Re:Let's Get Back Our Access to the Courts
on
Copyright as Cudgel
·
· Score: 1
Hell, I asked the government about that after the tobacco lawsuit was won, about 4 years ago. They told me to forget about it.
And mine would have not only hit the fast food companies, but also the junk food companies. Candy bars and soft drinks are as fattening as hamburgers.
Re:How to take care of the situation you describe
on
Copyright as Cudgel
·
· Score: 1
Good. Minimum wage is a bad idea anyway. An 18-year-old kid working at the cash register at a gas station isn't worth $6 an hour. Or $5, $4, $3. Maybe they are worth $2.50 an hour. If they do a good job for six months. Forcing every business to pay minimum wage, except for waitresses and waiters, just makes the prices for their goods and services higher.
And who is hurt more by higher prices on gasoline and bread? The poor people barely managing to live on their minimum wage job, or the rich bastards that can buy anything they want?
And the other argument is this: It's called "minimum wage" for a reason. If the people who only make minimum wage would try harder, they could get a job above the minimum wage. It was never intended to be a "make a living wage".
I washed dishes for minimum wage, then washed dishes and helped the cooks for 10 cents more, then took a second job bussing tables for a dollar more. And then I graduated high school. 96 hour weeks don't scare me. I was working 55 hours each week between two jobs while maintaining a 3.6+ GPA (damn that Honors English class, but at least the D counted as a C for GPA:) ). With a standard 6 classes, that's over 30 hours schooltime each week (good thing I could sleep in that first period, Honors English...D'oh!). Now a decade later, with a few attempts at college but no degree, I am working in a good position, for good money, doing what I enjoy. Despite having been paid minimum wage so long ago.
And you will only be working long hours for low pay if you agree to do it. If your boss isn't paying enough, find a better company in town, or a better part of the country. Less government control would mean more jobs, hence less competition for jobs, and more compensation to the employee.
As for me, if I lose this job, I will start my own company back up. Just because I accept a paycheck doesn't mean my whole life is tied up in accepting it.
"twist it to mean the exact opposite, if you can find the right judges."
Actually, both right and left judges. It just depends on the argument.
Argument 1: The government should leave decisions about school prayer up to the individual people.
Right Judge: Yes, there is a separation of church and state. If teachers want to lead their students in prayer, that is their choice based on their religious beliefs.
Left Judge: No. If we allow people to pray in school, that endorses religion, and violates the First Amendment. Their religious beliefs are immaterial.
Argument 2: Two homosexuals want to marry each other, and go to court to secure legal recognition to a personal commitment that their religious beliefs endorse.
Right Judge: No. Marriage is a holy union between a man and a woman. It says so in the Bible. And their religion isn't a true religion.
Left Judge: Yes. This couple's religious beliefs are being violated by this discriminatory policy. The law must recognize their religious beliefs.
Yeah. Back in November, 2000, the democrats used the lack of the postmark to disenfranchise thousands of military personnel. Oh, but surely those votes were evenly split between Gore and Bush, they were just making sure the letter of the law outweighed the spirit of the law this time.
"Into the breach dove the politicians, never a crowd intimidated by their lack of suitability for the task. They quickly recognized familiar features: The problem is international, requires human management, and has the potential for political manipulation. Call in the bureaucratic clowns."
I was just going through a minor program's EULA, and found a funny typo. You know how EULAs have a limited warranty that doesn't warrant anything beyond the physical media? The warranty doesn't ensure "merchantability or fitness for a specific task" or such.
This one doesn't cover "merchant ability or fitness for a particular purpose...." So the warranty does not cover the ability of the MERCHANT to actually anything, or be fit to do anything. What a riot.
Yes you do need them. Back in the '80s, a local merchant had a old pickup truck parked in an empty field, with a sign for his store on it. It sat there since before I was born, with no problem. Then one day he got a letter that he had to register it and put current plates on it, or it would be towed.
This truck was on private property, although not his own. It had four flat tires, hadn't been driven for a couple decades, probably didn't even run. Yet had to have legal plates, just so it could sit in a field with a billboard stuck into it.
Another person we know spotted police department helicopters flying overhead looking for derilect cars on his property. He owns his farm, about 20 acres heavily wooded with some open meadows. With the house, garage, and barn, there is no way anything in the trees could be seen from the road. So the police fly overhead to see if there are any revenue sources they can cite. If they happen to see any, they can get a warrant to enter the property, physically inspect the cars, and require him to have them registered.
Note that neither of these cases require that the vehicles are moved, maintained, drivable, sent to the junkyard, removed from view, or moved into view. Only that they are registered, with the state being paid of course. So they can't say it is a safety issue, or land value issue, or public eye-sore issue. Only a money issue.
So no you don't need to have license plates on your car, as long as no one knows you have it. If it is locked in a private, windowsless room, that is never opened. Otherwise, yes you do need plates, or you can be cited.
Hell, by time I found the Xanth series as a teenager, I had already been reading Playboy for 10 years. (Well, I did read much of the text, not just looking at the pictures.) As well as Hustler, Penthouse, Marie, Oui, Chic, Cherie. So Piers seemed rather tame to me at the time.
And the IRA with their car-bombs, and the Columbian drug lords and rebels, and the various African tribes, and various other groups around the world that kill people routinely. But let's just say it's only American servicemen, so our personal self-importance meter goes up a notch. Thanks Hanoi Jane.
If the humor is that weak, and over-ridden by the tasteless crap, change the channel. Or better yet, turn off the TV for that half-hour.
Personally, I thought a few things in the earlier episodes were funny, barely. But the constant trash and disgusting crap turned me off to it right away. So I have never been a fan, even though my step-son and his friends (teenagers) love it. It's not so bad I don't let him watch it, but I keep my young daughter away from it as much as I can. That and Barney.;^)
One of my instructors during Military training mentioned his time stationed in Turkey. All personnel were REQUIRED to convert most of their paychecks to the local currency, the lira, at the official exchange rate.But they would then take a handful of US $1 bills with them when they went off-base.
If they wanted to buy something in town that cost the equivalent of $10US, they could buy it with a single $1 bill. Any train ride cost a single $1 bill. The locals didn't want the Turkish lira money, they wanted the American $1 bill. Because the $1 bill was worth a lot more than the official exchange rate would allow.
The other funny part is that an American $10 bill or $100 bill was worthless, because the locals didn't know what they were. They knew what the $1 bill was, and that's all they wanted. That is the true value of a US 'greenback'.
So try your test, but don't be surprised if not everyone follows your reasoning.
By the way, the reason the military were required to convert most of their paycheck to Turkish lira was politics and economics. If everyone cashed their paychecks for $1 bills, then spent them in town, the economy would go down the drain. The exchange rate was seriously imbalanced, just to prop up the lira. A flood of $1 bills would have crashed the whole system.
Flawed example. You normally have to pay to see a movie, either in a theater, or by buying or renting the VHS or DVD release. They are not publically shown in the town square, free for anyone to watch or record at their leisure.
Websites on the other hand, are often free, and encourage people to visit many pages. If these pages are retained on the visitor's computer, that is the nature and intent of the WorldWideWeb.
Other arguments may survive more scrutiny, but that line of comparison is a dead-end.
Even if your neighbors have their door locked and the lights turned off, it would not be illegal for you to stand across the street, and watch them having sex while they are pressed against their large picture window in their living room.
Depending on the distance, there is only a [small percentage here] chance I would even hit the map. The only darts-like game I'm good at is "pin the tail on the donkey", at least I can find the paper taped on the wall.
Yes, I do realise how stupid it sound, and that _is_ why I quoted it. But that is a proper way to phrase it, since I live in the US. I could have said it in a different way, but that's the way I thought the question, so that's the way I typed it. But thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt.:^)
And thanks for the info. I was just wondering if the text was in the country's native language, since not everyone in the world speaks English. Not sure that the keyboard mapping is an issue.
Unions were very good when they started. The workers were working all day in dangerous conditions, for little pay, and had no hopes of ever getting anything better. The unions got better pay, of course, but most importantly, better conditions. Can't spend a pay-raise if you die from something collapsing on you, whether it's a mineshaft, painters scaffolding, railroad trestle, or whatnot.
Nowadays, safety isn't an issue, because the federal and state government have passed many strict laws, and there's always the courts to award multi-million dollar verdicts. So what do unions focus on? Pay and benefits. The unions are only interested in getting as much money from 'the company' as they can, with all-encompassing medical and dental coverage. This wouldn't be so bad, except that a unionised company can't fight back. It can refuse a new contract, but then the workers strike, and the company can't operate. The company can't fire them, because it's illegal to fire someone over a union issue. They can try to bring in non-union workers, but these workers face the ordeal of harassment, threats, and physical or property attacks. Plus, they know their job is temporary, just until the strike is over. And they are not as trained or experienced, otherwise they would probably already have a job.
Now, the worst case I have seen lately is with public worker unions. Especially when they have a lot of political pull in state elections. No one here can run for office if they say they want to limit the unions, or cut pay to union workers, or reduce the excessive benefits. The unions would ensure the candidate never gets into office. Consequently, most state officials buy union support by giving them generous contracts. That is not what unions are supposed to be for. They aren't supposed to drive the employer bankrupt with outrageous pay and benefits demands. They are supposed to allow workers to negotiate fair employment conditions.
No, the unions are no longer what they started out as, a way for workers to be considered valuable people, instead of replaceable assets. Now they are just extortion rackets. And the sad thing is, they will work to screw the union members as well as the employer. When I was working in high school, one of the other guys quit his other job because the union dues were higher than his take-home pay, because he had only worked six hours that week. He actually got a slip in his pay envelope saying he owed the union $2, because his paycheck was for $6, and dues were $8.
I know many people will want to flame me for this, but so what. It's true for many unions lately, and for all public unions where I live. There is no consideration of real issues when the union negotiates a contract, just higher pay and benefits.
I was wondering about something with computers for 'foreign' countries. What does the initial BIOS and POST screens look like when they boot? And not just Japanese, but also German, Italian, Swedish, Greek, Swahili, whatever.
Slashdot Mirror
Hell, I asked the government about that after the tobacco lawsuit was won, about 4 years ago. They told me to forget about it.
And mine would have not only hit the fast food companies, but also the junk food companies. Candy bars and soft drinks are as fattening as hamburgers.
Good. Minimum wage is a bad idea anyway. An 18-year-old kid working at the cash register at a gas station isn't worth $6 an hour. Or $5, $4, $3. Maybe they are worth $2.50 an hour. If they do a good job for six months. Forcing every business to pay minimum wage, except for waitresses and waiters, just makes the prices for their goods and services higher.
:) ). With a standard 6 classes, that's over 30 hours schooltime each week (good thing I could sleep in that first period, Honors English...D'oh!). Now a decade later, with a few attempts at college but no degree, I am working in a good position, for good money, doing what I enjoy. Despite having been paid minimum wage so long ago.
And who is hurt more by higher prices on gasoline and bread? The poor people barely managing to live on their minimum wage job, or the rich bastards that can buy anything they want?
And the other argument is this: It's called "minimum wage" for a reason. If the people who only make minimum wage would try harder, they could get a job above the minimum wage. It was never intended to be a "make a living wage".
I washed dishes for minimum wage, then washed dishes and helped the cooks for 10 cents more, then took a second job bussing tables for a dollar more. And then I graduated high school. 96 hour weeks don't scare me. I was working 55 hours each week between two jobs while maintaining a 3.6+ GPA (damn that Honors English class, but at least the D counted as a C for GPA
And you will only be working long hours for low pay if you agree to do it. If your boss isn't paying enough, find a better company in town, or a better part of the country. Less government control would mean more jobs, hence less competition for jobs, and more compensation to the employee.
As for me, if I lose this job, I will start my own company back up. Just because I accept a paycheck doesn't mean my whole life is tied up in accepting it.
"twist it to mean the exact opposite, if you can find the right judges."
Actually, both right and left judges. It just depends on the argument.
Argument 1: The government should leave decisions about school prayer up to the individual people.
Right Judge: Yes, there is a separation of church and state. If teachers want to lead their students in prayer, that is their choice based on their religious beliefs.
Left Judge: No. If we allow people to pray in school, that endorses religion, and violates the First Amendment. Their religious beliefs are immaterial.
Argument 2: Two homosexuals want to marry each other, and go to court to secure legal recognition to a personal commitment that their religious beliefs endorse.
Right Judge: No. Marriage is a holy union between a man and a woman. It says so in the Bible. And their religion isn't a true religion.
Left Judge: Yes. This couple's religious beliefs are being violated by this discriminatory policy. The law must recognize their religious beliefs.
Didn't you read the article a few months ago? The Lonegunmen are dead. There is no more hope. ;^)
Yeah. Back in November, 2000, the democrats used the lack of the postmark to disenfranchise thousands of military personnel. Oh, but surely those votes were evenly split between Gore and Bush, they were just making sure the letter of the law outweighed the spirit of the law this time.
Sure. Show her your post, and that $12,000 wedding will never happen at all. ;^}
"Into the breach dove the politicians, never a crowd intimidated by their lack of suitability for the task. They quickly recognized familiar features: The problem is international, requires human management, and has the potential for political manipulation. Call in the bureaucratic clowns."
Good point.
The poster should have said "like the British to the German invasion of Sudetenland in 1938."
Chamberlain let them have it and the rest of Czechoslovakia just to avoid actually having to do anything unpleasant.
I was just going through a minor program's EULA, and found a funny typo. You know how EULAs have a limited warranty that doesn't warrant anything beyond the physical media? The warranty doesn't ensure "merchantability or fitness for a specific task" or such.
This one doesn't cover "merchant ability or fitness for a particular purpose...." So the warranty does not cover the ability of the MERCHANT to actually anything, or be fit to do anything. What a riot.
C'mon. I can't see Jesus sitting there in bed with Mary Magdelene, reading the Kama Sutra. That is of course, the original Fucking Manual.
Besides, if he had, he probably wouldn't have agreed to get on the cross.
Yes you do need them. Back in the '80s, a local merchant had a old pickup truck parked in an empty field, with a sign for his store on it. It sat there since before I was born, with no problem. Then one day he got a letter that he had to register it and put current plates on it, or it would be towed.
This truck was on private property, although not his own. It had four flat tires, hadn't been driven for a couple decades, probably didn't even run. Yet had to have legal plates, just so it could sit in a field with a billboard stuck into it.
Another person we know spotted police department helicopters flying overhead looking for derilect cars on his property. He owns his farm, about 20 acres heavily wooded with some open meadows. With the house, garage, and barn, there is no way anything in the trees could be seen from the road. So the police fly overhead to see if there are any revenue sources they can cite. If they happen to see any, they can get a warrant to enter the property, physically inspect the cars, and require him to have them registered.
Note that neither of these cases require that the vehicles are moved, maintained, drivable, sent to the junkyard, removed from view, or moved into view. Only that they are registered, with the state being paid of course. So they can't say it is a safety issue, or land value issue, or public eye-sore issue. Only a money issue.
So no you don't need to have license plates on your car, as long as no one knows you have it. If it is locked in a private, windowsless room, that is never opened. Otherwise, yes you do need plates, or you can be cited.
Hell, by time I found the Xanth series as a teenager, I had already been reading Playboy for 10 years. (Well, I did read much of the text, not just looking at the pictures.) As well as Hustler, Penthouse, Marie, Oui, Chic, Cherie. So Piers seemed rather tame to me at the time.
"Perhaps the equation should be revised: E = J C ^ 2? "
Now that's funny.
And the IRA with their car-bombs, and the Columbian drug lords and rebels, and the various African tribes, and various other groups around the world that kill people routinely. But let's just say it's only American servicemen, so our personal self-importance meter goes up a notch. Thanks Hanoi Jane.
If the humor is that weak, and over-ridden by the tasteless crap, change the channel. Or better yet, turn off the TV for that half-hour.
;^)
Personally, I thought a few things in the earlier episodes were funny, barely. But the constant trash and disgusting crap turned me off to it right away. So I have never been a fan, even though my step-son and his friends (teenagers) love it. It's not so bad I don't let him watch it, but I keep my young daughter away from it as much as I can. That and Barney.
One of my instructors during Military training mentioned his time stationed in Turkey. All personnel were REQUIRED to convert most of their paychecks to the local currency, the lira, at the official exchange rate.But they would then take a handful of US $1 bills with them when they went off-base.
If they wanted to buy something in town that cost the equivalent of $10US, they could buy it with a single $1 bill. Any train ride cost a single $1 bill. The locals didn't want the Turkish lira money, they wanted the American $1 bill. Because the $1 bill was worth a lot more than the official exchange rate would allow.
The other funny part is that an American $10 bill or $100 bill was worthless, because the locals didn't know what they were. They knew what the $1 bill was, and that's all they wanted. That is the true value of a US 'greenback'.
So try your test, but don't be surprised if not everyone follows your reasoning.
By the way, the reason the military were required to convert most of their paycheck to Turkish lira was politics and economics. If everyone cashed their paychecks for $1 bills, then spent them in town, the economy would go down the drain. The exchange rate was seriously imbalanced, just to prop up the lira. A flood of $1 bills would have crashed the whole system.
Of course.
Flawed example. You normally have to pay to see a movie, either in a theater, or by buying or renting the VHS or DVD release. They are not publically shown in the town square, free for anyone to watch or record at their leisure.
Websites on the other hand, are often free, and encourage people to visit many pages. If these pages are retained on the visitor's computer, that is the nature and intent of the WorldWideWeb.
Other arguments may survive more scrutiny, but that line of comparison is a dead-end.
Better example would be:
Even if your neighbors have their door locked and the lights turned off, it would not be illegal for you to stand across the street, and watch them having sex while they are pressed against their large picture window in their living room.
Elect a democrat to office.
Depending on the distance, there is only a [small percentage here] chance I would even hit the map. The only darts-like game I'm good at is "pin the tail on the donkey", at least I can find the paper taped on the wall.
Come on, it's not 'monitoring statuses', it's 'monitoring stati'. Now please excuse me while I feed some cacti to my octopi.
Yes, I do realise how stupid it sound, and that _is_ why I quoted it. But that is a proper way to phrase it, since I live in the US. I could have said it in a different way, but that's the way I thought the question, so that's the way I typed it. But thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt. :^)
And thanks for the info. I was just wondering if the text was in the country's native language, since not everyone in the world speaks English. Not sure that the keyboard mapping is an issue.
Unions were very good when they started. The workers were working all day in dangerous conditions, for little pay, and had no hopes of ever getting anything better. The unions got better pay, of course, but most importantly, better conditions. Can't spend a pay-raise if you die from something collapsing on you, whether it's a mineshaft, painters scaffolding, railroad trestle, or whatnot.
Nowadays, safety isn't an issue, because the federal and state government have passed many strict laws, and there's always the courts to award multi-million dollar verdicts. So what do unions focus on? Pay and benefits. The unions are only interested in getting as much money from 'the company' as they can, with all-encompassing medical and dental coverage. This wouldn't be so bad, except that a unionised company can't fight back. It can refuse a new contract, but then the workers strike, and the company can't operate. The company can't fire them, because it's illegal to fire someone over a union issue. They can try to bring in non-union workers, but these workers face the ordeal of harassment, threats, and physical or property attacks. Plus, they know their job is temporary, just until the strike is over. And they are not as trained or experienced, otherwise they would probably already have a job.
Now, the worst case I have seen lately is with public worker unions. Especially when they have a lot of political pull in state elections. No one here can run for office if they say they want to limit the unions, or cut pay to union workers, or reduce the excessive benefits. The unions would ensure the candidate never gets into office. Consequently, most state officials buy union support by giving them generous contracts. That is not what unions are supposed to be for. They aren't supposed to drive the employer bankrupt with outrageous pay and benefits demands. They are supposed to allow workers to negotiate fair employment conditions.
No, the unions are no longer what they started out as, a way for workers to be considered valuable people, instead of replaceable assets. Now they are just extortion rackets. And the sad thing is, they will work to screw the union members as well as the employer. When I was working in high school, one of the other guys quit his other job because the union dues were higher than his take-home pay, because he had only worked six hours that week. He actually got a slip in his pay envelope saying he owed the union $2, because his paycheck was for $6, and dues were $8.
I know many people will want to flame me for this, but so what. It's true for many unions lately, and for all public unions where I live. There is no consideration of real issues when the union negotiates a contract, just higher pay and benefits.
I was wondering about something with computers for 'foreign' countries. What does the initial BIOS and POST screens look like when they boot? And not just Japanese, but also German, Italian, Swedish, Greek, Swahili, whatever.
Is there any website out there with pics?