Well, how about if the state simply raises business taxes, and then the web retailer jacks their prices up an amount that is exactly proportional to the state sales tax? Because if I'm a state govt, and I see my revenue swimming away out of state, I need to do something about it... Sales tax only works when it can be charged, and states need to pay for things like police/fire/EMT services somehow. You are using the resources of the state, in an indirect fashion - the retailer brings truckloads of widgets down the road to their warehouse, thereby putting wear and tear on the road. They are relying on the state to provide fire/police/EMT services. When you buy widgets from the retailer, you've used up a portion of the road, a portion of the emergency services, a portion of the state regulatory agency's time, etc. All because the state has to interact with the retailer. When you look at sales tax, it's really not that big a deal. -begin rant- Seeing people bitch (and I don't mean to single you out, you're just the one I'm replying to) about a few percent like this makes me sick when there are things like homelessness, hunger, and illeteracy that that small bit of sales tax might resolve. Why is everyone so fscking greedy, hmm? Part with your money, go out and live life instead of worrying. Be nice and generous and happy and you'll find that what goes around comes around.
itachi, who is feeling little patience today for those who are tight of fist
The online retailer is making heavy use of the physical infrastructure and so forth in the state in which they are based, much heavier than an individual citizen. Just a thought...
To you or me, 5 billion is a lot, but to the U.S. Federal govt, 5 billion USD is chump change. Like, really nothing. Take a look at the federal budget sometime, or look at the IMF statistical yearbooks. There's really big money floating around out there...
Pay per use is really not a nice way of doing things, though, because that disenfranchises the people who need the most help from the govt. (those who can't afford the basic services) and because police/fire/EMT services would be prohibitively expensive that way (crime would go up as people were less willing to spend the cash to report a mugging, so fewer muggings would get reported, so muggings would get reported, etc). A nice progressive tax on income, with a negative tax below a certain rate (like the existing Earned Income Tax Credit) actually works pretty well. The trick is setting the rates fairly, and then spending the money properly and fairly. As for the government and the internet, the govt. was running the whole deal until within the last ten years or so - Network Solutions got where they are on a grant from NSF within the last 10 years, private industry wasn't interested in taking over from ARPA in the mid and late eighties, etc. The government can do things right, but it's made of people, who are faliable. Let them know what you want, and where they're going wrong, otherwise they might not see that things are broken. Socialized health care doesn't sound very much like a capitalist govt, by the way. I think it is sorely needed, but it really isn't very capitalist. A capitalist government has a lot of really nasty side effects (like a lassiez faire attitude to business which _helps_ the lumbering, monopolistic companies) that nobody really wants. Just my 2 bits...
Not having the full text in front of me, I'm guessing the way around that would be an elimination of state sales taxes in favor of a Fed sales tax. (This way, it's not taxing the exports, it's taxing the sale that occured within US borders - that clause looks like it was meant to prevent the Fed from deciding that Texas, for instance, would not be selling anything out of state anymore...) But that voids the point of sales taxes, which, as implemented, support state budgets. I think that there isn't an easy answer because each of the 50 states raise cash in their own way - some of them with sales taxes, some with property taxes, Alaska makes money on oil, etc. And each state budget is different, too. Maybe the best way to do it would be to think of internet and catalog sales as happening in a 51st state, and then let the Fed. manage sales taxes and so forth there, with all the money being earmarked for state funding (eg. Fed highway funding, Fed school subsidies, etc.)
itachi
Re:Are you sure it was a dumpster diver?
on
Database Nation
·
· Score: 1
Well, IIRC, there was something that suggested that it was a dumpster diver, maybe the location where the purchases were made, or when she had used it last vs. when the fraud occured. But you're right, it is an assumption, and I should have pointed that out. It wasn't online shopping gone bad or shoulder surfing, though...
itachi, who sees dumpster diving as a privacy issue too
Communist East Germany took less time and lasted longer. Both of those examples were tied to a particular political system and a particular politcal clique maintaining control. It gets easier and easier for an organization to do what the Gestapo and their ilk did or do. I mean, has it never occured to you that that is the ultimate use of nano? The perfect spy camera, you just dump millions of them into the chemical tubs at a dandruff shampoo factory, and what do you know, it's just a bit of dandruff, right? Only it's watching everything you do and reporting it back to the oppresive organization that could never happen... The point is that it can happen, anything can happen, but whether things will happen depends on people. So don't let people think it's okay to screw with you and people will be less likely to screw with you.
But dude, the people who are going to abuse this the most don't care about everyone. It's the companies trying to sell stuff. Someone selling Cheez Whiz only cares about the people who live in places where Cheez Whiz is sold, and then within that area, people who are potential customers. And they will make cash money off of Cheez Whiz sales, which they can use to put together such databases. Look at DoubleClick. All they do is what you just described. That's it. They re-sell that to other companies. And it ten years, they'll be able to do it bigger better faster. I'm not suggesting that privacy is the only issue, but given improvements in technology, it will only get easier for this type of thing to get implemented. Another example of such databasing in action is grocery store "clubs", where you get a little card that gets swiped for discounts and such. Quite a few stores even advertise the fact that they use the info to create customer profiles, and then mail directed coupons to the "club" members. Of course, some of them also resell the data, but really, it's only a description of your life, why should you care that they know about your health (pharmaceuticals), your sex life (birth control/pregnancy tests), what you eat, how much you eat (when you have guests, how large your fam is, etc) and so forth. And no insurance company or potential employer would want to know about that sort of thing, right? - why insure/hire someone who will die soon or be sick all the time? Don't doubt it, in the DC metro area, TWO different grocery chains attempted a few years ago to sell pharmacy receipts to a company that does research for health insurers to determine if a person should be insured or not. The government, on the other hand, isn't going to do much to me with a database. I pay my taxes, don't violate many laws, so they don't have much to be interested in. But I'm a consumer, and that makes me interesting to people who sell.
itachi, who would like to point out to hemos that it is mwegner at cs.oberlin.edu
No, I went to Oberlin. I work elsewhere. And an AUP is based more on trust than anything else. People violate AUPs all the time, but the only people who get in trouble for it (at my workplace, anyway) are those that cause admins to get email saying "hey, someone is your domain is doing ____ to my box, could you make them stop?" or the like. No admin has the time to sit there sniffing traffic watching for misbehavior. Shutting off someone's port when they are in the middle of DoSing someone, on the other hand, is more of a job requirement, don't you think? As for the need for warrants, it depends. IANAL, but my understanding is that if a reasonable and understandable AUP is presented, any uni/corp. can kill a connection based on behavior that violates policy.
itachi, who resents being called jackbooted. I wear hiking boots with steel toes:)
At a certain point, you've got as much bandwidth as you can reasonably afford. The highest of high tech isn't available in the area, and the very biggest pipe is beyond your budget. (Note: this happens to Unis and companies, too - UUnet/Qwest/whomever might be able to get you DS-3, or even OC-3, but at a certain point, they just can't get you anything more, and those things aren't cheap) So at that point, what else can a Uni/company do? You limit the uses allowed. Why should a Uni help Johnny Frat-boy build the world's biggest MP3 collection? The Uni I work at spends as much as we can on connectivity without going overbudget, but we still are pretty much maxed out from about 8am to 1am. And about 25% to 33% of that was napster at last check. Another equal amount of webbrowsing. How much of it was academic? Genuinely? I could buy a good chunk of the web stuff. But Napster as academic research?
Sure, if all you're dealing with is a small subnet. But what about big operations, where you've got upwards of 50k users? 100k users? It gets pricey. Adding more bandwidth or traffic shapers gets pricey, and not-for-profits and Unis don't always have the funding to solve problems like this by throwing money at it. Sometimes adding something to the AUP makes sense. I know that in an academic environment, research and educational uses should come first. If that's distance learning, or engineers trying odd new things, or whatever. Joe and Jane User's resnet connection is low priority by comparison, imnsho. If Joe and Jane User want faster better more from a resnet situation, Joe and Jane ought to pony up and get themselves some commercial feed. Alright, maybe that's taking it too far. But at the very least, during business hours, doesn't it make a bit of sense? I think I saw a suggestion for bandwidth limitations on resnet stuff here on/. earlier. And for a Uni, I couldn't agree more. I like the high speed connection when I'm not working, but I waste it. Someone who is actually using it for work deserves it more.
itachi, who got to boot a luser on Friday for violating security policy despite warnings
Well, here in the US, we do happen to have a right wing fringe that is fond of the idea of throwing the UN out like a cheating lover. Or something like that. Then there are those on the lookout for UN occupation troops, and watching the skies for black helicopters. All in the name of keeping the US federal govt. seperate and distinct from the UN. So yes, you could say that there is not a universal acceptance of the UN.
As for the notion of a global currency, you're so right about not needing a central government to carry out such a plan. A single central bank would make it way more feasible, and it would also introduce all sorts of problems. First of all, a central bank is just as likely to be unpopular on the radical fringe of politcal thought (left and right). Second, a global central bank would prevent nations from carrying out their own monetary policy. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. But it can have bad side effects - what's sauce for the goose turns out not to be sauce for the economy of Algeria. Or something like that.
If you look at the Euro and the European Economic Union, they have taken steps to prevent this. First of all, there are restrictions on inflation and interest rates, etc. Each member nation had to stay in-band for a period of time prior to Euro roll-out, and so forth. It would not be impossible to do. But there are some really nice things about multiple currencies. One of them is the capability to use another currency to force your economy back to health - several central and south American nations have done this in recent years - pegged the (fill in the blank) to the USD and allowed the relative stability of the US economy and interest rates to keep their own inflation, interest rates under control. It is a lot easier, from a governmental and central bank point of view, to say that federal law requires whatever painful action that is about to be implemented than it is to say that the painful fix is not required but it is good in the long run. Essentially, a variety of currency allows fine control over national economies, whereas a global currency would have some serious benefits that turn into serious flaws during depressions/recessions. So the globo is a bad idea, yeah. But good, too. The whole article was pretty depressing, though. I don't want to live to 110. Thats like, old. And the extra years are old, frail years. That sucks, dude.
Dude, um, the Philly Inquirer isn't really a step up from the National Enquirer. I mean, last week, they did the entire front page on the who wants to marry a mkillionare thing. Entire front page. It's not a newspaper, it might not be a tabloid, it's passable as a fishwrapper. Not that I don't like it or anything:)
itachi, who seems to have wandered off topic a bit
Re:Strange things before you fall asleep(offtopic)
on
X-Files FPS Episode
·
· Score: 1
Dude, I get the same thing, only after seeing other people fall asleep in meetings and classes and such, I think you're prolly actually starting to tilt forward or sideways or what have you. Like I'm sitting there, trying to pay attention, but the coffee hasn't kicked in, and I am falling asleep, and then I fell myself falling forward and I jerk back awake, only seeing someone else do it it's sort of slow motion. Very entertaining to watch.
Oh, come on. Sure, the national debt isn't really as scary as everyone makes it out to be, but at least a third of it is owed externally. Which means that there are people who are going to want their money back. Sure, the velocity of money will mean that the more you spend, the more it helps the economy, but Reagan was a disaster, economically. If you account for lag, Carter gets credit for some good stuff, Reagan gets credit for keeping it going for a while, and then he gets credit for some of the recession action we saw under Bush. Worrying about the economy and taxes is a waste of time, though, since the US government is, imho, stuck on this back and forth thing where the flavor of taxation and spending we get will be determined by the party in power. I'd be more concerned with the policies that are enacted and the things that are done by the executive branch - little illegal things like Iran-Contra, Watergate, CIA sponsored coups and drug smuggling, etc. The taxation and spending by the government isn't going to change radically without an equally radical change in the voting system and the way the executive branch of the fed operates.
My point is more that in order to make something look nice in Premiere, you need to really grok it. I suppose the emacs analogy sucked. How about this - iMovie is cheap and easy and does the work for you, more like the MacOS, and Premiere (which, ironicly, I've only used on a Mac) takes more effort to get a nice looking end result? Eh, whatever. My total lack of artistic ability may have something to do with this as well....
No, dude. The difference between Premiere and iMovie is like the difference between emacs and your average word processor. iMovie is so that I can make a movie using an iMac and a video camera and it'll look halfway decent, maybe even pretty good if the lighting was good. Premiere is so someone with artistic vision, a lot of patience, and a lot of experience with Premiere can make something really beautiful. Premiere has a lot of capability, and it is really powerful, and it has a learning curve like you can't believe. In order to use Premiere to actually end up with a nice finished product, you have to know what you're doing. iMovie is like Premiere for the rest of us.
Oh, come on. Cisco provides something like 70% of the routers in use around the world. Of course Cisco stuff is going to be in place in most of these situations. And anyone worth hiring to set up your Cisco router is going to throw in an access list(or, depending on the IOS, there are alternative methods) on each exterior interface that will dis-allow outgoing packets that don't actually come from that AS. (in other words, if data is trying to leave your network with an IP that isn't part of your network, it gets dropped).
Because with a serious handgun like a.454 magnum or such, you do go hunting. Bear (for the rill brave and/or stupid), deer, etc. Relatively large game. And given the inherent lesser accuracy and shorter range of handguns, it is more of a challenge to hunt with a handgun. A handgun hunter has to get closer to the animal and/or shoot more accurately. I suppose you could also hunt small game with much smaller bore handguns, though it doesn't seem as common. And of course, for the literature fans, you can always go after that most dangerous prey - man (or law enforcement agents, if you think you're G. Gordon Liddy). I don't hunt, I don't own guns, but I believe in the second amendment.
Possibly Samuel Sheinbein? His father was born in Palestine in the 40s (note the date!), then left before 48. Sheinbein the younger and a friend butchered another young gent, then mutilated the body to try to hide the evidence of what they had done. Their motive was apparently practice - it seems they were planning on killing someone else, wanted to make sure that they could get away with it and carry it out. Mr. Tello was just a convenient victim. So when Sheinbein, his father, and his brother all fled the U.S. (making the father and brother felons in the U.S. for helping the accused flee the police despite the fact that they knew he was wanted for murder), Israel did nothing. Extradite? No, they are going to lock this evil, vicious bastard away for a few years. It is my sincere wish that Samuel Sheinbein returns to the U.S. at some point, is arrested, and returned to the state of Maryland, so he can be removed from the human race. He is a serious contaminant in the gene pool.
Dude, you're the market. I'm the market. Everybody's the market. If you think LinuxOne is evil and Suse (or debian or redhat or mandrake or OpenBSD etc etc) is better, be the market. Buy yourself a copy of your favorite distro's latest release. Buy it full price. Buy it from the part of the market you want to support (be that VA, or the distro org. themselves, or from Ma and Pa computers down the street...) You have market power, use it. It's not just about supporting the community, it's about market economies and who is going to be there in 20 years. And with something like Debian, yeah, they'll prolly be there for 20 years if the global economy collapsed tomorrow. But support your favorite linux companies, because they wont stick around unless the market asks them to...
It's interesting, while discussing the assasination of MLK jr, to point out that many conspiracy theorists point at the govt. for being responsible. Which hardly goes along with the notion of the govt. trying to paint a rosier picture of King. Getting around to responding to you, rasicm sucks, but bullshit is bullshit. I think King was one of the finest humans of the century, but that doesn't mean he was flawless. I'm not saying he was a screwup or that whatever people say about him is true, but he was human, you know?
Actually, I was thinking about it, and something sort of like everything.blockstackers Something dynamic that any number of linux users can add to, it's searchable, etc. Have you ever seen the owners manual in a Saturn? The index looks like it was written by a bunch of people off the street, but to the non-gear-head, it's perfect. Gear heads can figure out what they're refering to when something is listed in the index by a description, and the car-oblivious can make figure out the proper name of the thing hooked up to the other thing with the stuff coming out. Alright, well, the index is better written than that. But you see what I mean, right?
Slashdot Mirror
Well, how about if the state simply raises business taxes, and then the web retailer jacks their prices up an amount that is exactly proportional to the state sales tax? Because if I'm a state govt, and I see my revenue swimming away out of state, I need to do something about it... Sales tax only works when it can be charged, and states need to pay for things like police/fire/EMT services somehow. You are using the resources of the state, in an indirect fashion - the retailer brings truckloads of widgets down the road to their warehouse, thereby putting wear and tear on the road. They are relying on the state to provide fire/police/EMT services. When you buy widgets from the retailer, you've used up a portion of the road, a portion of the emergency services, a portion of the state regulatory agency's time, etc. All because the state has to interact with the retailer. When you look at sales tax, it's really not that big a deal. -begin rant- Seeing people bitch (and I don't mean to single you out, you're just the one I'm replying to) about a few percent like this makes me sick when there are things like homelessness, hunger, and illeteracy that that small bit of sales tax might resolve. Why is everyone so fscking greedy, hmm? Part with your money, go out and live life instead of worrying. Be nice and generous and happy and you'll find that what goes around comes around.
itachi, who is feeling little patience today for those who are tight of fist
The online retailer is making heavy use of the physical infrastructure and so forth in the state in which they are based, much heavier than an individual citizen. Just a thought...
itachi
To you or me, 5 billion is a lot, but to the U.S. Federal govt, 5 billion USD is chump change. Like, really nothing. Take a look at the federal budget sometime, or look at the IMF statistical yearbooks. There's really big money floating around out there...
itachi
Pay per use is really not a nice way of doing things, though, because that disenfranchises the people who need the most help from the govt. (those who can't afford the basic services) and because police/fire/EMT services would be prohibitively expensive that way (crime would go up as people were less willing to spend the cash to report a mugging, so fewer muggings would get reported, so muggings would get reported, etc). A nice progressive tax on income, with a negative tax below a certain rate (like the existing Earned Income Tax Credit) actually works pretty well. The trick is setting the rates fairly, and then spending the money properly and fairly. As for the government and the internet, the govt. was running the whole deal until within the last ten years or so - Network Solutions got where they are on a grant from NSF within the last 10 years, private industry wasn't interested in taking over from ARPA in the mid and late eighties, etc. The government can do things right, but it's made of people, who are faliable. Let them know what you want, and where they're going wrong, otherwise they might not see that things are broken. Socialized health care doesn't sound very much like a capitalist govt, by the way. I think it is sorely needed, but it really isn't very capitalist. A capitalist government has a lot of really nasty side effects (like a lassiez faire attitude to business which _helps_ the lumbering, monopolistic companies) that nobody really wants. Just my 2 bits...
itachi
Not having the full text in front of me, I'm guessing the way around that would be an elimination of state sales taxes in favor of a Fed sales tax. (This way, it's not taxing the exports, it's taxing the sale that occured within US borders - that clause looks like it was meant to prevent the Fed from deciding that Texas, for instance, would not be selling anything out of state anymore...) But that voids the point of sales taxes, which, as implemented, support state budgets. I think that there isn't an easy answer because each of the 50 states raise cash in their own way - some of them with sales taxes, some with property taxes, Alaska makes money on oil, etc. And each state budget is different, too. Maybe the best way to do it would be to think of internet and catalog sales as happening in a 51st state, and then let the Fed. manage sales taxes and so forth there, with all the money being earmarked for state funding (eg. Fed highway funding, Fed school subsidies, etc.)
itachi
Well, IIRC, there was something that suggested that it was a dumpster diver, maybe the location where the purchases were made, or when she had used it last vs. when the fraud occured. But you're right, it is an assumption, and I should have pointed that out. It wasn't online shopping gone bad or shoulder surfing, though...
itachi, who sees dumpster diving as a privacy issue too
Communist East Germany took less time and lasted longer. Both of those examples were tied to a particular political system and a particular politcal clique maintaining control. It gets easier and easier for an organization to do what the Gestapo and their ilk did or do. I mean, has it never occured to you that that is the ultimate use of nano? The perfect spy camera, you just dump millions of them into the chemical tubs at a dandruff shampoo factory, and what do you know, it's just a bit of dandruff, right? Only it's watching everything you do and reporting it back to the oppresive organization that could never happen... The point is that it can happen, anything can happen, but whether things will happen depends on people. So don't let people think it's okay to screw with you and people will be less likely to screw with you.
itachi
But dude, the people who are going to abuse this the most don't care about everyone. It's the companies trying to sell stuff. Someone selling Cheez Whiz only cares about the people who live in places where Cheez Whiz is sold, and then within that area, people who are potential customers. And they will make cash money off of Cheez Whiz sales, which they can use to put together such databases. Look at DoubleClick. All they do is what you just described. That's it. They re-sell that to other companies. And it ten years, they'll be able to do it bigger better faster. I'm not suggesting that privacy is the only issue, but given improvements in technology, it will only get easier for this type of thing to get implemented. Another example of such databasing in action is grocery store "clubs", where you get a little card that gets swiped for discounts and such. Quite a few stores even advertise the fact that they use the info to create customer profiles, and then mail directed coupons to the "club" members. Of course, some of them also resell the data, but really, it's only a description of your life, why should you care that they know about your health (pharmaceuticals), your sex life (birth control/pregnancy tests), what you eat, how much you eat (when you have guests, how large your fam is, etc) and so forth. And no insurance company or potential employer would want to know about that sort of thing, right? - why insure/hire someone who will die soon or be sick all the time? Don't doubt it, in the DC metro area, TWO different grocery chains attempted a few years ago to sell pharmacy receipts to a company that does research for health insurers to determine if a person should be insured or not. The government, on the other hand, isn't going to do much to me with a database. I pay my taxes, don't violate many laws, so they don't have much to be interested in. But I'm a consumer, and that makes me interesting to people who sell.
itachi, who would like to point out to hemos that it is mwegner at cs.oberlin.edu
No, I went to Oberlin. I work elsewhere. And an AUP is based more on trust than anything else. People violate AUPs all the time, but the only people who get in trouble for it (at my workplace, anyway) are those that cause admins to get email saying "hey, someone is your domain is doing ____ to my box, could you make them stop?" or the like. No admin has the time to sit there sniffing traffic watching for misbehavior. Shutting off someone's port when they are in the middle of DoSing someone, on the other hand, is more of a job requirement, don't you think? As for the need for warrants, it depends. IANAL, but my understanding is that if a reasonable and understandable AUP is presented, any uni/corp. can kill a connection based on behavior that violates policy.
:)
itachi, who resents being called jackbooted. I wear hiking boots with steel toes
At a certain point, you've got as much bandwidth as you can reasonably afford. The highest of high tech isn't available in the area, and the very biggest pipe is beyond your budget. (Note: this happens to Unis and companies, too - UUnet/Qwest/whomever might be able to get you DS-3, or even OC-3, but at a certain point, they just can't get you anything more, and those things aren't cheap) So at that point, what else can a Uni/company do? You limit the uses allowed. Why should a Uni help Johnny Frat-boy build the world's biggest MP3 collection? The Uni I work at spends as much as we can on connectivity without going overbudget, but we still are pretty much maxed out from about 8am to 1am. And about 25% to 33% of that was napster at last check. Another equal amount of webbrowsing. How much of it was academic? Genuinely? I could buy a good chunk of the web stuff. But Napster as academic research?
itachi
Sure, if all you're dealing with is a small subnet. But what about big operations, where you've got upwards of 50k users? 100k users? It gets pricey. Adding more bandwidth or traffic shapers gets pricey, and not-for-profits and Unis don't always have the funding to solve problems like this by throwing money at it. Sometimes adding something to the AUP makes sense. I know that in an academic environment, research and educational uses should come first. If that's distance learning, or engineers trying odd new things, or whatever. Joe and Jane User's resnet connection is low priority by comparison, imnsho. If Joe and Jane User want faster better more from a resnet situation, Joe and Jane ought to pony up and get themselves some commercial feed. Alright, maybe that's taking it too far. But at the very least, during business hours, doesn't it make a bit of sense? I think I saw a suggestion for bandwidth limitations on resnet stuff here on /. earlier. And for a Uni, I couldn't agree more. I like the high speed connection when I'm not working, but I waste it. Someone who is actually using it for work deserves it more.
itachi, who got to boot a luser on Friday for violating security policy despite warnings
Rene descartes was a drunken fart, I drink therefore I am.
me
Well, here in the US, we do happen to have a right wing fringe that is fond of the idea of throwing the UN out like a cheating lover. Or something like that. Then there are those on the lookout for UN occupation troops, and watching the skies for black helicopters. All in the name of keeping the US federal govt. seperate and distinct from the UN. So yes, you could say that there is not a universal acceptance of the UN.
As for the notion of a global currency, you're so right about not needing a central government to carry out such a plan. A single central bank would make it way more feasible, and it would also introduce all sorts of problems. First of all, a central bank is just as likely to be unpopular on the radical fringe of politcal thought (left and right). Second, a global central bank would prevent nations from carrying out their own monetary policy. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. But it can have bad side effects - what's sauce for the goose turns out not to be sauce for the economy of Algeria. Or something like that.
itachi
If you look at the Euro and the European Economic Union, they have taken steps to prevent this. First of all, there are restrictions on inflation and interest rates, etc. Each member nation had to stay in-band for a period of time prior to Euro roll-out, and so forth. It would not be impossible to do. But there are some really nice things about multiple currencies. One of them is the capability to use another currency to force your economy back to health - several central and south American nations have done this in recent years - pegged the (fill in the blank) to the USD and allowed the relative stability of the US economy and interest rates to keep their own inflation, interest rates under control. It is a lot easier, from a governmental and central bank point of view, to say that federal law requires whatever painful action that is about to be implemented than it is to say that the painful fix is not required but it is good in the long run. Essentially, a variety of currency allows fine control over national economies, whereas a global currency would have some serious benefits that turn into serious flaws during depressions/recessions. So the globo is a bad idea, yeah. But good, too. The whole article was pretty depressing, though. I don't want to live to 110. Thats like, old. And the extra years are old, frail years. That sucks, dude.
itachi
Dude, um, the Philly Inquirer isn't really a step up from the National Enquirer. I mean, last week, they did the entire front page on the who wants to marry a mkillionare thing. Entire front page. It's not a newspaper, it might not be a tabloid, it's passable as a fishwrapper. Not that I don't like it or anything :)
itachi, who seems to have wandered off topic a bit
Dude, I get the same thing, only after seeing other people fall asleep in meetings and classes and such, I think you're prolly actually starting to tilt forward or sideways or what have you. Like I'm sitting there, trying to pay attention, but the coffee hasn't kicked in, and I am falling asleep, and then I fell myself falling forward and I jerk back awake, only seeing someone else do it it's sort of slow motion. Very entertaining to watch.
itachi
Oh, come on. Sure, the national debt isn't really as scary as everyone makes it out to be, but at least a third of it is owed externally. Which means that there are people who are going to want their money back. Sure, the velocity of money will mean that the more you spend, the more it helps the economy, but Reagan was a disaster, economically. If you account for lag, Carter gets credit for some good stuff, Reagan gets credit for keeping it going for a while, and then he gets credit for some of the recession action we saw under Bush. Worrying about the economy and taxes is a waste of time, though, since the US government is, imho, stuck on this back and forth thing where the flavor of taxation and spending we get will be determined by the party in power. I'd be more concerned with the policies that are enacted and the things that are done by the executive branch - little illegal things like Iran-Contra, Watergate, CIA sponsored coups and drug smuggling, etc. The taxation and spending by the government isn't going to change radically without an equally radical change in the voting system and the way the executive branch of the fed operates.
itachi
My point is more that in order to make something look nice in Premiere, you need to really grok it. I suppose the emacs analogy sucked. How about this - iMovie is cheap and easy and does the work for you, more like the MacOS, and Premiere (which, ironicly, I've only used on a Mac) takes more effort to get a nice looking end result? Eh, whatever. My total lack of artistic ability may have something to do with this as well....
itachi
No, dude. The difference between Premiere and iMovie is like the difference between emacs and your average word processor. iMovie is so that I can make a movie using an iMac and a video camera and it'll look halfway decent, maybe even pretty good if the lighting was good. Premiere is so someone with artistic vision, a lot of patience, and a lot of experience with Premiere can make something really beautiful. Premiere has a lot of capability, and it is really powerful, and it has a learning curve like you can't believe. In order to use Premiere to actually end up with a nice finished product, you have to know what you're doing. iMovie is like Premiere for the rest of us.
itachi
Oh, come on. Cisco provides something like 70% of the routers in use around the world. Of course Cisco stuff is going to be in place in most of these situations. And anyone worth hiring to set up your Cisco router is going to throw in an access list(or, depending on the IOS, there are alternative methods) on each exterior interface that will dis-allow outgoing packets that don't actually come from that AS. (in other words, if data is trying to leave your network with an IP that isn't part of your network, it gets dropped).
Feh.
itachi
Because with a serious handgun like a .454 magnum or such, you do go hunting. Bear (for the rill brave and/or stupid), deer, etc. Relatively large game. And given the inherent lesser accuracy and shorter range of handguns, it is more of a challenge to hunt with a handgun. A handgun hunter has to get closer to the animal and/or shoot more accurately. I suppose you could also hunt small game with much smaller bore handguns, though it doesn't seem as common. And of course, for the literature fans, you can always go after that most dangerous prey - man (or law enforcement agents, if you think you're G. Gordon Liddy). I don't hunt, I don't own guns, but I believe in the second amendment.
itachi the increasingly offtopic
Possibly Samuel Sheinbein? His father was born in Palestine in the 40s (note the date!), then left before 48. Sheinbein the younger and a friend butchered another young gent, then mutilated the body to try to hide the evidence of what they had done. Their motive was apparently practice - it seems they were planning on killing someone else, wanted to make sure that they could get away with it and carry it out. Mr. Tello was just a convenient victim. So when Sheinbein, his father, and his brother all fled the U.S. (making the father and brother felons in the U.S. for helping the accused flee the police despite the fact that they knew he was wanted for murder), Israel did nothing. Extradite? No, they are going to lock this evil, vicious bastard away for a few years. It is my sincere wish that Samuel Sheinbein returns to the U.S. at some point, is arrested, and returned to the state of Maryland, so he can be removed from the human race. He is a serious contaminant in the gene pool.
itachi the bloodthirsty...
Dude, you're the market. I'm the market. Everybody's the market. If you think LinuxOne is evil and Suse (or debian or redhat or mandrake or OpenBSD etc etc) is better, be the market. Buy yourself a copy of your favorite distro's latest release. Buy it full price. Buy it from the part of the market you want to support (be that VA, or the distro org. themselves, or from Ma and Pa computers down the street...) You have market power, use it. It's not just about supporting the community, it's about market economies and who is going to be there in 20 years. And with something like Debian, yeah, they'll prolly be there for 20 years if the global economy collapsed tomorrow. But support your favorite linux companies, because they wont stick around unless the market asks them to...
itachi the econ geek
It's interesting, while discussing the assasination of MLK jr, to point out that many conspiracy theorists point at the govt. for being responsible. Which hardly goes along with the notion of the govt. trying to paint a rosier picture of King. Getting around to responding to you, rasicm sucks, but bullshit is bullshit. I think King was one of the finest humans of the century, but that doesn't mean he was flawless. I'm not saying he was a screwup or that whatever people say about him is true, but he was human, you know?
itachi
Actually, I was thinking about it, and something sort of like everything.blockstackers Something dynamic that any number of linux users can add to, it's searchable, etc. Have you ever seen the owners manual in a Saturn? The index looks like it was written by a bunch of people off the street, but to the non-gear-head, it's perfect. Gear heads can figure out what they're refering to when something is listed in the index by a description, and the car-oblivious can make figure out the proper name of the thing hooked up to the other thing with the stuff coming out. Alright, well, the index is better written than that. But you see what I mean, right?
itachi