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User: sphealey

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Comments · 2,282

  1. Re:Dear Mark on Zuckerberg's $100 Million Education Gift Solved Little · · Score: 1, Insightful

    - - - - - Next time hire me to handle it and come up with a plan based on set goals and achievements. - - - - -

    In other words, the way dedicated and capable public school teachers have been handling it in the United States for 275 years. Good plan.

    sPh

  2. Technically on Zuckerberg's $100 Million Education Gift Solved Little · · Score: 3, Insightful

    - - - - - — in order to reward results rather than persistence — - - - - -

    If my inferior public school education is any guide, I believe that is technically known as "begging the question". There was no evidence beforehand that there are significant problems with US K-12 education on average, but there was and is absolutely zero evidence that the vast majority of teachers weren't already working hard 'to achieve results' before Grover Norquist and Michelle Rhee got involved to "improve" the situation. On the other hand, there is over 100 years of evidence as to why schools tend to evolve toward seniority systems (hint: not to protect "incompetent" teachers), all of which was ignored.

    sPh

  3. Re:Shut Up on Let's Call It 'Climate Disruption,' White House Science Adviser Suggests (Again) · · Score: 3, Informative

    - - - - - - Michael Moore - - - - - -

    Yeah, Michael Moore is a professional filmmaker. He makes his living making films. That's what "professional filmmaker" means.

    Funny thing is that as the years go by most of Moore's documentaries look better and more prescient. I image the current managers of General Motors wish their predecessors had spent a little less money on giant SUVs and a little more on the internally developing the electric car research that they licensed to Toyota instead.

    sPh

  4. - - - - - On the other hand, he managed to make a little movie, do a little activism, and made a metric ton of money off the subject. - - - - - -

    Evidence that Al Gore has "made a metric ton of money off the subject [environmental activism]", please?

    Apparently, the only people who act on pure motives are Galtian corporate overlords. Hank Reardon and that sort. People who have a sincere concern about the future of the human race on planet Earth are only shills out to 'make a metric ton of money'; not possible for them to mean what they say. Because freedom BENGHAZI!

    sPh

  5. Re:so the hockey stick graph is bullshit after all on Let's Call It 'Climate Disruption,' White House Science Adviser Suggests (Again) · · Score: 1

    = = = You find it easier to ignore the sacrifice of our nation's ambassador in order to = = =

    Approximately a dozen people associated with the State Department - sworn officers, US employees, local employees, and their family members - die in the line of duty every year, consistently for the last 30 years. Very tough, but it is part of the job. Ambassadors who deliberately insert themselves in very dangerous situations - such as attempting to broker among factions in a war-torn land - are of course going to have a higher death rate.

    BTW, follow up reporting has shown that the US-made hate video did play a role in rioting in Benghazi that day. Not that it mattered to the specific situation once the ambassador made the decisions to try to get personally involved in that specific situation.

    sPh

  6. = = = Last I checked, Al Gore wasn't a professor. = = =

    Al Gore is relevant to either the issue and/or the OP exactly how?

    sPh

  7. At least he didn't include "global cooling" [sic] or "pause" in the screed, so let's count ourselves lucky.

    sPh

  8. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: 1


            - - - - - - - - but never says a word about how many paid for coverage if any have - - - - - - - -

    - - - It is fascinating how the hard radical Right obtains talking points from centralized sources and then starts pumping them near simultaneously. Does it not occur to you that doing this is utterly obvious?
    sPh - - -

    First it was "No one can get on the website!"
    Then it was "OK, the site is loading but no one can create an account!"
    Then "OK, you can create an account but no one can view the plans!"
    Then "OK, you can view the plans but no one can fill out their application!"
    Then "OK, you can apply but no one can actually enroll!"
    Then "OK, it works now, but no one bothering to do so anymore!"
    Then "OK, (a lot of) people are enrolling, but none of the data is being transferred to the insurance companies!"
    And now that we've hit over 1.8 million private enrollments, the new attack is:
    "FINE, a lot of people have ENROLLED, but how many have actually PAID???"

    About 85% - several months in advance of the premium deadline. Sorry. Nice try though.

    http://acasignups.net/graph

    sPh

    Next up: "LIEberal numbers! I have my own numbers right here!! You may end up with a different math, but you're entitled to your math. I'm entitled to THE math"

  9. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: 1

    A bit of Googling provides detailed data. As of 3/21 - well in advance of 1st premium deadline - 85% were fully paid. Paid in advance. Early. Before the deadline. About 5 million as of 3/21.

    http://acasignups.net/14/03/21...

    sPh

  10. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: 1

    = = = I guess I missed the memo, but isn't shitting on Obamacare last year's bugaboo? After you guys proclaimed that meeting the enrollment goal was impossible, you looked like complete morons when they exceeded it. Why double down on a losing hand? = = =

    Not to mention convincing their followers not to sign up for health insurance under the ACA, then (a) complaining that said people don't have health care (b) standing by while they die due to lack of health care.

    sPh

  11. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: 1

    "How many have paid? HOW MANY HAVE PAID"

    Under the ACA - as designed by the Republican think tank Heritage Foundation - premiums are paid directly to private insurance companies. Not to HHS or healthcare.gov. The CEOs of all the major health billing firms (aka 'insurance companies') have expressed satisfaction with the new enrollees and their accounts. The vast majority of those enrollees don't have a premium due until July 1st in any case.

    "How many have paid? HOW MANY HAVE PAID?".

    Just made-up LIEberal lamestream disinformation of course.

    sPh

  12. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: 1, Informative

    - - - - - And apparently you both missed the memo where those weren't paid subscribers, either, but supposedly the number who applied. - - - - -

    Every one of these hard radical Right talking points and phony anecdotes that has been investigated has proven to be false, most of the maliciously so. Every single one. But apparently we are supposed to just blindly swallow the latest from the breitbart propaganda machine ?

    sPh

    What is it with the hard radical right talking points infesting Slashdot of late? Is this a concerted effort to take over the site?

  13. Re:-1 Copied from Republican Talking Points on HealthCare.gov Back-End Status: See You In September · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    - - - - - but never says a word about how many paid for coverage if any have - - - - -

    It is fascinating how the hard radical Right obtains talking points from centralized sources and then starts pumping them near simultaneously. Does it not occur to you that doing this is utterly obvious?

    sPh

  14. Re:An obfuscation layer, how nice... on Oklahoma Moves To Discourage Solar and Wind Power · · Score: 1

    = = = This seems like the sort of problem that could be much more logically and less painfully solved by breaking out the (more or less constant, at least within a given size class and geographic area) grid hookup cost and the per-KW/h price for electricity as separate items on the bill. = = =

    Problem comes in when an entire region gets three day of hot, cloud-covered, calm weather. Then everyone expect "the grid" to produce the power that the panels and wind turbines aren't. The result where this has happened in the Midwest and Texas regions over the last two years has been spot market power prices going up to $1000/MWh but no power being available.

    I personally think the US needs a lot more solar and at least a fair amount more wind, but there are real problems that need to be worked out. And the Chicago School - which doesn't acknowledge the existence of market failure - doesn't have answer for those problems.

    sPh

  15. Re:this is nothing to do with the free market on Oklahoma Moves To Discourage Solar and Wind Power · · Score: 1

    = = =As a free market fan, I absolutely favor privatizing their state -supported industry. Let the entire network be split up into parallel systems, = = =

    That is exactly what has been happening to the US provision-of-electricity industry since 1994, with three successive "market reform" acts getting closer and closer to the University of Chicago ideal. The results have been absolutely disastrous for the consumer (both household and any business smaller than an aluminum smelter) and I would argue are driving the US ever-closer to both short-term grid collapse and long-term grid instability. The "answer" to the clearly-observable problems has so far been to impose even more, more extreme, Chicago School "markets" - every one of which gets gamed within 18 months.

    Might want to read up a bit on the actuality there sport.

    sPh

  16. Re:Dumbphone on Ask Slashdot: What Tech Products Were Built To Last? · · Score: 1

    Western Electric desk phones. Had to buy one on eBay to replace a string of junky modern ones that failed within a year each; the WE phone was manufactured around 1970 per the serial number.

    sPh

  17. LaserJet II and LaserJet 3 on Ask Slashdot: What Tech Products Were Built To Last? · · Score: 5, Informative

    HP LaserJet II and LaserJet 3 - worked reliably for 20 years and probably quite a few of them still in use.

    sPh

    Admittedly as noted above no high-tech product can yet match the longevity of a well-built plumbing system - some of them are over 2000 years old and still functioning as designed, while most major cities still depend on water and plumbing infrastructure build 1880-1920.

  18. Re:Oh, man, what a mess on Private Keys Stolen Within Hours From Heartbleed OpenSSL Site · · Score: 4, Interesting

    From the linked site: "He sent at least 2.5 million requests over the course of the day." So, no rate limiters, anti-DDS protection, or other active countermeasures in operation. Reasonable for this challenge but not overly realistic.

    sPh

  19. Non-profits contributing to political campaigns on Mozilla CEO Firestorm Likely Violated California Law · · Score: 1

    Under both federal and California law it is illegal for non-profits to contribute to political campaigns. For example, religious organizations organized as non-profits contributing to California proposition campaigns. Do you _really_ want to follow up on violations of California law?

    sPh

  20. Re:Really? on Kaspersky: Mt. Gox Data Archive Contains Bitcoin-Stealing Malware · · Score: 3, Informative

    - - - - - - NOPE! And I assure you, this mode of payment is not thousands of years old. - - - - - -

    Another crytocoin fanatic who hasn't bothered to read a detailed history of money, much less a standard theory of money textbook. Hint: more than one ancient language has been deciphered by translating magic documents known as "letters of credit".

    sPh

  21. Re:That's capitalism. on Prominent GitHub Engineer Julie Ann Horvath Quits Citing Harrassment · · Score: 0

    = = = Alcoholic beverages allowed and provided. Unlimited fastfood allowances. An in-house Bunny Ranch (legal for a Nevada campus). No bullshit anti-discrimination training and assorted brainwashing. Crash couches where you can chill or sleepover if you don't feel like going home. Generous basements for those of us who can't stand direct sunlight anymore. = = =

    I can't tell if this is Swiftian satire or not - which I guess makes it a brilliant piece of writing either way.

    For the record a very large percentage of men would find a work environment such as the parodist describes disgusting and depart within a few days as well. Leaving the rest to surf "game" web sites until the organization collapsed and the bankruptcy trustee started filing clawback lawsuits.

    sPh

  22. Re:Don't they have to fly that thing around? on What If the Next Presidential Limo Was a Tesla? · · Score: 0

    = = = I strongly suspect it's the most-widely-travelled wheeled vehicle on earth actually :) = = =

    I believe Rolls Royce has some demo vehicles that have been on the road since the aughts (the 19-aughts that is, not the 20-aughts) and have visited more countries than all US Presidents combined ;-)

    sPh

  23. Re:Buy a "Hello Kitty" wrist strap. on Ask Slashdot: How Can I Prepare For the Theft of My Android Phone? · · Score: 1

    Unfortunate when the thieves cut your hand off to get the phone though.

    sPh

  24. Re:Learning from history on The Tangled Tale of Mt. Gox's Missing Millions · · Score: 1

    = = = Bitcoin is regulated. It is regulated by the users and the protocol rather than a central authority than can be corrupted or one in which sociopaths naturally gravitate to. = = =

    Yeah, as I noted that system ("regulated by the users") was tried from 1500-1880. It didn't work so well, for exactly the reasons now afflicting Bitcoin.

    sPh

  25. Universities on Facebook To Pay City $200K-a-Year For a Neighborhood Cop · · Score: 1

    Interesting that this is drawing so much scrutiny because it is a business. Universities - including private universities - in large cities do this all the time. I can think of three large private schools in urban areas where the "campus police" are actually PD deputies and patrol the area around the campus as city police officers as well as patrolling the campus itself. No one complains because it is a traditional "school" doing this, even though some of the large private universities are pretty big money machines.

    sPh