Funny thing, I didn't make any comment regarding the "typical" Slashdot reader. I used the term "any".
Uh. No, you didn't. You said, and I quote:
Of course this is something no reader of SlashDot would ever condone... Right...
Any sane reader of the English language would interpret that statement as a sarcastic indictment of the Slashdot community. ie, <sarcasm>no reader of Slashdot would ever condone theft<sarcasm>.
'course, when it comes right down to it, it just sounds like your grasp of the English language is far weaker than you realize. You should work on that. Maybe then your otherwise insightful posts won't languish without modpoints.
Of course this is something no reader of SlashDot would ever condone... Right...
Because the typical Slashdot reader is a thief?
Stupid thing is, your post actually had an interesting anecdote and made a good point. And then you decided to close off with a nice, unnecessarily dickish comment.
Actually, there were a few stories about people using false names/locations to donate to the Obama campaign.
Sounds like fraud. A proper system for collecting and tracking those donations would make accepting such funds illegal.
So you don't mind if a bunch of non-Canadians decided to dump a bunch of money on your candidates?
Given you'd already be limiting the size of donations, it seems like a no-brainer to limit them to actual citizens.
Or lots of people from your large provinces funneling money to candidates in the smaller ones?
No, I really don't, so long as the numbers are properly divulged. Why would I? Hell, I can't imagine why that'd happen in the first place, but if some Albertan decides they want to support a candidate in Nova Scotia, who am I to argue?
No, you can't prove a statement like "X does not exist". However, you can most certainly prove the statement "there is no correlation between X and Y" (in this case, race and intelligence). Just run the numbers. Lucky, you don't need to. The scientific community already has and, surprise surprise... there is no such correlation.
There are of course exceptions to any generalization, but stereotypes and generalizations exist BECAUSE the observed trait is accurate sufficiently often.
So, let me get this straight. Back in the slavery days, Caucasians believed that, in general, African-descended individuals were genetically inferior.
So you're telling me that such a belief must've been based on some sort of observed trait? As opposed to, say, broad prejudices spawned by bigotry and xenophobia that were then passed on from generation to generation?
Interesting thesis...
When you're dealing with statistical sample sizes measured in millions or tens of millions, you can draw some pretty accurate results.
Well, now, that's something else entirely. Last I checked, your average bigot didn't run a statistical sample to determine if their prejudices were valid.
Or: Correlation certainly doesn't imply causation, but correlation *is* necessary to prove any kind of relationship, and you can't demonstrate correlation based upon stereotypes and anecdotes.
All that said, I certainly agree that some stereotypes *may* be based in a small grain of truth. *Some*. But to claim that's generally true is completely absurd.
Which is nothing compared to the war crimes the Japanese themselves managed to commit.
And that justifies nuking a city packed with non-coms, how?
Right. It doesn't.
The atomic weapons used on Japan saved millions and millions of lives
Well, the first one unquestionably ended the war pretty damn quick. Granted, they could've, say, detonated it off the coast of Japan, first, to demonstrate their might *before* wiping out tens of thousands of civilians. But, hey, I'll be generous and give the US a pass on the first bomb.
But the second one? That amounted to nothing more than unjustifiable butchery.
Uhuh. Or, alternatively, the company could hire lawyers who aren't complete morons, and they write up a contract which includes two termination options for the employer:
a) Termination with non-compete, including continued pay for the duration, or b) Termination without non-compete
If the company believes you possess knowledge that would be truly beneficial to their competitors, they can go with option a. For your mythical con-man, he gets option b.
Funny thing is, I'm not sure I am.:) Or, rather, maybe you missed the point on which I disagree. Your original statement was we should also "blame the politicians". My point is that that's hardly fair... any politician who actually tried to run a bribary-free campaign would simply get defeated. In essence, it's the very system that makes honest politics in the US impossible. So blaming the politicians is misguided at best. They're only doing what they need to do to get elected. If you want to take bribary out of the equation, you've gotta change the system itself.
If one is collecting funds via the campaign website, how can you be certain that #1 is being followed and not open up the donors & their financial accounts to identity thieves?
And yet, here, in Canada, where we've been doing this for a *long* time, there's never been a problem. Mayhap you've identified a tempest in a teapot?
Besides, if you're truly paranoid about this, there are myriad ways to deal with it. Assuming, for the moment, that you could get the states on board (a big problem in the US, where even Federal elections are largely run and controlled at the state level), you'd begin by creating an arms-length, non-partisan, non-profit, audited organization (or network of organizations) who's responsibility is to monitor the election process. This organization would then either:
1) Audit campaigns to ensure they're up-to-snuff when it comes to data retention policies, or 2) Actually get involved in the finance game, collecting donations on behalf of the campaigns, and then disbursing those funds (it's a lot easier to do a security audit on a single organization).
In either case, said organization would also be responsible for auditing campaign finance in order to ensure everyone was playing by the rules.
If you're curious about how such an organization would be run, go check out Elections Canada.
Are you going to restrict donations to the boundaries over which the office has jurisdiction too?
Probably not. Why would you? The important thing is that donations are limited in size, and can only be made by individuals.
Of course, even in that scenario, you can game the system. But it's a hell of a lot harder than in the graft-ridden free-for-all that is the current US system.
But the politician is only about power for himself and getting re-elected.
And you find this surprising? Let's say, just for the sake of argument, they you're a good little politician who's interested in doing what you believe is best for the nation. Well, guess what? Step one in enacting your little plan for the country is to get elected. Only then can you actually do those good things you planned to do.
So, picture this: you're in the modern age, where TV and the Internet have become the gateway to people's minds and voting habits. You're running for an election, but you're up against a nasty little bastard who, through the miracle of lobbying, has raked in truly astronomical amounts of dough to fund his election bid. He's buying half-hour TV spots, fancy web-sites, and a large cadre of people who's entire job is to create viral buzz about him on the internet. Meanwhile, you have a few volunteers and a few thousand bucks you managed to save up.
You tell me, who's going to win?
Now, there are two obvious solutions to this problem:
1) Limit campaign donations so they only come from individuals, and are very limited in size, and combine that with requirements that the campaign publish information about all donations they accept. Basically, take the teeth out of the lobbyists by removing the opportunity to game the system, or:
2) Everyone becomes corrupt as they all compete for lobbyist dollars.
The US, in its infinite wisdom, opted for option number two, under the absolutely insane belief that money == free speech, and therefore bribary == free speech. Go figure.
So, in the US, you truly do get the government you pay for. Enjoy!
Yeah, pro-life, what a wicked position to take. Who do those people think they are, anyway?
If they were truly pro-life, they'd be vegan. But they're not. They're pro-human-life. And a small blob of cells without a functioning brain is not a human life any more than the brain dead body of a person on life support is a human life (or do you have issues with "pulling the plug" on such cases?).
It is if you want lots of new stem cell lines. For a massive fetal stem cell research effort, where are you going to get all of the new lines?
IVF treatments. The number of embryos discarded in IVF treatments every year is enormous. Why not harvest stem cells before throwing them away?
You're then in the business of creating human life, perhaps in factory conditions, just to destroy it to harvest the resources.
Right, so then you must be morally opposed to IVF, as well, right?
Embryonic stem cells often come from IVF treatments, wherein numerous ova are fertilized, and then only a small subset are selected for implantation in the uterus, while the rest are frozen are discarded. They are, for all intents and purposes, "aborted already" (incidentally, some pro-lifers specifically disapprove of IVF for precisely this reason).
With the advent of web-based office solutions, does OO really matter that much any more?
And then you proceed to point out that:
Granted, Google Docs has a long, long way to go to be considered a serious contender
Uh, isn't that the point? Google Docs is still a toy compared to your average office suite, and will likely remain that way for a long time.
I work with very basic documents
Ah, and now I see. You don't actually represent the kind of people who really use MS Office on a day-to-day basis. Hell, sounds like you'd be happy with good ol' WordPad.
so once I open them they are stored on Google's servers, and I can access them wherever I am -- home, office, yacht club, city morgue, etc.
Centralized storage solves that problem. Why centralize the application? Do that, and suddenly it's useless if you want to work on a plane, or anywhere where you don't have internet connectivity. And all the content is in the hands of Google. Dibsout, thanks.
Personally, for that kind of application, I'd be much happier with an SFTP-aware office suite. Then I could read/write documents directly to my own servers using whichever thick client fits my needs. Fortunately, Ubuntu makes that trivial (just mount the remote server with FUSE and go to town).
Now, in the corporate intranet space, a centrally served package like Google Docs, deployed privately within the network makes sense (similarly to the Gmail appliance), assuming, of course, that it ever comes even close to feature parity with something like OO.o (let alone MS Office). But I simply do not buy the idea that people will be moving to Google Docs en masse any time soon.
But war changes people. Perhaps that is why we need realistic depictions in mediums such as games, to let us feel like what it was like "in their shoes".
That's what books and films are for. Why the hell does the gaming industry need to get involved?
The simple fact is, games have one goal: to be fun. Any attempt to make war "fun" will completely miss the point. And if the result isn't fun, it isn't a game. It's a simulation. And I *highly* doubt anyone out there will be terribly interested in buying and experiencing a real, honest-to-god war simulation.
P2P a la bittorrent is the only way to feed the world with vidéos. Period.
No. The only way to "feed the world with videos" is to use the multicasting technology that's built right into the internet. Too bad the ISPs and carriers screwed up so badly and forced developers to create a far less efficient L7 solution...
Citation please. This statistic could be distorted by the fact that we have the latest, most advanced healthcare technology available. Highly advanced technology usually comes at a higher cost.
My favorite statistic in that list is #2. The US is *third* on the list in terms of public funding, per capita, for health care, and yet has piss poor coverage by comparison. Talk about inefficient!
Of course, you can explain away some of that cost to fancy new technology. Maybe. All of it? I don't think so. Of course, believing that certainly feeds into the myth that the US is the most advanced, fantastic nation on the face of the planet, so I can see why you'd choose the explanation.
If I want to mortgage my house to have the latest and greatest cancer treatment, at least that's my decision to make.
Buh? Latest and greatest? Try regular ol' chemotherapy. You don't need fancy treatment to go bankrupt in the US.
So your choice is life, or to be financially destitute. Yeah, that's just great.
Yes. Lets encourage the poor (and, hell, middle class as well) to wait until they're at death's door, when it's truly expensive to treat them, before going to the doctor. Good plan.
If you're really poor..there is already a govt. system...medicare (or medicade? I get them confused).
Which doesn't help the millions and millions of people who fall through the cracks of the system.
Recall that much of the cost in our health care system is due to two factors: litigation and greed.
Actually, a large portion of the cost is also in overhead. Or did you think that all those insurance companies and so forth come for free?
and pharmaceutical companies want money.
Funny you left out the insurance companies, who make gobs of dough off of people while doing their best to provide as little service as possible.
Socializing the US health care system won't fix much.
Au contraire. Socialized medicine has lower overheads, better coverage (don't have to worry if you're poor or have a pre-existing condition) better delivery (no insurance companies trying to deny me coverage), and better choice (yes, better choice... I get to actually pick my doctor).
IMHO, the real myth, in the US, is that people don't view their employer-provided health insurance as just a shadow tax. The simple fact is that employer-provided healthcare in the US is *expensive*. And that money that's being spent on overly-expensive insurance is money that *could* be handed out in salaries.
So if you're being taxed already, why not at least pay less tax, and get a more efficient (money-wise) system that covers more people? Well, the answer to that is simple: adherence to the religion of free market capitalism and an strict adherence to the words of the founding fathers, who lived in the days when the US was a fraction of its current size and healthcare, as it exists today, was unimaginable.
You miss the point -- most small software companies are hoping to be purchased at some point so the owners can cash out and retire. This clearly shows that a company with an open source product is a risky purchase, which means you won't get as much money for it.
Agreed, there is an increased risk, there. But that just means the purchasing company needs to be careful to reassure the community that they are going to continue to support and develop the product.
I mean, most people don't *want* to fork. They'll only do it if they feel they're backed up against a wall. So as long as the purchasing company is reasonable, I really don't think the risk is that great.
If you have evidence that some company is poisoning your groundwater, get your neighbors together and create a negative PR shitstorm for them! Organize a boycott of the company's products. Inform media sources that carry the company's advertisements that you're going to boycott them as well. Engage in some civil disobedience.
Wow. You're desperately naive, aren't you?
First off, your average corporate conglomerate is so fucking big that no little advertising campaign or boycott will make one bit of difference.
And even if it did, what of it? They just move their operations to a neighbourhood where the people are too poor or destitute to raise a fuss. It's probably cheaper than trying to clean up their operations (yay negative externalities!).
They think that big government is the answer to all of the world's problems
And small-government weenies like yourself have the exact opposite problem: the belief that the government is never the answer.
Guess what? The truth lies somewhere in the middle. And I think your beloved, infallible Founding Fathers would agree if they could see the scope and power of corporations today, something they could never, in their wildest dreams, have imagined.
Almost twice as expensive, per-capita, as compared to any other system in the world, while leaving 40M people completely without coverage?
Dude. That's pretty bad. Dying in the streets bad? No. But pretty damn shitty.
At at least with our system, you don't have your care 'rationed' to you by a govt.
Right. It's rationed by income. But it's still rationed, and in the worst way possible, not based on the severity of the condition, but based on the size of the wallet.
If we could get them mostly out of the picture, and allow more things like HSA (Health Savings Accounts - you can load them up pre-tax, and it is not a use it or lose it thing like a FSA)....I think prices would get much more reasonable.
And a family with a member who has a critical illness would still go bankrupt. And it would still leave the poor out in the cold.
Is is a *little* better? Maybe. But it's still bad.
Using tax money to pay for stuff doesn't make it cheaper - it just hides the cost.
Funny, then, that the US healthcare system is the most expensive one in the world.
Using tax money *does* mean that there is no longer a motive to make a profit, which means, at least on the services side, cheaper rates because the goal is to recover costs, not make a profit. This would be why, when the government privatized alcohol sales around these parts, prices went *up*, not down.
Using tax money also means that projects that would only be long-term profitable (infrastructure development) or not profitable at all (fundamental science) will actually still get done, as the government can, in theory, take the long view ('course, they don't always... elected terms don't last forever... but at least the government isn't focused on quarterly profits).
In short: competition isn't necessarily the best or only route to economic efficiency (again, witness the incredible inefficiencies in the US healthcare system).
Slashdot Mirror
Uh. No, you didn't. You said, and I quote:
Any sane reader of the English language would interpret that statement as a sarcastic indictment of the Slashdot community. ie, <sarcasm>no reader of Slashdot would ever condone theft<sarcasm>.
'course, when it comes right down to it, it just sounds like your grasp of the English language is far weaker than you realize. You should work on that. Maybe then your otherwise insightful posts won't languish without modpoints.
Of course this is something no reader of SlashDot would ever condone... Right...
Because the typical Slashdot reader is a thief?
Stupid thing is, your post actually had an interesting anecdote and made a good point. And then you decided to close off with a nice, unnecessarily dickish comment.
Actually, there were a few stories about people using false names/locations to donate to the Obama campaign.
Sounds like fraud. A proper system for collecting and tracking those donations would make accepting such funds illegal.
So you don't mind if a bunch of non-Canadians decided to dump a bunch of money on your candidates?
Given you'd already be limiting the size of donations, it seems like a no-brainer to limit them to actual citizens.
Or lots of people from your large provinces funneling money to candidates in the smaller ones?
No, I really don't, so long as the numbers are properly divulged. Why would I? Hell, I can't imagine why that'd happen in the first place, but if some Albertan decides they want to support a candidate in Nova Scotia, who am I to argue?
Proving a negative can't be done.
Way to misuse that little aphorism.
No, you can't prove a statement like "X does not exist". However, you can most certainly prove the statement "there is no correlation between X and Y" (in this case, race and intelligence). Just run the numbers. Lucky, you don't need to. The scientific community already has and, surprise surprise... there is no such correlation.
There are of course exceptions to any generalization, but stereotypes and generalizations exist BECAUSE the observed trait is accurate sufficiently often.
So, let me get this straight. Back in the slavery days, Caucasians believed that, in general, African-descended individuals were genetically inferior.
So you're telling me that such a belief must've been based on some sort of observed trait? As opposed to, say, broad prejudices spawned by bigotry and xenophobia that were then passed on from generation to generation?
Interesting thesis...
When you're dealing with statistical sample sizes measured in millions or tens of millions, you can draw some pretty accurate results.
Well, now, that's something else entirely. Last I checked, your average bigot didn't run a statistical sample to determine if their prejudices were valid.
Or: Correlation certainly doesn't imply causation, but correlation *is* necessary to prove any kind of relationship, and you can't demonstrate correlation based upon stereotypes and anecdotes.
All that said, I certainly agree that some stereotypes *may* be based in a small grain of truth. *Some*. But to claim that's generally true is completely absurd.
Which is nothing compared to the war crimes the Japanese themselves managed to commit.
And that justifies nuking a city packed with non-coms, how?
Right. It doesn't.
The atomic weapons used on Japan saved millions and millions of lives
Well, the first one unquestionably ended the war pretty damn quick. Granted, they could've, say, detonated it off the coast of Japan, first, to demonstrate their might *before* wiping out tens of thousands of civilians. But, hey, I'll be generous and give the US a pass on the first bomb.
But the second one? That amounted to nothing more than unjustifiable butchery.
Uhuh. Or, alternatively, the company could hire lawyers who aren't complete morons, and they write up a contract which includes two termination options for the employer:
a) Termination with non-compete, including continued pay for the duration, or
b) Termination without non-compete
If the company believes you possess knowledge that would be truly beneficial to their competitors, they can go with option a. For your mythical con-man, he gets option b.
Funny thing is, I'm not sure I am. :) Or, rather, maybe you missed the point on which I disagree. Your original statement was we should also "blame the politicians". My point is that that's hardly fair... any politician who actually tried to run a bribary-free campaign would simply get defeated. In essence, it's the very system that makes honest politics in the US impossible. So blaming the politicians is misguided at best. They're only doing what they need to do to get elected. If you want to take bribary out of the equation, you've gotta change the system itself.
If one is collecting funds via the campaign website, how can you be certain that #1 is being followed and not open up the donors & their financial accounts to identity thieves?
And yet, here, in Canada, where we've been doing this for a *long* time, there's never been a problem. Mayhap you've identified a tempest in a teapot?
Besides, if you're truly paranoid about this, there are myriad ways to deal with it. Assuming, for the moment, that you could get the states on board (a big problem in the US, where even Federal elections are largely run and controlled at the state level), you'd begin by creating an arms-length, non-partisan, non-profit, audited organization (or network of organizations) who's responsibility is to monitor the election process. This organization would then either:
1) Audit campaigns to ensure they're up-to-snuff when it comes to data retention policies, or
2) Actually get involved in the finance game, collecting donations on behalf of the campaigns, and then disbursing those funds (it's a lot easier to do a security audit on a single organization).
In either case, said organization would also be responsible for auditing campaign finance in order to ensure everyone was playing by the rules.
If you're curious about how such an organization would be run, go check out Elections Canada.
Are you going to restrict donations to the boundaries over which the office has jurisdiction too?
Probably not. Why would you? The important thing is that donations are limited in size, and can only be made by individuals.
Of course, even in that scenario, you can game the system. But it's a hell of a lot harder than in the graft-ridden free-for-all that is the current US system.
But the politician is only about power for himself and getting re-elected.
And you find this surprising? Let's say, just for the sake of argument, they you're a good little politician who's interested in doing what you believe is best for the nation. Well, guess what? Step one in enacting your little plan for the country is to get elected. Only then can you actually do those good things you planned to do.
So, picture this: you're in the modern age, where TV and the Internet have become the gateway to people's minds and voting habits. You're running for an election, but you're up against a nasty little bastard who, through the miracle of lobbying, has raked in truly astronomical amounts of dough to fund his election bid. He's buying half-hour TV spots, fancy web-sites, and a large cadre of people who's entire job is to create viral buzz about him on the internet. Meanwhile, you have a few volunteers and a few thousand bucks you managed to save up.
You tell me, who's going to win?
Now, there are two obvious solutions to this problem:
1) Limit campaign donations so they only come from individuals, and are very limited in size, and combine that with requirements that the campaign publish information about all donations they accept. Basically, take the teeth out of the lobbyists by removing the opportunity to game the system, or:
2) Everyone becomes corrupt as they all compete for lobbyist dollars.
The US, in its infinite wisdom, opted for option number two, under the absolutely insane belief that money == free speech, and therefore bribary == free speech. Go figure.
So, in the US, you truly do get the government you pay for. Enjoy!
Yeah, pro-life, what a wicked position to take. Who do those people think they are, anyway?
If they were truly pro-life, they'd be vegan. But they're not. They're pro-human-life. And a small blob of cells without a functioning brain is not a human life any more than the brain dead body of a person on life support is a human life (or do you have issues with "pulling the plug" on such cases?).
It is if you want lots of new stem cell lines. For a massive fetal stem cell research effort, where are you going to get all of the new lines?
IVF treatments. The number of embryos discarded in IVF treatments every year is enormous. Why not harvest stem cells before throwing them away?
You're then in the business of creating human life, perhaps in factory conditions, just to destroy it to harvest the resources.
Right, so then you must be morally opposed to IVF, as well, right?
Embryonic stem cells often come from IVF treatments, wherein numerous ova are fertilized, and then only a small subset are selected for implantation in the uterus, while the rest are frozen are discarded. They are, for all intents and purposes, "aborted already" (incidentally, some pro-lifers specifically disapprove of IVF for precisely this reason).
So you ask:
And then you proceed to point out that:
Uh, isn't that the point? Google Docs is still a toy compared to your average office suite, and will likely remain that way for a long time.
Ah, and now I see. You don't actually represent the kind of people who really use MS Office on a day-to-day basis. Hell, sounds like you'd be happy with good ol' WordPad.
Centralized storage solves that problem. Why centralize the application? Do that, and suddenly it's useless if you want to work on a plane, or anywhere where you don't have internet connectivity. And all the content is in the hands of Google. Dibsout, thanks.
Personally, for that kind of application, I'd be much happier with an SFTP-aware office suite. Then I could read/write documents directly to my own servers using whichever thick client fits my needs. Fortunately, Ubuntu makes that trivial (just mount the remote server with FUSE and go to town).
Now, in the corporate intranet space, a centrally served package like Google Docs, deployed privately within the network makes sense (similarly to the Gmail appliance), assuming, of course, that it ever comes even close to feature parity with something like OO.o (let alone MS Office). But I simply do not buy the idea that people will be moving to Google Docs en masse any time soon.
Doh, good point... *sigh*
But war changes people. Perhaps that is why we need realistic depictions in mediums such as games, to let us feel like what it was like "in their shoes".
That's what books and films are for. Why the hell does the gaming industry need to get involved?
The simple fact is, games have one goal: to be fun. Any attempt to make war "fun" will completely miss the point. And if the result isn't fun, it isn't a game. It's a simulation. And I *highly* doubt anyone out there will be terribly interested in buying and experiencing a real, honest-to-god war simulation.
P2P a la bittorrent is the only way to feed the world with vidéos. Period.
No. The only way to "feed the world with videos" is to use the multicasting technology that's built right into the internet. Too bad the ISPs and carriers screwed up so badly and forced developers to create a far less efficient L7 solution...
Oh, and as an aside, here are some other interesting statistics regarding healthcare coverage and performance:
Physicians > per 1,000 people (most recent) by country
Nurses (most recent) by country
Hospital beds (most recent) by country
Acute care beds (most recent) by country
Note that the US is behind most nations with socialized systems. Go figure.
Citation please. This statistic could be distorted by the fact that we have the latest, most advanced healthcare technology available. Highly advanced technology usually comes at a higher cost.
Health care funding > Total per capita (most recent) by country
Total expenditure as % of GDP (most recent) by country
Health care funding > Public per capita (most recent) by country
Health care funding > Private per capita (most recent) by country
My favorite statistic in that list is #2. The US is *third* on the list in terms of public funding, per capita, for health care, and yet has piss poor coverage by comparison. Talk about inefficient!
Of course, you can explain away some of that cost to fancy new technology. Maybe. All of it? I don't think so. Of course, believing that certainly feeds into the myth that the US is the most advanced, fantastic nation on the face of the planet, so I can see why you'd choose the explanation.
If I want to mortgage my house to have the latest and greatest cancer treatment, at least that's my decision to make.
Buh? Latest and greatest? Try regular ol' chemotherapy. You don't need fancy treatment to go bankrupt in the US.
So your choice is life, or to be financially destitute. Yeah, that's just great.
If you are in need...you don't get turned away.
Yes. Lets encourage the poor (and, hell, middle class as well) to wait until they're at death's door, when it's truly expensive to treat them, before going to the doctor. Good plan.
If you're really poor..there is already a govt. system...medicare (or medicade? I get them confused).
Which doesn't help the millions and millions of people who fall through the cracks of the system.
Recall that much of the cost in our health care system is due to two factors: litigation and greed.
Actually, a large portion of the cost is also in overhead. Or did you think that all those insurance companies and so forth come for free?
and pharmaceutical companies want money.
Funny you left out the insurance companies, who make gobs of dough off of people while doing their best to provide as little service as possible.
Socializing the US health care system won't fix much.
Au contraire. Socialized medicine has lower overheads, better coverage (don't have to worry if you're poor or have a pre-existing condition) better delivery (no insurance companies trying to deny me coverage), and better choice (yes, better choice... I get to actually pick my doctor).
IMHO, the real myth, in the US, is that people don't view their employer-provided health insurance as just a shadow tax. The simple fact is that employer-provided healthcare in the US is *expensive*. And that money that's being spent on overly-expensive insurance is money that *could* be handed out in salaries.
So if you're being taxed already, why not at least pay less tax, and get a more efficient (money-wise) system that covers more people? Well, the answer to that is simple: adherence to the religion of free market capitalism and an strict adherence to the words of the founding fathers, who lived in the days when the US was a fraction of its current size and healthcare, as it exists today, was unimaginable.
You miss the point -- most small software companies are hoping to be purchased at some point so the owners can cash out and retire. This clearly shows that a company with an open source product is a risky purchase, which means you won't get as much money for it.
Agreed, there is an increased risk, there. But that just means the purchasing company needs to be careful to reassure the community that they are going to continue to support and develop the product.
I mean, most people don't *want* to fork. They'll only do it if they feel they're backed up against a wall. So as long as the purchasing company is reasonable, I really don't think the risk is that great.
If you have evidence that some company is poisoning your groundwater, get your neighbors together and create a negative PR shitstorm for them! Organize a boycott of the company's products. Inform media sources that carry the company's advertisements that you're going to boycott them as well. Engage in some civil disobedience.
Wow. You're desperately naive, aren't you?
First off, your average corporate conglomerate is so fucking big that no little advertising campaign or boycott will make one bit of difference.
And even if it did, what of it? They just move their operations to a neighbourhood where the people are too poor or destitute to raise a fuss. It's probably cheaper than trying to clean up their operations (yay negative externalities!).
They think that big government is the answer to all of the world's problems
And small-government weenies like yourself have the exact opposite problem: the belief that the government is never the answer.
Guess what? The truth lies somewhere in the middle. And I think your beloved, infallible Founding Fathers would agree if they could see the scope and power of corporations today, something they could never, in their wildest dreams, have imagined.
Geez, it isn't that bad.
Almost twice as expensive, per-capita, as compared to any other system in the world, while leaving 40M people completely without coverage?
Dude. That's pretty bad. Dying in the streets bad? No. But pretty damn shitty.
At at least with our system, you don't have your care 'rationed' to you by a govt.
Right. It's rationed by income. But it's still rationed, and in the worst way possible, not based on the severity of the condition, but based on the size of the wallet.
If we could get them mostly out of the picture, and allow more things like HSA (Health Savings Accounts - you can load them up pre-tax, and it is not a use it or lose it thing like a FSA)....I think prices would get much more reasonable.
And a family with a member who has a critical illness would still go bankrupt. And it would still leave the poor out in the cold.
Is is a *little* better? Maybe. But it's still bad.
Seriously, I was all like, "sure, maybe I'll download Ubuntu 9.04 and give it a whirl... but I should probably find out what q2k is doing, first..."
Using tax money to pay for stuff doesn't make it cheaper - it just hides the cost.
Funny, then, that the US healthcare system is the most expensive one in the world.
Using tax money *does* mean that there is no longer a motive to make a profit, which means, at least on the services side, cheaper rates because the goal is to recover costs, not make a profit. This would be why, when the government privatized alcohol sales around these parts, prices went *up*, not down.
Using tax money also means that projects that would only be long-term profitable (infrastructure development) or not profitable at all (fundamental science) will actually still get done, as the government can, in theory, take the long view ('course, they don't always... elected terms don't last forever... but at least the government isn't focused on quarterly profits).
In short: competition isn't necessarily the best or only route to economic efficiency (again, witness the incredible inefficiencies in the US healthcare system).