(I just hit the quota on the first account again, but same guy here)
If someone kills their IQ, they effectively lower their "worth" to contribute to society.
- I disagree. Nothing about killing one's IQ tells us anything about their 'worth to society'. In fact intelligence is not even a prerequisite to survival. People can be very useful to society and they can be quite unintelligent still. There are many jobs, many things that people can do that absolutely do not require high levels of intelligence.
What then? Do we set up opium-type dens and let them have at?
- why should you do anything about them, are they bothering you in any way? How are they hurting you by being not as intelligent as they could be otherwise?
You are not being made responsible for other people's decisions if you leave them alone. You are being made responsible by the government, that takes people, throws them to jail and forces you to pay taxes and pay in all other ways that society pays, when it places its members into jail.
You simply didn't understand a word of it, when you are saying: 'screw the attic fan manufacturer', you are talking about a guy who is reducing the US trade deficit. Putting him out of business, when his business is mostly manufacturing in USA, while buying a component that cannot be manufactured in USA is really stupid.
All it does it gives him 2 options: shut down entirely or move out of USA, guess what, most people in that position prefer to keep their business even if it means moving out.
This does not at all mean that by being 'nationalistic' you are going to have businesses spring out inside USA. I am from the former USSR, we didn't have businesses spring out behind the iron curtain, we just had entrepreneurial people who were hoping to leave at some point while doing something inside the country that was considered illegal. We had majority of the population that was poor, because they didn't have attic fans, or whatever, best products that could get gotten, was mostly foreign made, and we had a top class, the elite, who lived much better than the rest. They weren't producing anything, they were the political elite who had military in their hands, so they were the politicians that protected themselves from the population and from the outside world with military, that was it. That was the economy. You are going to be in the same position, you are moving in that direction.
Didn't you hear - those who do not know history will repeat it?
--
As to pollution, etc., you are going to have much more of it now, that you'll lose your manufacturing and the tools and the knowledge how to do, what you used to do, and then eventually the Chinese and the rest stop buying your debt, stop subsidizing you and giving you their products. Then you'll find out that you can't actually afford products from other countries if you are not manufacturing anything in return. You'll have to retool and rebuild manufacturing, but because you made all these mistakes, and lost your manufacturing, you are going to do it in the cheapest way possible, and you will pollute so much in your country now. So much pollution is going to be created now, with the EPA and everything else that your gov't pushed on you, because those very gov't functions, departments, destroyed your manufacturing and production. So you will end up polluting much more than free market would have caused.
Again, USSR was a huge polluter, because it was poor and had all that gov't to prevent free market.
And that attic fan manufacturer was one of the guys who produced something that could be exchanged for foreign made goods, thus reducing the balance of trade.
Saying: screw that guy, is exactly as the saying goes: cut your nose off to spite your face.
You know, I understand the frustration. However Fiorina was right. Unfortunately she was right.
I cannot underscore it enough, how much I am accenting the word 'unfortunately' here.
Why am I saying it? Because USA laws, regulations, taxes and inflation make it an unproductive, uncompetitive place to run business in.
If you want to understand what I am referring to, here is something for you to consider:
US manufacturer destroyed by US law, minutes 19:19 - 49:19 - here was a manufacturer, whose business required buying specialised miniature solar panels and the best supplier was in China. The new tariffs that were introduced basically killed his business. He was manufacturing an attic fan that used that solar panel, but all the rest of the manufacturing is (still) done in USA.
Now consider this: the new tariff means that for the businessman to stay in business he MUST OUTSOURCE ALL (100%) of his manufacturing elsewhere (Canada and Mexico are both inviting him in).
His business helped USA to reduce the enormous trade deficit that USA is running, because he was an importer as well as an exporter, his final product is bought around the world.
The sad part is that he was a poster-child for Obama's campaign when Obama sat down with supposedly 'small business community' where the ONLY person at the table that actually was a small businessman was this guy. The rest of the people who Obama was really talking to there, they were all large corporations getting something from Obama, they all wanted something. This guy didn't realise that he was used as a political prop at the time though.
Now the new tariffs are putting him out of business in USA and the only way to stay competitive, to stay in business is to move the business outside of USA.
--
Now back to Fiorina, AFAIC she is a fucking GENIUS. She didn't wait to be in the same predicament as this poor schmuck. She predicted a similar situation for her company and acted before it happened. As I said - it's unfortunate. But to understand the reasons behind it you need to understand the very problem itself in the first place.
----
(oh, and if you want to moderate this lower, you can take it upon both of my accounts, this one and the first one as well).
The interview is with a small business entrepreneur who was framed by Obama to be his poster boy when it was profitable politically, when Obama wanted to sell the idea that he is for 'small-business', while giving money to huge industry and what he actually did to small businessman, destroyed him.
.... Java Zero Day VulnerabilityâoeIn my lab environment, I was able to successfully exploit my test machine against latest version of Firefox with JRE version 1.7 update 6 installed,â he wrote on the company blog.
The exploit was found on a server in China, and if it successfully attacks a given endpoint, the payload that is delivered is hosted on the same server. While the IP address associated with the malicious box has been known to serve malware in the past, it isnâ(TM)t responding to browser connections. Nevertheless, the IP is live..... On Monday, the Metasploit Exploit team at Rapid7 said they found the PoC and had developed a working exploit that they say enables a successful attack against a fully patched Windows 7 SP1 with Java 7 Update 6.
âoeAs a user, you should take this problem seriously, because there is currently no patch from Oracle. For now, our recommendation is to completely disable Java until a fix is available,â a blog post from Rapid7 notes.
Once again, itâ(TM)s wise to remove Java if it isnâ(TM)t absolutely needed in your environment. Most home users have little need for the software these days, and most experts agree the risk outweighs the reward when it comes to installing it.
I don't know why the OP is moderated Funny, maybe they have Java installed on their 'humour sensing unit'.
--
OTOH I wish IBM bought Sun back when Oracle made their bid, this lack of interest by Oracle is just perplexing at this point. If Ellison doesn't see a way to monetize Java environment, why not sell it? Have an auction, put it on Ebay.
This is a normal thing that you see within any context where there are people who want control vs people who want freedom, this is just one type of manifestation of such a situation. Yes, RIAA and the cohorts will be pissed and they will try to shut it down as well. Yes, TPB will try to avoid being shut down and there will be more services like this one available. The fact that TPB is going to try and make a buck off of it makes perfect sense, somehow the service has to be managed, somebody has to put in the time and resources, whatever capital, land and labour that it will take to have this thing running and it makes perfect sense to try and run it for profit, why not, if people find this to be a useful service, they'll go for it, ads or no ads. Actually I wonder if they will also just have a subscription model, so that the service could be just bought with a monthly payment?
'human rights'? There is no such thing as a 'human right' that is supposed to give you a product. Who is going to pay for this, if 'everybody is getting it for free' exactly?
After reading it I don't think it should be taken seriously (it's not your NSA or CIA, Russia doesn't have the kind of people right now that would take a project like this seriously and not just steal the money).
My quick translation:
Kommersant's sources say that the intelligence agency started a number of programs, with code names 'Storm-12', 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' back in January-February of 2012. The idea is to create following programs:
1. To investigate methods of intelligence gathering from Internet providers and data centres and social networks (code name 'Dispute' at 4.41 million rubles).
2. To investigate methods of 'silent management within the Internet' (code name 'Monitor' at 4.99 million rubles).
3. To conduct a scientific type of research in order to develop 'means of pushing special information within social networks' - this means astroturfing (code name 'Storm-12' at 22.8 million rubles).
The three projects are interdependent, the plan is to monitor the Internet and social networks with the 'Dispute' system, which is supposed to 'research processes of social network formation and information dissemination within them' as well as 'establishing the factors that are responsible for the increasing influence and dissemination of information', basically trying to figure out why some information becomes more popular, how do things go viral as opposed to other things (I suggest they start by analysing LOLCAT videos for that).
Once the information is collected it is supposed to be analysed by 'Monitor-3', which is responsible for 'developing the methods of organisation and management of the Internet virtual social networks by using experts, setting tasks, controlling the work of social media, regularly collecting information from the experts in their respective fields'. (Actually this part doesn't read well in Russian and translating something that is written so poorly and ambiguously in one language into another is not easy. This is part of the reason, except for the minuscule funds, why I wouldn't take this program seriously.)
Lastly, 'Storm-12' is then supposed to introduce managed information into the social networks based on the collected data. Its task is described very poorly and grammatically ambiguously as the following: 'development of special programming system of automated dissemination of information within large social networks. Organisation of information support structures into predefined scenarios in order to have a desired affect upon the mass audience of social networks.' The purpose of this 'virtual military' is described as 'mass dissemination of information messages within the (monitored) social networks, with existing user accounts, in order to shape public opinion. Aggregation of statistics and analysis of effectiveness of management of public opinion. Analysis of usefulness of the most popular social services as vectors of initialisation of information waves for directing the public opinion about various matters'.
Kommersan'ts sources say that in order to make the programs secret, the government passed the following bills: N1116-36 on 23 of December, 2011.
Supposedly the systems 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' will be ready in 2012 and 'Storm-12' will be ready in 2013'.
--------
and so on and so forth. I can tell you this much: this entire story reads like a bad spy thriller, it's just not plausible.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to do anything for that amount of money in Russia, with that much money they won't even be able to set up a server room, never mind paying the right people the right amounts of money to do any of this work. This is complete nonsense.
I am not saying that Russia is not doing something like this, in fact by
But I didn't say that there is no Communist party in Russia (there is actually), I said this: once KGB, always KGB. Who do you think is at the helm of Russian government right now?
By the way, is this/. story a test of a kind? Because the link that says: "Google translation" literally leads to Google's translator page and nothing else.
I found the silly article from Kommersant that this story is about, here it is.
After reading it I don't think it should be taken seriously (it's not your NSA or CIA, Russia doesn't have the kind of people right now that would take a project like this seriously and not just steal the money).
My quick translation:
Kommersant's sources say that the intelligence agency started a number of programs, with code names 'Storm-12', 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' back in January-February of 2012. The idea is to create following programs:
1. To investigate methods of intelligence gathering from Internet providers and data centres and social networks (code name 'Dispute' at 4.41 million rubles).
2. To investigation methods of 'silent management within the Internet' (code name 'Monitor' at 4.99 million rubles).
3. To conduct a scientific type of research in order to develop 'means of pushing special information within social networks' - this means astroturfing (code name 'Storm-12' at 22.8 million rubles).
The three projects are interdependent, the plan is to monitor the Internet and social networks with the 'Dispute' system, which is supposed to 'research processes of social network formation and information dissemination within them' as well as 'establishing the factors that are responsible for the increasing influence and dissemination of information', basically trying to figure out why some information becomes more popular, how do things go viral as opposed to other things (I suggest they start by analysing LOLCAT videos for that).
Once the information is collected it is supposed to be analysed by 'Monitor-3', which is responsible for 'developing the methods of organisation and management of the Internet virtual social networks by using experts, setting tasks, controlling the work of social media, regularly collecting information from the experts in their respective fields'. (Actually this part doesn't read well in Russian and translating something that is written so poorly and ambiguously in one language into another is not easy. This is part of the reason, except for the minuscule funds, why I wouldn't take this program seriously.)
Lastly, 'Storm-12' is then supposed to introduce managed information into the social networks based on the collected data. Its task is described very poorly and grammatically ambiguously as the following: 'development of special programming system of automated dissemination of information within large social networks. Organisation of information support structures into predefined scenarios in order to have a desired affect upon the mass audience of social networks.' The purpose of this 'virtual military' is described as 'mass dissemination of information messages within the (monitored) social networks, with existing user accounts, in order to shape public opinion. Aggregation of statistics and analysis of effectiveness of management of public opinion. Analysis of usefulness of the most popular social services as vectors of initialisation of information waves for directing the public opinion about various matters'.
Kommersan'ts sources say that in order to make the programs secret, the government passed the following bills: N1116-36 on 23 of December, 2011.
Supposedly the systems 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' will be ready in 2012 and 'Storm-12' will be ready in 2013'.
--------
and so on and so forth. I can tell you this much: this entire story reads like a bad spy thriller, it's just not plausible.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to do anything for that amount of money in Russia, with that much money they won't even be able to set up a server room, never mind paying the right people the right amounts of money to do any of this work. This is complete nonsense.
The tank holds about 175 liters of compressed air that can be filled at special stations or by activating the on-board electric motor to suck air in from the outside. Costing about $10,000, this car could beat out most smart cars from the market.
- so if this needs 'special stations', why does it have an on-board electric motor at all? Don't make this car suck twice, first with the on-board electrical engine and the second time with the price-tag ($10,000 for the Indian market?)
So some silly agency says: 9 Billion is what the software applications market is worth (for the year 2012), and FB was 'valued' at 100 billion or so. What a fucking ridiculous joke these planned economies are, the price discovery mechanism is so broken right now because of all the government interventions into the economies of the world. How can anybody know what prices are right now, with all this money being printed.
9 Billion? How much of that is inflation, how much of that is efficiencies, how much of that is government contracts, how much of that is new platforms, what is this? If you read that 'article' you will see NOTHING.
(this is my second account, I get on and off ability to comment here now, you can imagine it's not easy to be able to refute dozens of posts without being moderated down and being shut out of the forum)
So in your hypothetical perfect world, the thief basically becomes a slave of the person he stole from until they can compensate the damage?
- if you want to put it this way then yes, of-course. There is nothing wrong with somebody being your 'work slave' for debts AFAIC. You can't abuse them, they are supposed to pay you, not to die for you. That's the exact same situation as alimony or taxes.
What's the difference between this and paying alimony or child support or income taxes? You are forced to by the system, it's exactly the same thing.
It's worse with income taxes than with alimony, income taxes don't stop until you stop earning, alimony and child support stops.
If you steal from me, I want you to work for me, I want your wages to be garnished.
I don't need you to work for me in my company, (I wouldn't hire you, dirty thief), but I want you to repay the damages and with interest and the interest is set by the court.
If it's not the first time you steal, then the interest is higher. The interest should be a multiple of what you stole, maybe 3 times, maybe more, if it's not the first time you are stealing.
If you are going to run away and not pay, I want you caught and fines added. If you are not working, I don't want you to get any support from the gov't (it's my taxes too). If you are completely refusing to pay, I want you to be thrown into debtor prison. Maybe the prison will assign you to a job and it's not me, who is setting the value of your labour, it's the market. I don't need you to work for me forever for 1 cent an hour, I want you to do what you can in the market to earn the wage and to pay back your debt with interest.
This is far better than throwing you to jail and having MY money spent on holding you there.
I am not talking about 'selling' you, no more than the people who have to pay alimony are 'sold'.
As to child issues, etc., as I said, I want your wages to be garnished, the is exactly the same situation as with alimony, you are NOT paying 100% of your paycheck to me, but you are obligated to return the debt.
In the example you gave, you mentioned 3.5 Million in salary, no deductions. So they would be paying 1.45% of 3,500,000.
- so now I see what they mean, when they talk about the weird consequences of this non-education.
I "mention" what?
I said 10,000,000 dollars in yearly salary that the person would pay himself, which means that 3,5million is the federal income tax.
FICA is paid on 100% of earnings, not on 35% of it.
The person who pays himself a salary is a self employed individual, I am talking about a business owner, so he pays both, employee and employer portion, thus 2.9%, not 1.45%.
(same person here, again hitting the posting limit on the other account)
You don't know what you are talking about, it's called FICA.
Quote:
The employer is also liable for 6.2% Social Security and 1.45% Medicare taxes,[10] making the total Social Security tax 12.4% of wages, and the total Medicare tax 2.9%. (Self-employed people are responsible for the entire FICA percentage of 15.3% (= 12.4% + 2.9%), since they are in a sense both the employer and the employed; however, see the section on self-employed people for more details.)
The 2.9 is paid on all the money, not on 35%. What, you don't like numbers?
Yes, and the majority has its tyranny. The government is completely tyrannical and it is the majority that supports that government, whatever side they are on. It doesn't matter - Democrat or Republican, either of them are for huge tyrannical governments and are against individual freedoms.
Those people who are actually for individual freedoms do not make it into the government, and if they do by some chance, like Ron Paul, they are insulated, isolated, boxed in, completely ignored and prevented from changing the workings of the system.
In case of Ron Paul actually, the system didn't do enough prevention, his words did get out and there is now a huge libertarian crowd out there, not huge enough to make it into this election on the Republican ticket, but it is much more likely that it will be able to take over that party for another elections.
At this point the person who is still running that is for individual liberty is Gary Johnson, though nobody agrees with anybody else on 100% of issues, he is mostly correct when it comes to the economy.
--
By the way, on the topic brought up by another poster, who replied to your comment, he is right about something - the US is a Republic, not a democracy, and as such, it is not supposed to encourage everybody to vote. Actually the idea is to have as few as possible people voting, only those, who are actually paying into the system. If you pay taxes - you may vote, if you are a net tax receiver (which, by the way, includes all government workers and contractors) you shouldn't be allowed to vote.
If it was free market I would agree, but Comcast is not a free market. It is a natural monopoly and just like the electric, natural gas, water, and sewer monopolies needs to be regulated.
- there is nothing here that says 'natural monopoly', the government makes it a monopoly, not the company.
Secondly, there is no reason in this world that electric lines, gas, water, sewer should be a monopoly, and they are a monopoly, but again, this has nothing to do with nature, they are government monopoly. Which part of this is unclear? How is it a 'natural' monopoly, when the city grants licenses and permits and tax code is manipulated and various subsidies are provided, what exactly is natural about it, unless you believe that having government do this is a 'natural' thing and cannot be avoided?
I am not going to assume anything about you, you are just a number with the wrong ideas in your head.
The Clean Air and Clean Water acts were only necessary in USA because the country sold out its principles of private property rights long time ago and it is the government that provides the protections to the companies against any liability for their actions.
As much as everybody here, that is arguing for the government mandating the auto-insurance, is completely full of nonsense on what the insurance is supposed to be for and how it is supposed to work in an actual free market (covering you, not anybody else in case you happen to be in an accident, covering your costs, be it a broken vehicle or your legs or a lawsuit against you by any other party), just as much the people are wrong on the idea that government can or does protect the environment for them.
The only thing that protects the environment is private property ownership and being able to sue the people that pollute your private property.
Government gives the companies green light to pollute on these so called 'public properties', which shouldn't exist in the first place, and if they do exist, no business can be allowed to do anything there. The pollution may be initially created by some business, but given private property protections and the free market, this problem eventually goes away, because private property ownership is paramount and must be protected just like all other individual rights, which is what the government is supposed to be for in the first place.
Government creates the moral hazards, the incentives and the means (all of this in the form of limited liability, so called public property and various licenses and permits). The government protects the businesses against their real liability and the government prevents other private property owners from ever being successful protecting their private property.
So how can people afford cars yet cannot afford insurance? To answer this of-course, one has to step back and realize that so many people also cannot afford their vehicles and the only reason they have them is because their driving is also subsidized by the fake government set interest rates, by borrowing and printing (inflation).
There are many fronts on which the economy is being simultaneously hurt by the government.
Quite a number of people shouldn't even be driving, they can drive only because of the fake interest rates that go to subsidize their loans.
(I have to juggle 2 accounts here, depending on how the moderation goes)
There is the problem with those assets being in the hands of the government in the first place. Obviously this is completely inefficient that there is any sort of government ownership there, the frequencies must be sold off at an auction, people should bet on them and then use them once they buy them, lease them, resell them, borrow them, whatever.
In any given moment, 15% of people are uninsured, with or without your government regulations.
The problem for everybody is not that some people are uninsured, the problem is that the economy is so weak, that people have nothing, no savings, no jobs, no productivity, they are hoping to keep living off of other people's productivity.
Insurance is about you, yourself, setting a bet, making a choice that you will pay some premium in order to avoid a much bigger loss in the future, it is nothing else than that.
As to your last statement, that gov't is supposed to force everybody to have insurance (that's what your statement comes down to), yeah, that is exactly what you have now, a government that destroys the economy and thus the society in process with all these regulations, inflation, income related taxes.
You think you are going not to have risks, you think you are going to have a risk free life because you abdicate your own responsibility for your life to the government? The only thing that you are getting for this is not risk free life, what you are getting for this is the eventuality of life full of risks. Risks that are much worse than what you understand. Risks of not having a working economy at all.
Because he has no property, his car is now totalled and he may well not even be employed.
- and how many unemployed individuals are driving around without insurance and are going to hit you, what type of a contrived non-existing scenario are you setting up?
Actually with government mandates, government taxes, government regulations there will be more and more unemployed individuals driving around who have nothing and even that is probably on a 0% mortgage, subsidized by the fake money created as credit by the federal reserve.
If we are going to go down the road of discussing this, realize that you are much more likely to be hurt and have bad coverage and the situation that you are describing in an economy that is destroyed by the huge government (and you are one of the people who want a huge government, that is the entire point of this, isn't it?)
In a vibrant economy without gov't mandates, taxes, regulations, inflation people have jobs, people have savings, majority of people do not have a problem buying some form of insurance.
What you are clearly INCAPABLE of understanding is that I AM NOT AGAINST INSURANCE AS A PRINCIPLE.
Insurance is just another product, I am against the huge government with the ability to force people to buy insurance and that is the crux of the problem. It's not the few people who can't afford insurance but still have cars in an economy subsidized with fake money and borrowing.
This is about the fact that government is meddling with the economy, this is about the fact that government is forcing people into its ponzi schemes, into its moral hazards and that's exactly what destroys the economy.
Would you rather have a vibrant economy with a possibility that some number of people don't have insurance (and whatever you do, it's up to 15% that don't have it at any moment) or would you rather have your vision? Your vision - government in everything, forcing everybody into what it wants, but in the process creating all of the moral hazards, all of the fake money and thus inflation, all of the regulations and rules and taxing people's income, so people are moving all of their productivity somewhere else?
Slashdot Mirror
(I just hit the quota on the first account again, but same guy here)
If someone kills their IQ, they effectively lower their "worth" to contribute to society.
- I disagree. Nothing about killing one's IQ tells us anything about their 'worth to society'. In fact intelligence is not even a prerequisite to survival. People can be very useful to society and they can be quite unintelligent still. There are many jobs, many things that people can do that absolutely do not require high levels of intelligence.
What then? Do we set up opium-type dens and let them have at?
- why should you do anything about them, are they bothering you in any way? How are they hurting you by being not as intelligent as they could be otherwise?
You are not being made responsible for other people's decisions if you leave them alone. You are being made responsible by the government, that takes people, throws them to jail and forces you to pay taxes and pay in all other ways that society pays, when it places its members into jail.
You simply didn't understand a word of it, when you are saying: 'screw the attic fan manufacturer', you are talking about a guy who is reducing the US trade deficit. Putting him out of business, when his business is mostly manufacturing in USA, while buying a component that cannot be manufactured in USA is really stupid.
All it does it gives him 2 options: shut down entirely or move out of USA, guess what, most people in that position prefer to keep their business even if it means moving out.
This does not at all mean that by being 'nationalistic' you are going to have businesses spring out inside USA. I am from the former USSR, we didn't have businesses spring out behind the iron curtain, we just had entrepreneurial people who were hoping to leave at some point while doing something inside the country that was considered illegal. We had majority of the population that was poor, because they didn't have attic fans, or whatever, best products that could get gotten, was mostly foreign made, and we had a top class, the elite, who lived much better than the rest. They weren't producing anything, they were the political elite who had military in their hands, so they were the politicians that protected themselves from the population and from the outside world with military, that was it. That was the economy. You are going to be in the same position, you are moving in that direction.
Didn't you hear - those who do not know history will repeat it?
--
As to pollution, etc., you are going to have much more of it now, that you'll lose your manufacturing and the tools and the knowledge how to do, what you used to do, and then eventually the Chinese and the rest stop buying your debt, stop subsidizing you and giving you their products. Then you'll find out that you can't actually afford products from other countries if you are not manufacturing anything in return. You'll have to retool and rebuild manufacturing, but because you made all these mistakes, and lost your manufacturing, you are going to do it in the cheapest way possible, and you will pollute so much in your country now. So much pollution is going to be created now, with the EPA and everything else that your gov't pushed on you, because those very gov't functions, departments, destroyed your manufacturing and production. So you will end up polluting much more than free market would have caused.
Again, USSR was a huge polluter, because it was poor and had all that gov't to prevent free market.
And that attic fan manufacturer was one of the guys who produced something that could be exchanged for foreign made goods, thus reducing the balance of trade.
Saying: screw that guy, is exactly as the saying goes: cut your nose off to spite your face.
You know, I understand the frustration. However Fiorina was right. Unfortunately she was right.
I cannot underscore it enough, how much I am accenting the word 'unfortunately' here.
Why am I saying it? Because USA laws, regulations, taxes and inflation make it an unproductive, uncompetitive place to run business in.
If you want to understand what I am referring to, here is something for you to consider:
US manufacturer destroyed by US law, minutes 19:19 - 49:19 - here was a manufacturer, whose business required buying specialised miniature solar panels and the best supplier was in China. The new tariffs that were introduced basically killed his business. He was manufacturing an attic fan that used that solar panel, but all the rest of the manufacturing is (still) done in USA.
Now consider this: the new tariff means that for the businessman to stay in business he MUST OUTSOURCE ALL (100%) of his manufacturing elsewhere (Canada and Mexico are both inviting him in).
His business helped USA to reduce the enormous trade deficit that USA is running, because he was an importer as well as an exporter, his final product is bought around the world.
The sad part is that he was a poster-child for Obama's campaign when Obama sat down with supposedly 'small business community' where the ONLY person at the table that actually was a small businessman was this guy. The rest of the people who Obama was really talking to there, they were all large corporations getting something from Obama, they all wanted something. This guy didn't realise that he was used as a political prop at the time though.
Now the new tariffs are putting him out of business in USA and the only way to stay competitive, to stay in business is to move the business outside of USA.
--
Now back to Fiorina, AFAIC she is a fucking GENIUS. She didn't wait to be in the same predicament as this poor schmuck. She predicted a similar situation for her company and acted before it happened. As I said - it's unfortunate. But to understand the reasons behind it you need to understand the very problem itself in the first place.
----
(oh, and if you want to moderate this lower, you can take it upon both of my accounts, this one and the first one as well).
Here is what Obama does to the productive class in USA, this is an audio interview from today, the interview I am talking about is between minutes 19:19 and 49:19
The interview is with a small business entrepreneur who was framed by Obama to be his poster boy when it was profitable politically, when Obama wanted to sell the idea that he is for 'small-business', while giving money to huge industry and what he actually did to small businessman, destroyed him.
....
Java Zero Day VulnerabilityâoeIn my lab environment, I was able to successfully exploit my test machine against latest version of Firefox with JRE version 1.7 update 6 installed,â he wrote on the company blog.
The exploit was found on a server in China, and if it successfully attacks a given endpoint, the payload that is delivered is hosted on the same server. While the IP address associated with the malicious box has been known to serve malware in the past, it isnâ(TM)t responding to browser connections. Nevertheless, the IP is live. ....
On Monday, the Metasploit Exploit team at Rapid7 said they found the PoC and had developed a working exploit that they say enables a successful attack against a fully patched Windows 7 SP1 with Java 7 Update 6.
âoeAs a user, you should take this problem seriously, because there is currently no patch from Oracle. For now, our recommendation is to completely disable Java until a fix is available,â a blog post from Rapid7 notes.
Once again, itâ(TM)s wise to remove Java if it isnâ(TM)t absolutely needed in your environment. Most home users have little need for the software these days, and most experts agree the risk outweighs the reward when it comes to installing it.
I don't know why the OP is moderated Funny, maybe they have Java installed on their 'humour sensing unit'.
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OTOH I wish IBM bought Sun back when Oracle made their bid, this lack of interest by Oracle is just perplexing at this point. If Ellison doesn't see a way to monetize Java environment, why not sell it? Have an auction, put it on Ebay.
This is a normal thing that you see within any context where there are people who want control vs people who want freedom, this is just one type of manifestation of such a situation. Yes, RIAA and the cohorts will be pissed and they will try to shut it down as well. Yes, TPB will try to avoid being shut down and there will be more services like this one available. The fact that TPB is going to try and make a buck off of it makes perfect sense, somehow the service has to be managed, somebody has to put in the time and resources, whatever capital, land and labour that it will take to have this thing running and it makes perfect sense to try and run it for profit, why not, if people find this to be a useful service, they'll go for it, ads or no ads. Actually I wonder if they will also just have a subscription model, so that the service could be just bought with a monthly payment?
I do have a choice, I moved already.
'human rights'? There is no such thing as a 'human right' that is supposed to give you a product. Who is going to pay for this, if 'everybody is getting it for free' exactly?
'Universal service provisions' simply means setting up a monopoly and raising prices for everybody. No, I would not pay this tax.
Here is that silly article from Kommersant.
After reading it I don't think it should be taken seriously (it's not your NSA or CIA, Russia doesn't have the kind of people right now that would take a project like this seriously and not just steal the money).
My quick translation:
Kommersant's sources say that the intelligence agency started a number of programs, with code names 'Storm-12', 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' back in January-February of 2012. The idea is to create following programs:
1. To investigate methods of intelligence gathering from Internet providers and data centres and social networks (code name 'Dispute' at 4.41 million rubles).
2. To investigate methods of 'silent management within the Internet' (code name 'Monitor' at 4.99 million rubles).
3. To conduct a scientific type of research in order to develop 'means of pushing special information within social networks' - this means astroturfing (code name 'Storm-12' at 22.8 million rubles).
The three projects are interdependent, the plan is to monitor the Internet and social networks with the 'Dispute' system, which is supposed to 'research processes of social network formation and information dissemination within them' as well as 'establishing the factors that are responsible for the increasing influence and dissemination of information', basically trying to figure out why some information becomes more popular, how do things go viral as opposed to other things (I suggest they start by analysing LOLCAT videos for that).
Once the information is collected it is supposed to be analysed by 'Monitor-3', which is responsible for 'developing the methods of organisation and management of the Internet virtual social networks by using experts, setting tasks, controlling the work of social media, regularly collecting information from the experts in their respective fields'. (Actually this part doesn't read well in Russian and translating something that is written so poorly and ambiguously in one language into another is not easy. This is part of the reason, except for the minuscule funds, why I wouldn't take this program seriously.)
Lastly, 'Storm-12' is then supposed to introduce managed information into the social networks based on the collected data. Its task is described very poorly and grammatically ambiguously as the following: 'development of special programming system of automated dissemination of information within large social networks. Organisation of information support structures into predefined scenarios in order to have a desired affect upon the mass audience of social networks.' The purpose of this 'virtual military' is described as 'mass dissemination of information messages within the (monitored) social networks, with existing user accounts, in order to shape public opinion. Aggregation of statistics and analysis of effectiveness of management of public opinion. Analysis of usefulness of the most popular social services as vectors of initialisation of information waves for directing the public opinion about various matters'.
Kommersan'ts sources say that in order to make the programs secret, the government passed the following bills: N1116-36 on 23 of December, 2011.
Supposedly the systems 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' will be ready in 2012 and 'Storm-12' will be ready in 2013'.
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and so on and so forth. I can tell you this much: this entire story reads like a bad spy thriller, it's just not plausible.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to do anything for that amount of money in Russia, with that much money they won't even be able to set up a server room, never mind paying the right people the right amounts of money to do any of this work. This is complete nonsense.
I am not saying that Russia is not doing something like this, in fact by
Sorry, I can't reply to you from my first account, the reason for it is very ironic given this story.
But I didn't say that there is no Communist party in Russia (there is actually), I said this: once KGB, always KGB. Who do you think is at the helm of Russian government right now?
Oh, and I actually found that article this /. story is supposed to link to, translated some of it and posted it here.
By the way, is this /. story a test of a kind? Because the link that says: "Google translation" literally leads to Google's translator page and nothing else.
I found the silly article from Kommersant that this story is about, here it is.
After reading it I don't think it should be taken seriously (it's not your NSA or CIA, Russia doesn't have the kind of people right now that would take a project like this seriously and not just steal the money).
My quick translation:
Kommersant's sources say that the intelligence agency started a number of programs, with code names 'Storm-12', 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' back in January-February of 2012. The idea is to create following programs:
1. To investigate methods of intelligence gathering from Internet providers and data centres and social networks (code name 'Dispute' at 4.41 million rubles).
2. To investigation methods of 'silent management within the Internet' (code name 'Monitor' at 4.99 million rubles).
3. To conduct a scientific type of research in order to develop 'means of pushing special information within social networks' - this means astroturfing (code name 'Storm-12' at 22.8 million rubles).
The three projects are interdependent, the plan is to monitor the Internet and social networks with the 'Dispute' system, which is supposed to 'research processes of social network formation and information dissemination within them' as well as 'establishing the factors that are responsible for the increasing influence and dissemination of information', basically trying to figure out why some information becomes more popular, how do things go viral as opposed to other things (I suggest they start by analysing LOLCAT videos for that).
Once the information is collected it is supposed to be analysed by 'Monitor-3', which is responsible for 'developing the methods of organisation and management of the Internet virtual social networks by using experts, setting tasks, controlling the work of social media, regularly collecting information from the experts in their respective fields'. (Actually this part doesn't read well in Russian and translating something that is written so poorly and ambiguously in one language into another is not easy. This is part of the reason, except for the minuscule funds, why I wouldn't take this program seriously.)
Lastly, 'Storm-12' is then supposed to introduce managed information into the social networks based on the collected data. Its task is described very poorly and grammatically ambiguously as the following: 'development of special programming system of automated dissemination of information within large social networks. Organisation of information support structures into predefined scenarios in order to have a desired affect upon the mass audience of social networks.' The purpose of this 'virtual military' is described as 'mass dissemination of information messages within the (monitored) social networks, with existing user accounts, in order to shape public opinion. Aggregation of statistics and analysis of effectiveness of management of public opinion. Analysis of usefulness of the most popular social services as vectors of initialisation of information waves for directing the public opinion about various matters'.
Kommersan'ts sources say that in order to make the programs secret, the government passed the following bills: N1116-36 on 23 of December, 2011.
Supposedly the systems 'Monitor-3' and 'Dispute' will be ready in 2012 and 'Storm-12' will be ready in 2013'.
--------
and so on and so forth. I can tell you this much: this entire story reads like a bad spy thriller, it's just not plausible.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to do anything for that amount of money in Russia, with that much money they won't even be able to set up a server room, never mind paying the right people the right amounts of money to do any of this work. This is complete nonsense.
I am not say
The tank holds about 175 liters of compressed air that can be filled at special stations or by activating the on-board electric motor to suck air in from the outside. Costing about $10,000, this car could beat out most smart cars from the market.
- so if this needs 'special stations', why does it have an on-board electric motor at all? Don't make this car suck twice, first with the on-board electrical engine and the second time with the price-tag ($10,000 for the Indian market?)
So some silly agency says: 9 Billion is what the software applications market is worth (for the year 2012), and FB was 'valued' at 100 billion or so. What a fucking ridiculous joke these planned economies are, the price discovery mechanism is so broken right now because of all the government interventions into the economies of the world. How can anybody know what prices are right now, with all this money being printed.
9 Billion? How much of that is inflation, how much of that is efficiencies, how much of that is government contracts, how much of that is new platforms, what is this? If you read that 'article' you will see NOTHING.
There is nothing there.
(this is my second account, I get on and off ability to comment here now, you can imagine it's not easy to be able to refute dozens of posts without being moderated down and being shut out of the forum)
So in your hypothetical perfect world, the thief basically becomes a slave of the person he stole from until they can compensate the damage?
- if you want to put it this way then yes, of-course. There is nothing wrong with somebody being your 'work slave' for debts AFAIC. You can't abuse them, they are supposed to pay you, not to die for you. That's the exact same situation as alimony or taxes.
What's the difference between this and paying alimony or child support or income taxes? You are forced to by the system, it's exactly the same thing.
It's worse with income taxes than with alimony, income taxes don't stop until you stop earning, alimony and child support stops.
If you steal from me, I want you to work for me, I want your wages to be garnished.
I don't need you to work for me in my company, (I wouldn't hire you, dirty thief), but I want you to repay the damages and with interest and the interest is set by the court.
If it's not the first time you steal, then the interest is higher. The interest should be a multiple of what you stole, maybe 3 times, maybe more, if it's not the first time you are stealing.
If you are going to run away and not pay, I want you caught and fines added. If you are not working, I don't want you to get any support from the gov't (it's my taxes too). If you are completely refusing to pay, I want you to be thrown into debtor prison. Maybe the prison will assign you to a job and it's not me, who is setting the value of your labour, it's the market. I don't need you to work for me forever for 1 cent an hour, I want you to do what you can in the market to earn the wage and to pay back your debt with interest.
This is far better than throwing you to jail and having MY money spent on holding you there.
I am not talking about 'selling' you, no more than the people who have to pay alimony are 'sold'.
As to child issues, etc., as I said, I want your wages to be garnished, the is exactly the same situation as with alimony, you are NOT paying 100% of your paycheck to me, but you are obligated to return the debt.
you know what's funny, it's how stupid you are while thinking that you have said something intelligent or insightful.
There is pound-mass and there is pound-force, but that is irrelevant even, because the joke had nothing to do with it, so you are also very dim.
In the example you gave, you mentioned 3.5 Million in salary, no deductions. So they would be paying 1.45% of 3,500,000.
- so now I see what they mean, when they talk about the weird consequences of this non-education.
I "mention" what?
I said 10,000,000 dollars in yearly salary that the person would pay himself, which means that 3,5million is the federal income tax.
FICA is paid on 100% of earnings, not on 35% of it.
The person who pays himself a salary is a self employed individual, I am talking about a business owner, so he pays both, employee and employer portion, thus 2.9%, not 1.45%.
You are a disgrace.
(same person here, again hitting the posting limit on the other account)
You don't know what you are talking about, it's called FICA.
Quote:
The employer is also liable for 6.2% Social Security and 1.45% Medicare taxes,[10] making the total Social Security tax 12.4% of wages, and the total Medicare tax 2.9%. (Self-employed people are responsible for the entire FICA percentage of 15.3% (= 12.4% + 2.9%), since they are in a sense both the employer and the employed; however, see the section on self-employed people for more details.)
The 2.9 is paid on all the money, not on 35%. What, you don't like numbers?
Yes, and the majority has its tyranny. The government is completely tyrannical and it is the majority that supports that government, whatever side they are on. It doesn't matter - Democrat or Republican, either of them are for huge tyrannical governments and are against individual freedoms.
Those people who are actually for individual freedoms do not make it into the government, and if they do by some chance, like Ron Paul, they are insulated, isolated, boxed in, completely ignored and prevented from changing the workings of the system.
In case of Ron Paul actually, the system didn't do enough prevention, his words did get out and there is now a huge libertarian crowd out there, not huge enough to make it into this election on the Republican ticket, but it is much more likely that it will be able to take over that party for another elections.
At this point the person who is still running that is for individual liberty is Gary Johnson, though nobody agrees with anybody else on 100% of issues, he is mostly correct when it comes to the economy.
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By the way, on the topic brought up by another poster, who replied to your comment, he is right about something - the US is a Republic, not a democracy, and as such, it is not supposed to encourage everybody to vote. Actually the idea is to have as few as possible people voting, only those, who are actually paying into the system. If you pay taxes - you may vote, if you are a net tax receiver (which, by the way, includes all government workers and contractors) you shouldn't be allowed to vote.
If it was free market I would agree, but Comcast is not a free market. It is a natural monopoly and just like the electric, natural gas, water, and sewer monopolies needs to be regulated.
- there is nothing here that says 'natural monopoly', the government makes it a monopoly, not the company.
Secondly, there is no reason in this world that electric lines, gas, water, sewer should be a monopoly, and they are a monopoly, but again, this has nothing to do with nature, they are government monopoly. Which part of this is unclear? How is it a 'natural' monopoly, when the city grants licenses and permits and tax code is manipulated and various subsidies are provided, what exactly is natural about it, unless you believe that having government do this is a 'natural' thing and cannot be avoided?
I am not going to assume anything about you, you are just a number with the wrong ideas in your head.
The Clean Air and Clean Water acts were only necessary in USA because the country sold out its principles of private property rights long time ago and it is the government that provides the protections to the companies against any liability for their actions.
As much as everybody here, that is arguing for the government mandating the auto-insurance, is completely full of nonsense on what the insurance is supposed to be for and how it is supposed to work in an actual free market (covering you, not anybody else in case you happen to be in an accident, covering your costs, be it a broken vehicle or your legs or a lawsuit against you by any other party), just as much the people are wrong on the idea that government can or does protect the environment for them.
The only thing that protects the environment is private property ownership and being able to sue the people that pollute your private property.
Government gives the companies green light to pollute on these so called 'public properties', which shouldn't exist in the first place, and if they do exist, no business can be allowed to do anything there. The pollution may be initially created by some business, but given private property protections and the free market, this problem eventually goes away, because private property ownership is paramount and must be protected just like all other individual rights, which is what the government is supposed to be for in the first place.
Government creates the moral hazards, the incentives and the means (all of this in the form of limited liability, so called public property and various licenses and permits). The government protects the businesses against their real liability and the government prevents other private property owners from ever being successful protecting their private property.
So how can people afford cars yet cannot afford insurance? To answer this of-course, one has to step back and realize that so many people also cannot afford their vehicles and the only reason they have them is because their driving is also subsidized by the fake government set interest rates, by borrowing and printing (inflation).
There are many fronts on which the economy is being simultaneously hurt by the government.
Quite a number of people shouldn't even be driving, they can drive only because of the fake interest rates that go to subsidize their loans.
(I have to juggle 2 accounts here, depending on how the moderation goes)
There is the problem with those assets being in the hands of the government in the first place. Obviously this is completely inefficient that there is any sort of government ownership there, the frequencies must be sold off at an auction, people should bet on them and then use them once they buy them, lease them, resell them, borrow them, whatever.
In any given moment, 15% of people are uninsured, with or without your government regulations.
The problem for everybody is not that some people are uninsured, the problem is that the economy is so weak, that people have nothing, no savings, no jobs, no productivity, they are hoping to keep living off of other people's productivity.
Insurance is about you, yourself, setting a bet, making a choice that you will pay some premium in order to avoid a much bigger loss in the future, it is nothing else than that.
As to your last statement, that gov't is supposed to force everybody to have insurance (that's what your statement comes down to), yeah, that is exactly what you have now, a government that destroys the economy and thus the society in process with all these regulations, inflation, income related taxes.
You think you are going not to have risks, you think you are going to have a risk free life because you abdicate your own responsibility for your life to the government? The only thing that you are getting for this is not risk free life, what you are getting for this is the eventuality of life full of risks. Risks that are much worse than what you understand. Risks of not having a working economy at all.
Because he has no property, his car is now totalled and he may well not even be employed.
- and how many unemployed individuals are driving around without insurance and are going to hit you, what type of a contrived non-existing scenario are you setting up?
Actually with government mandates, government taxes, government regulations there will be more and more unemployed individuals driving around who have nothing and even that is probably on a 0% mortgage, subsidized by the fake money created as credit by the federal reserve.
If we are going to go down the road of discussing this, realize that you are much more likely to be hurt and have bad coverage and the situation that you are describing in an economy that is destroyed by the huge government (and you are one of the people who want a huge government, that is the entire point of this, isn't it?)
In a vibrant economy without gov't mandates, taxes, regulations, inflation people have jobs, people have savings, majority of people do not have a problem buying some form of insurance.
What you are clearly INCAPABLE of understanding is that I AM NOT AGAINST INSURANCE AS A PRINCIPLE.
Insurance is just another product, I am against the huge government with the ability to force people to buy insurance and that is the crux of the problem. It's not the few people who can't afford insurance but still have cars in an economy subsidized with fake money and borrowing.
This is about the fact that government is meddling with the economy, this is about the fact that government is forcing people into its ponzi schemes, into its moral hazards and that's exactly what destroys the economy.
Would you rather have a vibrant economy with a possibility that some number of people don't have insurance (and whatever you do, it's up to 15% that don't have it at any moment) or would you rather have your vision? Your vision - government in everything, forcing everybody into what it wants, but in the process creating all of the moral hazards, all of the fake money and thus inflation, all of the regulations and rules and taxing people's income, so people are moving all of their productivity somewhere else?
What economy do you choose? I know what I choose.