If you don't vote for anyone, not even one of the "others", you're also part of the problem then.
Who said anything at all about not voting? I was talking about equal-opportunity mocking.
Because there is no good reason for the Two Parties to change if they keep getting > 98% of all the votes.
I agree. That's why I vote third-party when I can and for independent candidates in the rare occasions when the two-party system fields them. Russ Feingold cast the sole vote against the draconian and Orwellian "USA Patriot" act, and I voted for him twice, though unfortunately it was not enough to save him from being tea-bagged.
In contrast even when one of the Two Parties still wins, if that percentage starts dropping fast, you will see change eventually.
We hope. Either way, it's still fun to mock all involved on both sides.
I think you might be thinking of Capitalists rather than Conservatives.
Why is it everyone assumes I don't know what a conservative is? First people tell me I mean Republican, not Conservative. No, I don't: I'm not talking about people who are running for office with "R" next to their name, I'm not talking about registered Republicans, I'm talking about people whose political positions lie at the right flank of what Republicans usually stand for and people who vote for the Constitution party, or the Libertarian party, or the Republican party, whoever has the candidate with the best conservative credentials in a given race.
Now you're telling me I'm really talking about Capitalists. I don't know what you're talking about. I'm talking about people who say, "you can't take away my guns, it's in the Constitution!" because guns are something they believe in, but when you talk about the free speech rights of people who criticize US military policy they tell you those people are "idiots" who don't count because that criticism is not something they believe in. I don't see anything Capitalist about that. I also don't see anything Conservative (per se) about that, but these are folks who are conservative in basically every other sense (opposing social change, uncritically upholding tradition, claiming to care about budget deficits except when a conservative president is in office, et cetera) and who call themselves "conservative", so I take them at their word on that and call them conservatives as well.
It has been my observation over the years that in politics, when someone accusing what they see as an opposing side of something, their side is just as guilty, if not more so, of the same charge.
Mistake #1: Picking a side.
Some of us have wisely decided to mock all sides from on high.
Actually, she did know what was in the Constitution.
False. She believed the clause that says government can not participate in "establishment of religion" (the Establishment Clause) was not in the First Amendment.
"Separation of Church and State" does not appear anywhere in the Constitution. It is a phrase coined by Thomas Jefferson.
True. It was a phrase coined by Jefferson to illustrate what he thought the Establishment Clause meant. Many ordinary Americans like myself and many erudite legal scholars side with Jefferson on this one.
She specifically asked her opponent where that phrase appeared in the Constitution.
No, she asked where the principle appeared in the Constitution. When her opponent stated, "Congress shall make no establishment of religion," O'Donnell responded sarcastically and incredulously, "That's in the First Amendment," then smirked as though she'd caught her opponent saying something stupid. Watching the debate, it is abundantly clear that she believed the Establishment Clause is not part of the First Amendment.
(Coons did omit the words "law respecting an" from the Establishment Clause, but the meaning is the same)
She then followed up by asking him what five freedoms are in the First Amendment, he was unable to answer her question, but most of the press never bothered to report that.
She asked him a grade-school question in hopes it would trip him up, and he responded maturely by returning to the subject matter of the debate rather than get off on a fifth-grade-trivia pissing-contest tangent. You construe his unwillingness to answer an irrelevant and distracting question as inability to answer. Quite a leap of logic on your part.
Ha! You think ANYONE of any party who can currently manage to get into office cares what's in the Constitution? Dennis Kucinich excepted, since he carries that mini-Constitution in his breast pocket, right next to his heart.
He also carries around a teabag (but he started before it was cool!) and a mini Stephen Colbert, though, too. But yeah, who said anything about getting into office? We were talking about little-c conservatives here. Rank and file folks. My experience getting in extensive debates with many conservatives has been that they care about the Constitution until it protects something they don't like, and then they don't.
The funny thing is, you probably think Democrats DO.
Actually I don't, which is why I vote 3rd party, unless the party in question is particularly repugnant. I would much rather see Libertarians and Greens fight over what to do in government than Democrats and Republicans. I don't agree with a single one of Ron Paul's positions on spending or economics, but I'd vote for him for President simply because I know my 1st-amendment rights will be better protected under him than, say, Obama.
If you want REAL change, how about we dump the two corrupt parties that got us into this mess. EVERYONE should vote third party. Don't worry about "throwing your vote away", because the two parties are the same, and things just keep getting worse the longer they stay in power.
I won't go so far as to say the two parties are the same. There are meaningful differences between the two. The problem is, as long as the majority votes for one or the other every time, they have an incentive to be as similar as possible. Democrats will typically do best by being only one step to the left of Republicans, Republicans will (usually) do best by being no more than one step to the right of Democrats, and they can united in bipartisan initiatives like warrantless wiretapping, police raids of non-violent protest groups, indefinite detentions without criminal charges, and spending all our money on pork. The more we vote outside the two-party system, the less they'll get away with that crap and the more difference they'll have to show between themselves.
I agree that this is a really nice from Microsoft, but why not go for the "original", i.e. Ocaml?
I've never used either, but I'm guessing from the aggregate of the above posts that F# is a considerable improvement, because Ocaml is rough around the edges and falling into disrepair.
What makes it interesting is that it will all be from a definitively conservative basis, it would be interesting to watch Republicans publicly attempt to defend copyright protections for pornography.
Ha! You think conservatives actually care about following what's in the Constitution, instead of merely invoking its name to support whatever they've dreamed up. Sucker!
Now technically as the movie can not demonstrate the ability to "promote the useful arts and sciences" under law it is not entitled to copyright protection. So for those who can stand the embarrassment of public admitting sharing that film, there is always a US constitutional challenge...
Unfortunately, the copyright clause of the US constitution has been ignored by all courts for decades. Especially the whole "for limited times" bit.
It's harder to make them look ridiculous with their huge fines if we're not grounded in reality either and pretend d/l music/movies is so good that it helps children in Africa heal from AIDS and prolongs unicorn marriages.
Wait...you mean it doesn't? Shit, what was I torrenting 20,000 gigs of unicorn hentai for then?
How did he "scam" them? He inserted his thoughts and ideas into the public debate. Nobody held a gun to a voters head and said "You must do what Mr. Ballmer says is right."
Oh, you're right. I momentarily forgot that the definition of "scam" was "hold a gun to someone's head." My mistake.
Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't California have a state income tax as well as the highest sales tax and yet it still manages to a magnet for high tech companies.
You're right, but anti-tax ideologues will never admit it, because they live in a world where facts need not apply.
Stop using logic when Slashdot is having its 2 minutes of hate for Microsoft!
If your definition of "logic" is lying about what the summary says and then calling everyone who actually read it an idiot, then yeah, stop using that logic!
You fail to see how whether the proposed tax was passed or not it would have absolutely NO IMPACT on the $2 billion in shares he sold?
I fail to see how it can be so damn hard to Read the Fucking Summary, which clearly states that the tax would have applied to those capital gains. Also, that he is planning to sell. Not already sold.
Also, income taxes are a very inefficient form of taxation because it discourages people from working (Economist Gregory Mankiw wrote an article in the NY Times recently about this).
Yes, but are you aware that three out of Mankiw's Ten Principles of Economics can just be rephrased as "Blah blah blah?"
I also fail to see the story. Ask any business manager and he will be against higher income taxes, in part because it makes it harder to attract new talent when your area has income tax higher than average.
I don't think the point is about Ballmer opposing the tax increase. You're right, that would be obvious. I think the point was about the political process being so manipulable: he was able to invest a few hundred thousand dollars to avoid having to pay a few tens of millions in taxes (which the state could probably use pretty badly right about now). Hopefully I-1098 was actually a bad idea, because otherwise Ballmer just scammed the Washington electorate.
Income tax is on income, not capital gains. He wouldn't have been paying income tax on his share sale anyway.
Capital gains are a form of income. Let me ask you this: when you realize capital gains, do you have more money than you did before? Then it's income, because that's the definition of income: money coming in. They're only treated separately from "earned income" by a statutory distinction (particularly in the federal tax code), not because they're fundamentally a different animal. Also, RTFS, "I-1098 would apply this tax rate to all income, including capital gains and dividends..."
And his argument was that it would hurt his ability to attract talent. Unless by talent he meant himself I fail to see how what he does with his assets has to do with this issue.
You feel to see how it shows the whole "attracting talent" angle was a pretext?
Slashdot Mirror
If you don't vote for anyone, not even one of the "others", you're also part of the problem then.
Who said anything at all about not voting? I was talking about equal-opportunity mocking.
Because there is no good reason for the Two Parties to change if they keep getting > 98% of all the votes.
I agree. That's why I vote third-party when I can and for independent candidates in the rare occasions when the two-party system fields them. Russ Feingold cast the sole vote against the draconian and Orwellian "USA Patriot" act, and I voted for him twice, though unfortunately it was not enough to save him from being tea-bagged.
In contrast even when one of the Two Parties still wins, if that percentage starts dropping fast, you will see change eventually.
We hope. Either way, it's still fun to mock all involved on both sides.
I think you might be thinking of Capitalists rather than Conservatives.
Why is it everyone assumes I don't know what a conservative is? First people tell me I mean Republican, not Conservative. No, I don't: I'm not talking about people who are running for office with "R" next to their name, I'm not talking about registered Republicans, I'm talking about people whose political positions lie at the right flank of what Republicans usually stand for and people who vote for the Constitution party, or the Libertarian party, or the Republican party, whoever has the candidate with the best conservative credentials in a given race.
Now you're telling me I'm really talking about Capitalists. I don't know what you're talking about. I'm talking about people who say, "you can't take away my guns, it's in the Constitution!" because guns are something they believe in, but when you talk about the free speech rights of people who criticize US military policy they tell you those people are "idiots" who don't count because that criticism is not something they believe in. I don't see anything Capitalist about that. I also don't see anything Conservative (per se) about that, but these are folks who are conservative in basically every other sense (opposing social change, uncritically upholding tradition, claiming to care about budget deficits except when a conservative president is in office, et cetera) and who call themselves "conservative", so I take them at their word on that and call them conservatives as well.
I thought the Slashdot crowd were more inclined to robes and wizard hats...
Hey, we like variety.
It has been my observation over the years that in politics, when someone accusing what they see as an opposing side of something, their side is just as guilty, if not more so, of the same charge.
Mistake #1: Picking a side.
Some of us have wisely decided to mock all sides from on high.
Actually, she did know what was in the Constitution.
False. She believed the clause that says government can not participate in "establishment of religion" (the Establishment Clause) was not in the First Amendment.
"Separation of Church and State" does not appear anywhere in the Constitution. It is a phrase coined by Thomas Jefferson.
True. It was a phrase coined by Jefferson to illustrate what he thought the Establishment Clause meant. Many ordinary Americans like myself and many erudite legal scholars side with Jefferson on this one.
She specifically asked her opponent where that phrase appeared in the Constitution.
No, she asked where the principle appeared in the Constitution. When her opponent stated, "Congress shall make no establishment of religion," O'Donnell responded sarcastically and incredulously, "That's in the First Amendment," then smirked as though she'd caught her opponent saying something stupid. Watching the debate, it is abundantly clear that she believed the Establishment Clause is not part of the First Amendment.
(Coons did omit the words "law respecting an" from the Establishment Clause, but the meaning is the same)
She then followed up by asking him what five freedoms are in the First Amendment, he was unable to answer her question, but most of the press never bothered to report that.
She asked him a grade-school question in hopes it would trip him up, and he responded maturely by returning to the subject matter of the debate rather than get off on a fifth-grade-trivia pissing-contest tangent. You construe his unwillingness to answer an irrelevant and distracting question as inability to answer. Quite a leap of logic on your part.
Ha! You think ANYONE of any party who can currently manage to get into office cares what's in the Constitution? Dennis Kucinich excepted, since he carries that mini-Constitution in his breast pocket, right next to his heart.
He also carries around a teabag (but he started before it was cool!) and a mini Stephen Colbert, though, too. But yeah, who said anything about getting into office? We were talking about little-c conservatives here. Rank and file folks. My experience getting in extensive debates with many conservatives has been that they care about the Constitution until it protects something they don't like, and then they don't.
The funny thing is, you probably think Democrats DO.
Actually I don't, which is why I vote 3rd party, unless the party in question is particularly repugnant. I would much rather see Libertarians and Greens fight over what to do in government than Democrats and Republicans. I don't agree with a single one of Ron Paul's positions on spending or economics, but I'd vote for him for President simply because I know my 1st-amendment rights will be better protected under him than, say, Obama.
If you want REAL change, how about we dump the two corrupt parties that got us into this mess. EVERYONE should vote third party. Don't worry about "throwing your vote away", because the two parties are the same, and things just keep getting worse the longer they stay in power.
I won't go so far as to say the two parties are the same. There are meaningful differences between the two. The problem is, as long as the majority votes for one or the other every time, they have an incentive to be as similar as possible. Democrats will typically do best by being only one step to the left of Republicans, Republicans will (usually) do best by being no more than one step to the right of Democrats, and they can united in bipartisan initiatives like warrantless wiretapping, police raids of non-violent protest groups, indefinite detentions without criminal charges, and spending all our money on pork. The more we vote outside the two-party system, the less they'll get away with that crap and the more difference they'll have to show between themselves.
Both sides only interest in what the Constitution contains extends only as far as the contents support their position.
True. That's why I'd rather not be either.
I agree that this is a really nice from Microsoft, but why not go for the "original", i.e. Ocaml?
I've never used either, but I'm guessing from the aggregate of the above posts that F# is a considerable improvement, because Ocaml is rough around the edges and falling into disrepair.
What makes it interesting is that it will all be from a definitively conservative basis, it would be interesting to watch Republicans publicly attempt to defend copyright protections for pornography.
Ha! You think conservatives actually care about following what's in the Constitution, instead of merely invoking its name to support whatever they've dreamed up. Sucker!
Now technically as the movie can not demonstrate the ability to "promote the useful arts and sciences" under law it is not entitled to copyright protection. So for those who can stand the embarrassment of public admitting sharing that film, there is always a US constitutional challenge...
Unfortunately, the copyright clause of the US constitution has been ignored by all courts for decades. Especially the whole "for limited times" bit.
I wonder why its so popular? I never thought to myself, "gee, I'd really like to fuck that girl... AS BATMAN!"
What the fuck are you doing on Slashdot? Clearly you don't belong here.
When do we get to the part where Axel Braun gets sued for using the trademarked name Batman for a porn movie?
It's harder to make them look ridiculous with their huge fines if we're not grounded in reality either and pretend d/l music/movies is so good that it helps children in Africa heal from AIDS and prolongs unicorn marriages.
Wait...you mean it doesn't? Shit, what was I torrenting 20,000 gigs of unicorn hentai for then?
How did he "scam" them? He inserted his thoughts and ideas into the public debate. Nobody held a gun to a voters head and said "You must do what Mr. Ballmer says is right."
Oh, you're right. I momentarily forgot that the definition of "scam" was "hold a gun to someone's head." My mistake.
That would be great, if we were talking about the unemployment rate. The discussion was about attracting high-tech industry and talent.
Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't California have a state income tax as well as the highest sales tax and yet it still manages to a magnet for high tech companies.
You're right, but anti-tax ideologues will never admit it, because they live in a world where facts need not apply.
Stop using logic when Slashdot is having its 2 minutes of hate for Microsoft!
If your definition of "logic" is lying about what the summary says and then calling everyone who actually read it an idiot, then yeah, stop using that logic!
Of course I'm a left leaning person who believes that civic and social responsibility are important features of a functioning democracy.
Ha! Fool! You naively believe in civic and social responsibility. Did Ayn Rand teach you nothing?
You fail to see how whether the proposed tax was passed or not it would have absolutely NO IMPACT on the $2 billion in shares he sold?
I fail to see how it can be so damn hard to Read the Fucking Summary, which clearly states that the tax would have applied to those capital gains. Also, that he is planning to sell. Not already sold.
You feel to see how it shows the whole "attracting talent" angle was a pretext?
*fail to see
Also, income taxes are a very inefficient form of taxation because it discourages people from working (Economist Gregory Mankiw wrote an article in the NY Times recently about this).
Yes, but are you aware that three out of Mankiw's Ten Principles of Economics can just be rephrased as "Blah blah blah?"
I also fail to see the story. Ask any business manager and he will be against higher income taxes, in part because it makes it harder to attract new talent when your area has income tax higher than average.
I don't think the point is about Ballmer opposing the tax increase. You're right, that would be obvious. I think the point was about the political process being so manipulable: he was able to invest a few hundred thousand dollars to avoid having to pay a few tens of millions in taxes (which the state could probably use pretty badly right about now). Hopefully I-1098 was actually a bad idea, because otherwise Ballmer just scammed the Washington electorate.
Income tax is on income, not capital gains. He wouldn't have been paying income tax on his share sale anyway.
Capital gains are a form of income. Let me ask you this: when you realize capital gains, do you have more money than you did before? Then it's income, because that's the definition of income: money coming in. They're only treated separately from "earned income" by a statutory distinction (particularly in the federal tax code), not because they're fundamentally a different animal. Also, RTFS, "I-1098 would apply this tax rate to all income, including capital gains and dividends..."
And his argument was that it would hurt his ability to attract talent. Unless by talent he meant himself I fail to see how what he does with his assets has to do with this issue.
You feel to see how it shows the whole "attracting talent" angle was a pretext?