Lowering spending is the only option. Raising taxes in never an option.
What is it about the topic of taxes that makes so many of my fellow Americans so stupid whenever the topic comes up?
When spending is too low, lowering it is not an option. When taxes are too low, raising them is an option.
Spending on basic physical and social infrastructure has been too low for decades, and much has fallen into disrepair from neglect. Lowering it is not an option if we want a decent quality of life in this country.
On the other hand, spending on building a military empire has been overly high, has as been spending on putting people in jail. That spending can certainly be lowered.
Compared to most other industrialized countries, the U.S. pays low taxes. Compared with our history, the top marginal tax rates are quite low. (The graph there is interesting. Note the decline in taxes that proceeded the Great Depression, and the decline in taxes that preceded our current financial shitstorm.) So yes, raising taxes is an option; we could go back to the 50% top rate of the socialist Regan years, or even the 91% top rate that applied during the communist reign of Eisenhower, and the nation would do quite well.
Simple observation of the world tells me that the sun moves around a stationary earth.
"Simple observation" is no substitute for rigorous critical thinking based on cross-checked observations and an attempt to filter out bias.
The situation is even worse when dealing with social stereotypes, which can become self-fulfilling prophecies. "Group X likes to be with their own kind. So we'll put up social , legal, and economic structures to keep the rest of us from mixing with them. (Time passes.) People from Group X don't know how to deal well with people from other groups. Well, I guess it's true what they say, Group X likes to be with their own kind."
BMI and ASCAP have been thugs for a long time, threatening bar and club owners for licensing agreements for offering live music.
Not licensing for live music, licensing for peforming someone else's composition. That's their job.
When you play a songwriter's composition in a way that makes you money (such as attracting customers), you owe that songwriter a cut.
While BMI and ASCAP may be bastards, the general principle of "share this song if you like it, but if you make money from it you owe me a royalty" is, IMHO, a good one -- indeed, it's the principle that ought to apply to all media. (Along with the understanding that such a royalty right applies for a limited time and only to authors, not their heirs or employers or assignees. It's ridiculous that someone still claims rights on "Happy Birthday" -- though the claim is dubious, they still manage to squeeze money out of people.)
For this reason, AS220 in Providence no longer allows musicians to perform any cover songs!
A venue that encourages original music? Outstanding!
Riiiiiiiight... except in a balanced, rational world, the laws would be so simple and equitable that one set of laws could apply to the entire nation, without offending one or the other.
In terms of basic criminal law, mostly so. But in terms of regulatory law, it's trickier. New York City shouldn't have the same sort of building codes as a town in the middle of rural Wyoming. Baltimore (on the Chesapeake Bay) should not have the same sort of water and sewage regulations as Las Vegas (in the middle of the desert).
Let's see the "I don't believe in imaginary property" crowd come out with their memes -- and see them getting a new one ripped out...It is about everything, that's easy to replicate, but hard to design... Be it a book, a song, a shoe-design, or software program...
Um, hate to tell you, but those of us opposed to the use of government force to prevent people from making copies already understand that.
So, what's your point? You'd prefer a scenario where no one had the right to read?
If a course is designed and taught around a textbook, then maybe the guy (or institution) teaching the class ought to owe a royalty to the textbook's author, since his course is a derivative work. I've been arguing for royalty-right as a replacement for copyright for years. But threatening students with jail time for copying textbooks is nothing but a price support for the textbook racket.
Besides, the "percentage of the income they make from it" would essentially be a free license for anyone to reproduce the work as much as they want without any restrictions, as long as they don't do it for profit.
Yes. It's just like a musician's ability to play a song all they want without paying the songwriter, as long as they're playing for free. It's only when the performance is commercial in nature that the songwriter has to be paid mechanical royalties. Dylan gets his nickel if I play "Tangled Up in Blue" during a paid gig (via ASCAP or BMI, the bar pays, not me), but not if I play it at a party at a friend's house.
I've been advocating a system like this for years -- not a copyright, but a "royalty-right" on commercial use. Nice to see others starting to catch up.:-)
"Hey, post our whole feature film or piece of software to Youtube or anywhere else, just as long as you offer it for free!"
And if Youtube ever makes money from it (and they're going to have to figure out a way eventually, or they go away), they owe the creator of the film or software a cut.
In almost every jurisdiction that I've ever been in during my life, if an actual office of the law (as opposed to rentacops) demands ID, you provide it. Refusal to do so is illegal.
(It may, of course, be to your advantage to show them ID -- if they're looking for John Smith and you can show your name is Richard Roe, you can be about your business that much sooner.)
When we have a young Jean-Luc Picard on the screen, you can have more tea sipping.
Young Jean-Luc was enough of a hellion to end up needing a replacement heart after getting impaled by a big alien knife during a bar fight.
Middle-aged Picard singlehandedly defeated a squad of terrorists trying to take over the Enterprise. Not too shabby.
Picard can sip tea and read Shakespeare, but you underestimate his ability to buckle a swash at your peril.
And don't forget that, while we didn't see much of it, Kirk was known to be fond of poetry, that "longhair stuff" as Mitchell put it.) Different command styles, yes, but then Picard is running a much larger ship, he has to delegate.
Applying a patch takes a trivial amount of time in any sane project.
Performing the necessary configuration management, code review, and regression testing -- for a patch is non-trivial in any responsbily-maintained project.
Although local farmers using chemical fertilizers and pesticides will still be more efficient than the organic growers. Just because they're local doesn't mean they can't use modern tech.
There is nothing "efficient" about externalizing costs and using unsustainable methods.
I'm a bit peeved at organic farming, because it is deliberately under-utilizing land and being purposely inefficient at creating one of the most precious resources on Earth: food.
I'm outraged at industrial farming which destroys soil, pollutes the air and the water, and uses irreplaceable fossil fuel resources -- and then wastes most of the crop production by using it for animal feed.
If the world switched to growing most crops organically, we would kill hundreds of millions of people, if not billions.
My argument for rinsing hair still stands though, being a person with very long hair I can attest that it takes WAAAAAY longer and probably more water in the end to rinse under a low-flow shower head.
Then you have a crappy showerhead. My "Shower Massage" on the center-spray setting will rise the longest hair right quick, at the low-flow standard of 2.5 g/min.
(Haven't have a haircut in a dozen years -- proof of my long-hair credentials here.)
When you buy cheap crap that claims to be eco-friendly and are disappointed by the performance, it's not the eco-friendly that's to blame, it's the cheap crap part.
Of course, use CFLs. The same CFLs that contain large amounts of mercury. The same CFLs that cost an environmental cleanup crew $2000 to clean up if you break one and follow proper procedure.
By that reasoning, it should be okay for Bob to place shackles on my feet and force me to work for him, to make sure he can buy that new McMansion he wants.
That's utter nonsense. There is no way to build a rational argument from the premise, "The price you pay for creating a system of 'property rights' is seeing that others have their basic physical needs met", and arrive at the conclusion "We will now put you in shackles and force you to work for Bob so he can have a McMansion."
Dish Network is moving to the small packages and it sells pretty good.
In their early days, they offered the "Dish Pix" package, where for $15/month you got to pick 10 channels. They don't offer it for new customers anymore, but they've let me keep my existing plan.
All I really want is Comedy Central, Cartoon Network, Discovery (pretty much just for Mythbusters) and Sci-Fi (and all I get out of the latter these days is ST:TNG reruns). Occasionally CNN for when big news goes down.
Forcing me to pay for Billy-Joe Bob's new heart (or house) (or car) is akin to making me Billy's slave.
Making you pay a bill you owe is in no way akin to making you a slave.
You want the government to create property rights for you and to enforce them? Fine. The ante for the game in which government force keeps me from building a shelter or growing or gathering food on what the state says is "your property", is that everybody has a place to live and enough to eat. The ante for building roads (again, making land off-limits for basic shelter/food use) to benefit those well-off enough to own cars, and for making all the urban planning choices that support a car culture, is seeing that everyone has access to useful mass transit -- or even, if necessary, subsidizing their cars.
As for health care, the basics are as much a part of the government's job to "provide for the common defense" as is raising an army and organizing a militia. A society without basic universal health care, where even those who can afford coverage are forced into high-deductible plans that discourage them from seeking care at the first sign of trouble, is much more vulnerable to pandemics or to bioterrorist attacks. Disease is communicable: not only do we all benefit if your neighbor get their flu or anthrax or herpes symptoms checked out ASAP, but basic preventative care means a healthy population that is less likely to get infected.
GPL or Apache doesn't really matters -- what matters is if you can make money.
If you're a greedhead, yes.
If you're a person who prioritizes freedom -- everyone's, not just yours -- over money, then no.
There essential matter is whether the software in question is a tool you use or the product you sell itself.
Outside of games, software is always a tool to accomplish a task. The vast majority of software that gets written is bespoke -- written in-house for use as a tool for a specific task. That's why Free Software is no threat to most developer's jobs, in fact it only makes it possible for them to be more productive.
For a while, proprietary COTS vendors thought they could profit by locking people in to mass-produced tools, but more and more that's falling to FOSS. Good riddance.
But, the grill logo had been removed, and a black blank had been put in it's place. They hadn't acquired rights to use the Mercedes logo in their show.
You do not need any rights to use a product bearing a logo in a film or TV show. Trademark protection covers the use of a mark in commerce in a certain field, not all use everywhere (as much as various litigious bastards would like it to be otherwise).
However, if your show is sponsored by BMW, they may not want you to show the Mercedes logo. And even if you're not sponsored by a competitor, why would you give Mercedes free product placement when they're paying other shows?
The one thing can control, though, is themselves. The best path to inner peace may be for them to reassess their own values and world view.
So very, very interesting that you post that as an AC, putting yourself in a situation where no one can harass you the way that these people were harassed.
There are two issues here. One is what is the best thing, in terms of psychological health, for this couple to do; the other is, shall we permit people who engage in this sort of harassment to wander about on their own, or shall we place them under the supervision of the criminal justice system?
Slashdot Mirror
Left out this link re: marginal tax rates: http://www.truthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php
What is it about the topic of taxes that makes so many of my fellow Americans so stupid whenever the topic comes up?
When spending is too low, lowering it is not an option. When taxes are too low, raising them is an option.
Spending on basic physical and social infrastructure has been too low for decades, and much has fallen into disrepair from neglect. Lowering it is not an option if we want a decent quality of life in this country.
On the other hand, spending on building a military empire has been overly high, has as been spending on putting people in jail. That spending can certainly be lowered.
Compared to most other industrialized countries, the U.S. pays low taxes. Compared with our history, the top marginal tax rates are quite low. (The graph there is interesting. Note the decline in taxes that proceeded the Great Depression, and the decline in taxes that preceded our current financial shitstorm.) So yes, raising taxes is an option; we could go back to the 50% top rate of the socialist Regan years, or even the 91% top rate that applied during the communist reign of Eisenhower, and the nation would do quite well.
Simple observation of the world tells me that the sun moves around a stationary earth.
"Simple observation" is no substitute for rigorous critical thinking based on cross-checked observations and an attempt to filter out bias.
The situation is even worse when dealing with social stereotypes, which can become self-fulfilling prophecies. "Group X likes to be with their own kind. So we'll put up social , legal, and economic structures to keep the rest of us from mixing with them. (Time passes.) People from Group X don't know how to deal well with people from other groups. Well, I guess it's true what they say, Group X likes to be with their own kind."
Not licensing for live music, licensing for peforming someone else's composition. That's their job.
When you play a songwriter's composition in a way that makes you money (such as attracting customers), you owe that songwriter a cut.
While BMI and ASCAP may be bastards, the general principle of "share this song if you like it, but if you make money from it you owe me a royalty" is, IMHO, a good one -- indeed, it's the principle that ought to apply to all media. (Along with the understanding that such a royalty right applies for a limited time and only to authors, not their heirs or employers or assignees. It's ridiculous that someone still claims rights on "Happy Birthday" -- though the claim is dubious, they still manage to squeeze money out of people.)
A venue that encourages original music? Outstanding!
In terms of basic criminal law, mostly so. But in terms of regulatory law, it's trickier. New York City shouldn't have the same sort of building codes as a town in the middle of rural Wyoming. Baltimore (on the Chesapeake Bay) should not have the same sort of water and sewage regulations as Las Vegas (in the middle of the desert).
And this is based on the detailed sociological studies of...who, exactly?
Um, hate to tell you, but those of us opposed to the use of government force to prevent people from making copies already understand that.
So, what's your point? You'd prefer a scenario where no one had the right to read?
If a course is designed and taught around a textbook, then maybe the guy (or institution) teaching the class ought to owe a royalty to the textbook's author, since his course is a derivative work. I've been arguing for royalty-right as a replacement for copyright for years. But threatening students with jail time for copying textbooks is nothing but a price support for the textbook racket.
Yes. It's just like a musician's ability to play a song all they want without paying the songwriter, as long as they're playing for free. It's only when the performance is commercial in nature that the songwriter has to be paid mechanical royalties. Dylan gets his nickel if I play "Tangled Up in Blue" during a paid gig (via ASCAP or BMI, the bar pays, not me), but not if I play it at a party at a friend's house.
I've been advocating a system like this for years -- not a copyright, but a "royalty-right" on commercial use. Nice to see others starting to catch up. :-)
And if Youtube ever makes money from it (and they're going to have to figure out a way eventually, or they go away), they owe the creator of the film or software a cut.
Citation needed. Thanks.
Not in the U.S. of A., it is not. You are within your rights to tell a cop who says "papers, please" as you're walking down the street, "I would prefer not to," and the courts have gotten it correct on recognizing that right. But it still takes people with guts to stand up for it.
(It may, of course, be to your advantage to show them ID -- if they're looking for John Smith and you can show your name is Richard Roe, you can be about your business that much sooner.)
You are also within your rights to decline to tell a cop your name, though SCOTUS did a Dred Scott on this one a few years ago in the Hiibel case. I look forward to our Fourth Amendment rights
Young Jean-Luc was enough of a hellion to end up needing a replacement heart after getting impaled by a big alien knife during a bar fight.
Middle-aged Picard singlehandedly defeated a squad of terrorists trying to take over the Enterprise. Not too shabby.
Picard can sip tea and read Shakespeare, but you underestimate his ability to buckle a swash at your peril.
And don't forget that, while we didn't see much of it, Kirk was known to be fond of poetry, that "longhair stuff" as Mitchell put it.) Different command styles, yes, but then Picard is running a much larger ship, he has to delegate.
Performing the necessary configuration management, code review, and regression testing -- for a patch is non-trivial in any responsbily-maintained project.
There is nothing "efficient" about externalizing costs and using unsustainable methods.
I'm outraged at industrial farming which destroys soil, pollutes the air and the water, and uses irreplaceable fossil fuel resources -- and then wastes most of the crop production by using it for animal feed.
Growing most crops organically is the only way we can continue to feed people once the oil runs out. Using permaculture methods, plenty of food can be grown organically.
Then you have a crappy showerhead. My "Shower Massage" on the center-spray setting will rise the longest hair right quick, at the low-flow standard of 2.5 g/min.
(Haven't have a haircut in a dozen years -- proof of my long-hair credentials here.)
When you buy cheap crap that claims to be eco-friendly and are disappointed by the performance, it's not the eco-friendly that's to blame, it's the cheap crap part.
Bullshit. I'm getting tired of this anti-CFL FUD.
CFLs contain tiny amounts of mercury -- in the best bulbs, about 1-1.5 mg, a fraction of the amount in the standard fluorescent lights we've all had in our offices and homes for decades. If your electricity comes from coal (as it does for most of the US), more mercury is kept out of the air by the electricity savings versus an incandescent bulb than is released if the CFL is trashed.
And of course they can and should be recycled. So during a normal lifecycle, no mercury is released from a CFL.
The $2000 figure for the cost of clean-up for a broken CFL is an urban legend based upon a comedy of errors between one ignorant consumer, one inept state bureaucrat, and one greedy contractor. Proper procedure if one is broken is basically to open a window, air out the room, and clean the glass up really well. If you want to go all-out, a mercury spill clean-up kit runs about $35.
You've got at least a dozen things in your house more dangerous than the mercury from a broken CFL.
That's utter nonsense. There is no way to build a rational argument from the premise, "The price you pay for creating a system of 'property rights' is seeing that others have their basic physical needs met", and arrive at the conclusion "We will now put you in shackles and force you to work for Bob so he can have a McMansion."
In their early days, they offered the "Dish Pix" package, where for $15/month you got to pick 10 channels. They don't offer it for new customers anymore, but they've let me keep my existing plan.
All I really want is Comedy Central, Cartoon Network, Discovery (pretty much just for Mythbusters) and Sci-Fi (and all I get out of the latter these days is ST:TNG reruns). Occasionally CNN for when big news goes down.
Making you pay a bill you owe is in no way akin to making you a slave.
You want the government to create property rights for you and to enforce them? Fine. The ante for the game in which government force keeps me from building a shelter or growing or gathering food on what the state says is "your property", is that everybody has a place to live and enough to eat. The ante for building roads (again, making land off-limits for basic shelter/food use) to benefit those well-off enough to own cars, and for making all the urban planning choices that support a car culture, is seeing that everyone has access to useful mass transit -- or even, if necessary, subsidizing their cars.
As for health care, the basics are as much a part of the government's job to "provide for the common defense" as is raising an army and organizing a militia. A society without basic universal health care, where even those who can afford coverage are forced into high-deductible plans that discourage them from seeking care at the first sign of trouble, is much more vulnerable to pandemics or to bioterrorist attacks. Disease is communicable: not only do we all benefit if your neighbor get their flu or anthrax or herpes symptoms checked out ASAP, but basic preventative care means a healthy population that is less likely to get infected.
Congratulations! You're this weeks winner of the "I Don't Know What Socialism Is But I Know It's An Insult!" prize.
Corporate monsters like Comcast and Time-Warner as socialist. What a hearty belly laugh it produces!
If you're a greedhead, yes.
If you're a person who prioritizes freedom -- everyone's, not just yours -- over money, then no. There essential matter is whether the software in question is a tool you use or the product you sell itself.
Outside of games, software is always a tool to accomplish a task. The vast majority of software that gets written is bespoke -- written in-house for use as a tool for a specific task. That's why Free Software is no threat to most developer's jobs, in fact it only makes it possible for them to be more productive.
For a while, proprietary COTS vendors thought they could profit by locking people in to mass-produced tools, but more and more that's falling to FOSS. Good riddance.
Assuming, that is, that a potentially lethal torture device is a "quality product".
You do not need any rights to use a product bearing a logo in a film or TV show. Trademark protection covers the use of a mark in commerce in a certain field, not all use everywhere (as much as various litigious bastards would like it to be otherwise).
However, if your show is sponsored by BMW, they may not want you to show the Mercedes logo. And even if you're not sponsored by a competitor, why would you give Mercedes free product placement when they're paying other shows?
Not at all. Some people simply like being the object of respect, with no ulterior motive.
So very, very interesting that you post that as an AC, putting yourself in a situation where no one can harass you the way that these people were harassed.
There are two issues here. One is what is the best thing, in terms of psychological health, for this couple to do; the other is, shall we permit people who engage in this sort of harassment to wander about on their own, or shall we place them under the supervision of the criminal justice system?
Sure you can. In sufficient degree, "being a dick" is "harassment".