at 2AM from all over the World by folks with their pants down and well... just because of your comment.
I worked in a rehab one time, and I talked to various folks who were getting off of things: alcohol, coke, crack, etc... all of the ones who smoked cigarettes said that nicotine was the hardest drug to kick. Meaning, many of them beat all the other drugs but were struggling to kick cigarettes.
the iPhone is only unique in that its popular so people actually care that only one service provider can support it.
How true. Anyway...
Apple did in fact approach the other carriers (IIRC), but they refused to put into their infrastructure the ability for the iPhone to download messages without the user having to dial up for them. The iPhone owners I've talked to really like that feature and it allows them to jump around messages without having to listen to them all from the beginning of the queue - one of these guys had quite a few voicemails and I can see why he didn't want to have to listen to them all and it allowed him to glance at them all and listen to the one from say, his doctor, without having to start from the beginning.
I refused to get an iPhone because I didn't like the terms and conditions and pricing of the package.
I don't have a big screen TV. My wife and I both drive 4 cylinders that sip gas - when gas goes up to $4+ gallon we don't even notice. I don't watch TV - although, I do waste too much time on sites like this. And we keep the house cool in the Winter and the AC down in the Summer. So, yes, I am going first.
We, in the US to use an often cited stat, use 25% of the World's oil - and we're what? 4% of the World's population?
The reason why the consumption around the World is increasing is because people in developing countries want to live like US. If 300 million people are using 25% of the oil, then that would mean that only 1.2 billion can use oil like we do.
I say, we here in the USofA lead by example. If folks want to live like US, let's show them how to live.
Because they have a huge budget shortfall and they want to get rid of the big screen TVs, why not tax the shit out of them? It won't get rid of the TVs but it will really curtail their consumption.
Yeah, I know, there the issues of a black market or keep folks from crossing over to another state to buy them....
I will have to go back to using linx now because I trust nothing else...
If you're that paranoid — use a virtual machine to browse the web and rollback to a trusted, clean snapshot a few times a day.
Yeah, but how do I know that the snapshot is clean? Or for that matter how do I know that my virtual machine hasn't been compromised?
They could have put a chip in my brain that makes my think that I'm browsing securely but in fact I'm not!
And who are you to be posting these things to make us feel like we can be secure? The sig of yours is French, no? But your user name looks Arabic. You could be a French secret agent with an Arabic code name - or, an Islamic Jihadist, hiding in France acting like a friendly internet user "helping" folks to "secure" their browsing habits all along undermining their computers so you and your agents can break in, compromise their machines, do your nefarious activities, and all the while, the poor sap who follows your advice gets arrested by the FBI while you take off with the hot secret agent babes from Russia.
Non-root users can't install in Windows either. The problem is that most Windows users run their machines as admins; hence, all the virus problems folks have in the Windows World.
When a politician sneaks anything into law, I have to wonder what nefarious reasons he could have for doing it.
Why does it have to be sneaked in? Is there something that is undemocratic about it? What is being hidden from debate?
This is as bad as I've ever seen, folks. It's a declaration of war by the entertainment industry and their captured regulators against the principles of free speech, privacy, freedom of assembly, the presumption of innocence, and competition.
I see. The entertainment industry is calling the shots.
For Queen, Country and the Entertainment Industry.
1. the Quit/Fired employee says that he was eating Chinese food and typing the only word for cat that he could think of at the time was pussy. 2. Get a litigator and sue both the school and the St. Louis Dispatch for discrimination. The St. Louis dispatch is obviously discriminating against Asians and people who like to eat Asian food. 3. Profit. Great embarrassment among school administrator and paper.
The unmanned exploration is mostly useless. Nobody other than soil scientists care whether the crust of Mars is 27.6% silica or 27.7& silica.
Hogwash. A good remote-bot sample-return program could cover more areas than humans for roughly 1/4 the cost.
Thank you. That's right. Unmanned exploration gives you the biggest bang for the buck.
The GP talks about white collar aerospace welfare program, which is exactly what I think whenever I see an ISS story. Exactly what has that given us with regards to science or engineering?
How about a mission to an extrasolar planet? Or even the outer reaches of our solar system?
Folks talk about sending people out there, usually over some fantasy based on Star Trek, but the thing is, if we start just sending folks out without really knowing what is out there, we'll be not only putting folks at needless risk, but we'll also be putting money and other resources at risk. When I say risk, I mean needless risk. Risk is inherit with any human activity, but we shouldn't be sending folks out there willy nilly and without a stated goal other than putting them out there for the sake of having manned space flight.
The joke will be on them when they discover the value of real estate in 2013.
From what I've been seeing in the business press, the optimists think 2012 will be the year that real estate starts making it's comeback. 2018 is the pessimist's prediction. But the consensus is that we've hit bottom with residential real estate. Now, commercial real estate is a whole different matter.
A lot of natural resources go into Solar panels. Resources that need to be mined.
True. But there are a few different solar technologies out there that rely in different mix of natural resources. It isn't like today's nuclear tech that relies on one natural resource for the whole thing.
But as time goes on, we'll see more and more research into other areas of technology for all energy sources, including fossil fuels. We can't fall into the traps of: we're doomed because there's just not enough of 'X' in the World or, on the other side, we have nothing to worry about because someday, somehow, some technology will come by and solve all of our problems and in the meantime, business as usual and there's no reason to plan.
Am I the only one who's starting to think that as soon as we put all of our eggs in the solar energy basket, somebody will come along and say that we're almost out of sun?
If it does happen, I would think it was the speculators who bought all those sunshine futures and stock piled sunshine with the hopes of it going up in price.
Slashdot Mirror
Can this actually be legal? Smoking is ( currently at least ) legal, so how can they penalize a smoker?
Because they can. Unless you're a member of a protected class, you can discriminate. For example, retirement homes. They can legally say no one under the age of 50 is allowed - that's what an attorney told me when I asked.
As I was told by the lawyer, people have this incorrect idea that all discrimination is illegal - it's not.
Well know protected classes: racial minorities, women are minorities even though they're 51% of the population, and old people.
If you're white, male, and under 40, you're pretty much screwed as far as anti discrimination laws are concerned.
(don't tell me how cutting taxes stimulates the economy and raises money and the laffer curve and supply side and fleeing jobs and all that... CA's economy has been "stimulated" in this manner for a generation, and it's still fucked.)
The problems that California have is the result of spending more that it earns. It's as simple as that. The economy was booming and tax revenues went through the roof because of it. Their tax policy, as far as income was concerned, wasn't too bad. Unfortunately, on April 15th in past years, the California legislature sees that huge pile of cash come in and they spent it thinking that California's boom will last forever. The Legislature, especially the liberal Democrats, have no clue about saving for the future or any clue that times do change and there are downturns in an economy.
Every time someone had some sort of project and regardless of its merits, they put money into it. Look now, when they want to cut spending, regardless of where, some special interest protests saying that they are important and the legislature needs to cut somewhere else.
If they had a responsible fiscal plan instead of spending every penny that came in they wouldn't be in this situation.
Laffer said that reducing taxes stimulates the economy as long as government reduces spending to match inflows. The California legislature was too stupid to realize that and they were too beholden to the special interests that always have their hands out for government money.
They might as well release "Steve Ballmer's Excrement Beta 4 - Now With More Cherry Flavoring!"
You know, this being the internet and everything, I'm sure Slashdot is going to be getting hits at 2AM from all over the World by folks with their pants down and well... just because of your comment.
I worked in a rehab one time, and I talked to various folks who were getting off of things: alcohol, coke, crack, etc... all of the ones who smoked cigarettes said that nicotine was the hardest drug to kick. Meaning, many of them beat all the other drugs but were struggling to kick cigarettes.
How true. Anyway...
Apple did in fact approach the other carriers (IIRC), but they refused to put into their infrastructure the ability for the iPhone to download messages without the user having to dial up for them. The iPhone owners I've talked to really like that feature and it allows them to jump around messages without having to listen to them all from the beginning of the queue - one of these guys had quite a few voicemails and I can see why he didn't want to have to listen to them all and it allowed him to glance at them all and listen to the one from say, his doctor, without having to start from the beginning.
I refused to get an iPhone because I didn't like the terms and conditions and pricing of the package.
We save a lot of money by being pinko greenies.
We, in the US to use an often cited stat, use 25% of the World's oil - and we're what? 4% of the World's population?
The reason why the consumption around the World is increasing is because people in developing countries want to live like US. If 300 million people are using 25% of the oil, then that would mean that only 1.2 billion can use oil like we do.
I say, we here in the USofA lead by example. If folks want to live like US, let's show them how to live.
Yeah, I know, there the issues of a black market or keep folks from crossing over to another state to buy them....
If you're that paranoid — use a virtual machine to browse the web and rollback to a trusted, clean snapshot a few times a day.
Yeah, but how do I know that the snapshot is clean? Or for that matter how do I know that my virtual machine hasn't been compromised?
They could have put a chip in my brain that makes my think that I'm browsing securely but in fact I'm not!
And who are you to be posting these things to make us feel like we can be secure? The sig of yours is French, no? But your user name looks Arabic. You could be a French secret agent with an Arabic code name - or, an Islamic Jihadist, hiding in France acting like a friendly internet user "helping" folks to "secure" their browsing habits all along undermining their computers so you and your agents can break in, compromise their machines, do your nefarious activities, and all the while, the poor sap who follows your advice gets arrested by the FBI while you take off with the hot secret agent babes from Russia.
No sir! I know what you're doing here!
Non-root users can't install in Windows either. The problem is that most Windows users run their machines as admins; hence, all the virus problems folks have in the Windows World.
GP, see what you started? You're to blame.
Why does it have to be sneaked in?
Is there something that is undemocratic about it?
What is being hidden from debate?
This is as bad as I've ever seen, folks. It's a declaration of war by the entertainment industry and their captured regulators against the principles of free speech, privacy, freedom of assembly, the presumption of innocence, and competition.
I see. The entertainment industry is calling the shots.
For Queen, Country and the Entertainment Industry.
1. the Quit/Fired employee says that he was eating Chinese food and typing the only word for cat that he could think of at the time was pussy.
2. Get a litigator and sue both the school and the St. Louis Dispatch for discrimination. The St. Louis dispatch is obviously discriminating against Asians and people who like to eat Asian food.
3. Profit.
Great embarrassment among school administrator and paper.
I didn't realize there was a real software reason for it.
I wonder if there's a way to do the same for my wife - you know, fix a software bug.
Gotta run she's home!
The first thing I thought of was those Yahoo! toolbars that folks love to slip into every browser.
Why yes, I'm binging on the internet and I still can't get my fill!
Dr. Myhrvold has long pursued a Renaissance man portfolio of interests.
Renaissance man? More like Toad from the "Wind and the Willows".
EVIL and GOOD were
static int EVIL = 1;
and
static int GOOD = 0;
REALLY old guys from the K&R C Days would have done this
#define EVIL 1
#define GOOD 0
You youngin's and you're wipper snapper managed OOP langauges ....
Actually, I like them myself. I'm learning to really like C#. Managed C++, though, is a spawn of Satan.
CellCorp = EVIL;
}else{
CellCorp = GOOD;
}
The same goes for locking phones.
That was stupid of the military to dump the .45ACP for the 9mm.
--Father in Law, Ex - Army shooting and sniper trainer.
Hogwash. A good remote-bot sample-return program could cover more areas than humans for roughly 1/4 the cost.
Thank you. That's right. Unmanned exploration gives you the biggest bang for the buck.
The GP talks about white collar aerospace welfare program, which is exactly what I think whenever I see an ISS story. Exactly what has that given us with regards to science or engineering?
How about a mission to an extrasolar planet? Or even the outer reaches of our solar system?
Folks talk about sending people out there, usually over some fantasy based on Star Trek, but the thing is, if we start just sending folks out without really knowing what is out there, we'll be not only putting folks at needless risk, but we'll also be putting money and other resources at risk. When I say risk, I mean needless risk. Risk is inherit with any human activity, but we shouldn't be sending folks out there willy nilly and without a stated goal other than putting them out there for the sake of having manned space flight.
The joke will be on them when they discover the value of real estate in 2013.
From what I've been seeing in the business press, the optimists think 2012 will be the year that real estate starts making it's comeback. 2018 is the pessimist's prediction. But the consensus is that we've hit bottom with residential real estate. Now, commercial real estate is a whole different matter.
A lot of natural resources go into Solar panels. Resources that need to be mined.
True. But there are a few different solar technologies out there that rely in different mix of natural resources. It isn't like today's nuclear tech that relies on one natural resource for the whole thing.
But as time goes on, we'll see more and more research into other areas of technology for all energy sources, including fossil fuels. We can't fall into the traps of: we're doomed because there's just not enough of 'X' in the World or, on the other side, we have nothing to worry about because someday, somehow, some technology will come by and solve all of our problems and in the meantime, business as usual and there's no reason to plan.
Am I the only one who's starting to think that as soon as we put all of our eggs in the solar energy basket, somebody will come along and say that we're almost out of sun?
If it does happen, I would think it was the speculators who bought all those sunshine futures and stock piled sunshine with the hopes of it going up in price.
First "Pirate Bay" and torrents and now Hash?!? What next, cocaine?!