And how's that working out for you over in the USA?
It's been a mixed bag. Privately-owned weapons have mostly been useful for self defense against individual perps, but citizens have also stopped overreaching officials on several occasions, such as preventing the federal troops from enforcing the fugitive slave act in Vermont in the 1850s, or keeping the FBI from arresting Japanese-American ranch hands in Montana in the 1940s.
But I think that there are an awful lot of projects where if we/.ers had the chance to easily contribute a few bucks when we saw a story about a project we liked, it would add up to serious money fast. I would opt in. I
The means to do this were invented centuries ago; it's called joint-stock corporation. In the USA these days though, overregulation has made it impractical to sell shares in a new venture to the public unless you're trying to raise tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.
Isn't this the reason you own guns: to defend yourselves from utter tossers in the workplace?
No, we own guns to prevent the government from having a monopoly on deadly force. Governments have different options available to them when the people are armed, than they do when the people are unarmed.
TI and NeXT used NuBus as well, although NeXT changed the form factor of the cards and ran the bus at a higher clock rate. TI shipped it in their short-lived "Explorer" workstation, which was their version of a Lisp machine.
The money the federal government takes from us by direct taxation is dwarfed by the theft through inflation. They can't raise trillions through taxes, they can only do it by further devaluing the currency.
Don't kid yourself. All of our rights depend first and foremost on our willingness to insist on them, and the people in the USA have been just as docile as anyone else for a very long time.
The idea that scientists and assorted elite intellectuals were the rightful ruling class
That idea goes back at least to Plato. It was wrong then, and it's still wrong today. There is no "rightful" ruling class. We are entitled to our liberty, and anyone who seeks to infringe upon it carries the burden of justifying that use of force.
he also imprisoned people below the poverty line for growing their own food.
Yeah, and he also threw people in jail for performing services for less than the price that the NRA insisted they should charge. The NRA established minimum prices on all kinds of things. I've been reading a collection of articles from the Saturday Evening Post from that period, and the man was far worse than I'd ever realized.
I've also been reading up n the history of the minimum wage laws, which had the immediate effect of putting about half a million black men out of work when they were enacted.
The problem with your graph of employment, is that it includes people with unproductive jobs paid for with tax money. The Soviet Union nominally had close to full employment, yet it was an economic basket case.
The essence of Keynsianism is conceit. Keynes believed that he was such a genius that he could override the forces of supply and demand just by getting the government to do his bidding.
Slashdot Mirror
And how's that working out for you over in the USA?
It's been a mixed bag. Privately-owned weapons have mostly been useful for self defense against individual perps, but citizens have also stopped overreaching officials on several occasions, such as preventing the federal troops from enforcing the fugitive slave act in Vermont in the 1850s, or keeping the FBI from arresting Japanese-American ranch hands in Montana in the 1940s.
-jcr
But I think that there are an awful lot of projects where if we /.ers had the chance to easily contribute a few bucks when we saw a story about a project we liked, it would add up to serious money fast. I would opt in. I
The means to do this were invented centuries ago; it's called joint-stock corporation. In the USA these days though, overregulation has made it impractical to sell shares in a new venture to the public unless you're trying to raise tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.
-jcr
It's also hard to get soldiers to shoot at their fellow citizens, especially when out en masse.
That's what brought Ceaucescu down. He gave the order to fire on the protestors, and the soldiers refused. Once that happened, he was history.
-jcr
You know, there's this thing called google these days, which can easily point you to their web site, where you can find all the pictures they've got.
Or you could just bitch about it.
-jcr
The idea that an armed populace could effectively fight a government trained and equipped army is patently ludicrous.
That's what King George the Third believed.
-jcr
Isn't this the reason you own guns: to defend yourselves from utter tossers in the workplace?
No, we own guns to prevent the government from having a monopoly on deadly force. Governments have different options available to them when the people are armed, than they do when the people are unarmed.
-jcr
TI and NeXT used NuBus as well, although NeXT changed the form factor of the cards and ran the bus at a higher clock rate. TI shipped it in their short-lived "Explorer" workstation, which was their version of a Lisp machine.
-jcr
the divot that makes the apple USB keyboard extender cord incompatible with non-apple keyboards is incomprehensible,
As I recall, that was required because of some peculiarity of getting the USB certification.
-jcr
The new Macbook doesn't have an 8" floppy?!?!
It's worse than that. It doesn't even read Hollerith cards.
-jcr
The money the federal government takes from us by direct taxation is dwarfed by the theft through inflation. They can't raise trillions through taxes, they can only do it by further devaluing the currency.
-jcr
Don't kid yourself. All of our rights depend first and foremost on our willingness to insist on them, and the people in the USA have been just as docile as anyone else for a very long time.
-jcr
disaster precipitated by laissez-faire policies before those years
Guess again. The Federal Reserve was created in 1913, and it provided the inflation that made the stock bubble of the 1920s possible.
-jcr
The idea that scientists and assorted elite intellectuals were the rightful ruling class
That idea goes back at least to Plato. It was wrong then, and it's still wrong today. There is no "rightful" ruling class. We are entitled to our liberty, and anyone who seeks to infringe upon it carries the burden of justifying that use of force.
-jcr
he also imprisoned people below the poverty line for growing their own food.
Yeah, and he also threw people in jail for performing services for less than the price that the NRA insisted they should charge. The NRA established minimum prices on all kinds of things. I've been reading a collection of articles from the Saturday Evening Post from that period, and the man was far worse than I'd ever realized.
I've also been reading up n the history of the minimum wage laws, which had the immediate effect of putting about half a million black men out of work when they were enacted.
-jcr
The problem with your graph of employment, is that it includes people with unproductive jobs paid for with tax money. The Soviet Union nominally had close to full employment, yet it was an economic basket case.
-jcr
I'm not familiar with any definition of the Great Depression that extends it to 1946
War production isn't wealth, even if some economists include it in the GNP.
-jcr
Maybe to apply for a credit card, instead of beiing age>=18*, there should be a gullible test.
There already is. The consumer credit companies want the most gullible customers they can find, so they can hit them with double-digit interest rates.
-jcr
There's at least one major error in your data above. The great depression began in the Hoover administration and continued until 1946.
-jcr
depressions and recessions were longer and deeper prior to Keynes than they have been since.
Except for the biggest one so far. FDR followed Keynes' advice, and we had a depression for a couple of decades.
Saying otherwise is simple historical ignorance.
And what would you call ignoring the single largest counter-example to your argument?
-jcr
You can't blame FDR for that.
I don't blame him for the onset, I blame him for its continuation.
-jcr
Keynesian economics is one giant fraud.
Like Keynes himself.
-jcr
That being the case, the state of education in Sweden must be rather worse than I had assumed.
-jcr
The bottom line is that he favored the bailout. Picking one unconstitutional scheme over another is nothing but splitting hairs.
-jcr
So your idea that there would be food for all, if only bad old FDR
I see that you have the typical obnoxious pseudo-intellectual habit of arguing against things I haven't said.
believe me, I'm not retarded.
I'll need a bit more than your assertion to believe that, sunshine.
-jcr
The essence of Keynsianism is conceit. Keynes believed that he was such a genius that he could override the forces of supply and demand just by getting the government to do his bidding.
-jcr