Well, there are other ways of doing it than the Government running it directly - e.g., outsourcing to companies, or even simply making it so everyone receives insurance, that they then use for existing private companies.
The NHS here in the UK has many problems, but it's still nowhere near as screwed up as a system without any national healthcare, in my opinion.
It's the standard rule for Apple. If they do something, or if there's even a mere rumour about a new product, it gets reported wildly by the media, with tonnes of hype and sensationalism, even if there have been other actual products doing the same for years beforehand.
You can't have it both ways, and go crying when it backfires. Let's wait for the special pleading now - "It doesn't matter that Apple weren't the first to employ child slaves, the point is that they were the ones to popularise it"...
I'm sure every Slashdotter is thinking, if only the only limit on how often they could fuck was the time spent in work...
"Yeah, I'm fucking every evening, then all day on weekends, but damn I'm envious of those slum-dwellers who carry on at it fucking all day everyday too, when I'm having to be in work."
I don't smoke, and do drink, but please let's stick to the facts. Alcohol can be addictive, just as can be tobacco. And just because people do things that cause harm isn't an argument for criminalisation - otherwise there's a whole list of things we'd better ban before that.
The point of my post is that although adding poison to anything is a bad thing to do, I have absolutely no pity for smokers who are poisoning themselves and everyone else around them with their filthy habit.
Cool, next time you do something I deem to be not 100% safe, I'll have no sympathy if someone comes along and harms you against your will.
E.g., I hope you never have sex, because that's the only way to be truly safe.
His point still remains. If you ever do one activity that I deem to consider risky, it's okay for me to cause harm to you against your will? I don't think so.
"Your honor, I know I cut the ropes of these mountain climbers. But climbing mountains isn't perfectly safe, clearly I should be let off!"
Oh right, I'll try that at my defence if I'm found guilty of poisoning someone.
"Your honor, I only killed 1 confirmed person over a period of my lifetime. Shocker! But the drink I poisoned kills more than 10,000 people annually etc..."
Where's the story?
That the Government poisoned people - the number of deaths resulting from other things is irrelevant. Oh wait, it is relevant - the fact that the support for criminalising drugs is that "they harm people" makes it all the more hypocritical if that Government supported poisoning.
If the Government had placed sharks into waters that were previously fine, then yes, you can be sure the Government would be at fault, and I'd have sympathy for anyone killed by the sharks.
(I'm not sure your example makes sense, anyway. I don't know anyone who laughs when someone dies from a shark attack. I hope you never do anything that has any risk.)
It is like watching a pot addict claim that pot is not addictive but boy, do not get between him and his fix. Here is a hint, if you been to jail 2 times and risk getting life if you get caught again and you still smoke for a short high regardless. YOU ARE AN ADDICT!
Nope, that's a fallacy. Addiction is either a psychological or physical addition. But someone going to prison for something doesn't entail addiction.
In countries where people have been imprisoned for gay sex, are you going to tell me they have a medical condition of sex addiction? (Even for things which we agree should be illegal, this claim still doesn't make sense - we don't talk of people being addicted to say, burglary or committing traffic violations, just because they've done it and been punished for it more than once.)
No, you are not fighting the system. You are not a rebel with a cause. Rebels do something worthwhile.... Getting high is not.
Who is claiming this? And this is a rather dubious claim - for any draconian law, it's not rebelling unless the act is something "worthwhile" (as opposed to simply harmless)? This would cover all sorts of things (including my example of gay sex). And this relates to your "Anon publishing documents people don't want the world to see is worthwhile stuff." - you sound like the kind of person who says he's against censorship, but then it turns out that's only for "worthwhile" stuff that the world wants to see, but would happily support censorship of say porn, films, computer games and books, that you don't consider "worthwhile".
But anyway, why is publishing things that people don't want the world to see, different to making available substances that people don't want the world to use?
Hell, most drug abusers are very much in favor of control, as long as it suits them. The proof? How many alcohol addicts want a ban on pot? How many pot smokers agree that drink driving is bad but driving while high is okay?
I'm not sure how people having inconsistent views on alcohol and other drugs proves your point. On the contrary, it's just further evidence of how stupid and inconsistent the drug laws are.
I agree that there is way too much scaremongering over pedophilia, and it's ridiciluous the way it's treated as a thought crime.
But that doesn't mean equating oral sex to sex with children is valid. What next? If I was disagreeing with someone who says that gay sex between adults was wrong, are you going to say "Well his view is equally valid as someone who believes that raping babies and then eating them is wrong"? No, it's not equally valid. Yes, there's a debate to be had on when children can consent. But it's not meaningful to say that any "X is wrong" view is equally valid as any other.
The thing you are missing is that there other reasons than simply thinking it "abhorrent". The criticism against non-consensual sex is not that it is "abhorrent".
Young people never need healthcare, and healthy people never become unhealthy?
Btw, if you're a young healthy person who decides only to get private health insurance after becoming unhealthy, how does that work out for your premiums?
It's funny that you believe that people with a sense of entitlement to health care are somehow 'better' than those with a sense of entitlement to go traveling in space.
Can you point me to where I said that?
I don't believe such a thing either - my point is that branding views on tax as "entitlement" is nonsense.
The only way I can see to fix this would require a law or constitutional amendment, if necessary, to enable congress to assign budgetary funds, ideally multi-year, that are paid in advance and very difficult to change. At least a 2/3 or even a 3/4 vote should be necessary to remove or repeal. This sort of protection will have to include the top management at Nasa as well.
As sad as I am to see space funding wasted like this, be careful for what you wish for. How would this work for say a scheme we might disagree with? E.g., a Government pledges billions to be spent implementing some draconian scheme like a centralised DNA database, which the following Government wants to cancel?
(As a real world example, here in the UK the Government has been spending years implementing compulsory ID cards and centralised database. They are likely to be out of power by May this year, and the opposition parties say they will cancel the scheme. But one of the Government's tactics has been to spend as much money as possible on getting the scheme implemented anyway, and to tie themselves into contracts, so that to cancel it will look like a "waste of money".)
I wish there was more money for space, but for heaven's sake - if it really was a choice between socialised healthcare for people, or socialised manned space travel, I'd still put the former first.
But it's not one or the other. Curiously this false dichotomy is used by people against manned space travel. After all, the argument against the common "But the are more important things to spend money on than manned space travel" is not to somehow argue that manned space travel is more important than people living and having basic needs, but to point out that there can be money for both. As one example, perhaps if they spent slightly less on a socialised military, there'd be plenty of money for both socialised healthcare and socialised manned space travel.
We've lost our backbone for adventure as we've continued to reinforce the entitlement mentality that is draining our country dry of resources.
Yes, obviously it's those evil people who are ill who are just draining resources, obviously they should be paying for those who have a sense of entitlement to go travelling in space. There's no "entitlement" here - your view on how taxes should be spent is no less an "entitlement mentality" than anyone else's.
It's the mobile market according to Slashdot, don't you know: it consists of Apple (with apparently greater than 50% share), with the rest filled by Google, and then RIM. Windows is only mentioned to make the Iphones look better. No other company exists. Although I'm gobsmacked that they referenced Nokia for once.
although I think it'd be a pretty big stretch to call the RAZR a "smartphone"...Certainly by today's standards
That makes no sense. No smartphone of the past, even the best on the market of the time, would be a smartphone by "today's standards". The original Iphone certainly wouldn't either, for example.
And anyhow, if it isn't a smartphone, that just proves the point even more - if even years old non-smartphones had GPS, there's certainly nothing special about a modern high end smartphone having it.
smartphones (phones able to run fairly sophisticated apps)
The RAZR could run "apps". Phones running software has been standard on bog standard phones since 2005 or earlier. Of course you've qualified it with "fairly sophisicated", but that's a completely ill-defined way to distinguish them. Obviously as time goes on, all phones become more sophisticated in terms of what they can run.
I see no evidence that more people have smartphones today - people are still buying in the low end of the market too. Of course, more people have more advanced phones, but that's because of progress, and not necessarily that people are buying in a different market, or spending more money on them.
You forgot to post a reference to the US murder rate - remind me again, please?
(And yes, I'm aware that some countries manage to have lower murder rates even with guns allowed, but the US is not one of those countries. So how US citizens behave is of interest, when we're talking about all US citizens walking around with guns.)
Oh yes, and let's also compare that murder rate, to the number of people murdered by these imaginary terrorist operated drones.
Great, let's just have everyone shooting everyone.
The point of interest is, how do the deaths resulting from guns, compare to the deaths caused by hypothetical terrorrr. Seriously, "But please won't somebody think about the terrorists" scaremongering is never accepted by people here, why is it any different for this argument?
I wear a watch so I don't have to dig around in my pocket or bag for my phone just to quickly glance at the time. (Or have to get my phone, if I'm at home, which may be in a different room.)
Also it still works when my phone has drained its battery because I forgot the regular recharge it needs. And for people who ever go swimming, there are obvious advantages there too.
But I wonder what technological breakthrough took so long that wrist-phones only show up now.
I remember as a child, "books of the future" showed people wearing small computers as their watches. They were almost right, except it was the phone that turned into a computer, not the watch.
Even when the technology can make powerful computers the size of the watch, I think many people would still rather have something with a larger screen/keyboard size, that they can still carry (i.e., a phone). Indeed, it's not uncommon for me to know people who no longer wear watches at all, because they have a phone.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, there are other ways of doing it than the Government running it directly - e.g., outsourcing to companies, or even simply making it so everyone receives insurance, that they then use for existing private companies.
The NHS here in the UK has many problems, but it's still nowhere near as screwed up as a system without any national healthcare, in my opinion.
And wait - does that mean you agree with poisoning alcohol too, or not?
It's the standard rule for Apple. If they do something, or if there's even a mere rumour about a new product, it gets reported wildly by the media, with tonnes of hype and sensationalism, even if there have been other actual products doing the same for years beforehand.
You can't have it both ways, and go crying when it backfires. Let's wait for the special pleading now - "It doesn't matter that Apple weren't the first to employ child slaves, the point is that they were the ones to popularise it"...
I'm sure every Slashdotter is thinking, if only the only limit on how often they could fuck was the time spent in work...
"Yeah, I'm fucking every evening, then all day on weekends, but damn I'm envious of those slum-dwellers who carry on at it fucking all day everyday too, when I'm having to be in work."
I don't smoke, and do drink, but please let's stick to the facts. Alcohol can be addictive, just as can be tobacco. And just because people do things that cause harm isn't an argument for criminalisation - otherwise there's a whole list of things we'd better ban before that.
The point of my post is that although adding poison to anything is a bad thing to do, I have absolutely no pity for smokers who are poisoning themselves and everyone else around them with their filthy habit.
Cool, next time you do something I deem to be not 100% safe, I'll have no sympathy if someone comes along and harms you against your will.
Straw man. He said "safer" not "safe".
E.g., I hope you never have sex, because that's the only way to be truly safe.
His point still remains. If you ever do one activity that I deem to consider risky, it's okay for me to cause harm to you against your will? I don't think so.
"Your honor, I know I cut the ropes of these mountain climbers. But climbing mountains isn't perfectly safe, clearly I should be let off!"
Your second sentence is a straw man, also.
Oh right, I'll try that at my defence if I'm found guilty of poisoning someone.
"Your honor, I only killed 1 confirmed person over a period of my lifetime. Shocker! But the drink I poisoned kills more than 10,000 people annually etc..."
Where's the story?
That the Government poisoned people - the number of deaths resulting from other things is irrelevant. Oh wait, it is relevant - the fact that the support for criminalising drugs is that "they harm people" makes it all the more hypocritical if that Government supported poisoning.
If the Government had placed sharks into waters that were previously fine, then yes, you can be sure the Government would be at fault, and I'd have sympathy for anyone killed by the sharks.
(I'm not sure your example makes sense, anyway. I don't know anyone who laughs when someone dies from a shark attack. I hope you never do anything that has any risk.)
It is like watching a pot addict claim that pot is not addictive but boy, do not get between him and his fix. Here is a hint, if you been to jail 2 times and risk getting life if you get caught again and you still smoke for a short high regardless. YOU ARE AN ADDICT!
Nope, that's a fallacy. Addiction is either a psychological or physical addition. But someone going to prison for something doesn't entail addiction.
In countries where people have been imprisoned for gay sex, are you going to tell me they have a medical condition of sex addiction? (Even for things which we agree should be illegal, this claim still doesn't make sense - we don't talk of people being addicted to say, burglary or committing traffic violations, just because they've done it and been punished for it more than once.)
No, you are not fighting the system. You are not a rebel with a cause. Rebels do something worthwhile. ... Getting high is not.
Who is claiming this? And this is a rather dubious claim - for any draconian law, it's not rebelling unless the act is something "worthwhile" (as opposed to simply harmless)? This would cover all sorts of things (including my example of gay sex). And this relates to your "Anon publishing documents people don't want the world to see is worthwhile stuff." - you sound like the kind of person who says he's against censorship, but then it turns out that's only for "worthwhile" stuff that the world wants to see, but would happily support censorship of say porn, films, computer games and books, that you don't consider "worthwhile".
But anyway, why is publishing things that people don't want the world to see, different to making available substances that people don't want the world to use?
Hell, most drug abusers are very much in favor of control, as long as it suits them. The proof? How many alcohol addicts want a ban on pot? How many pot smokers agree that drink driving is bad but driving while high is okay?
I'm not sure how people having inconsistent views on alcohol and other drugs proves your point. On the contrary, it's just further evidence of how stupid and inconsistent the drug laws are.
So what is "important" then? Posting on Slashdot?
I agree that there is way too much scaremongering over pedophilia, and it's ridiciluous the way it's treated as a thought crime.
But that doesn't mean equating oral sex to sex with children is valid. What next? If I was disagreeing with someone who says that gay sex between adults was wrong, are you going to say "Well his view is equally valid as someone who believes that raping babies and then eating them is wrong"? No, it's not equally valid. Yes, there's a debate to be had on when children can consent. But it's not meaningful to say that any "X is wrong" view is equally valid as any other.
The thing you are missing is that there other reasons than simply thinking it "abhorrent". The criticism against non-consensual sex is not that it is "abhorrent".
Young people never need healthcare, and healthy people never become unhealthy?
Btw, if you're a young healthy person who decides only to get private health insurance after becoming unhealthy, how does that work out for your premiums?
It's funny that you believe that people with a sense of entitlement to health care are somehow 'better' than those with a sense of entitlement to go traveling in space.
Can you point me to where I said that?
I don't believe such a thing either - my point is that branding views on tax as "entitlement" is nonsense.
Does the constitution specify how much must be spent on the military? Because no one suggested scrapping it completely.
The only way I can see to fix this would require a law or constitutional amendment, if necessary, to enable congress to assign budgetary funds, ideally multi-year, that are paid in advance and very difficult to change. At least a 2/3 or even a 3/4 vote should be necessary to remove or repeal. This sort of protection will have to include the top management at Nasa as well.
As sad as I am to see space funding wasted like this, be careful for what you wish for. How would this work for say a scheme we might disagree with? E.g., a Government pledges billions to be spent implementing some draconian scheme like a centralised DNA database, which the following Government wants to cancel?
(As a real world example, here in the UK the Government has been spending years implementing compulsory ID cards and centralised database. They are likely to be out of power by May this year, and the opposition parties say they will cancel the scheme. But one of the Government's tactics has been to spend as much money as possible on getting the scheme implemented anyway, and to tie themselves into contracts, so that to cancel it will look like a "waste of money".)
I wish there was more money for space, but for heaven's sake - if it really was a choice between socialised healthcare for people, or socialised manned space travel, I'd still put the former first.
But it's not one or the other. Curiously this false dichotomy is used by people against manned space travel. After all, the argument against the common "But the are more important things to spend money on than manned space travel" is not to somehow argue that manned space travel is more important than people living and having basic needs, but to point out that there can be money for both. As one example, perhaps if they spent slightly less on a socialised military, there'd be plenty of money for both socialised healthcare and socialised manned space travel.
We've lost our backbone for adventure as we've continued to reinforce the entitlement mentality that is draining our country dry of resources.
Yes, obviously it's those evil people who are ill who are just draining resources, obviously they should be paying for those who have a sense of entitlement to go travelling in space. There's no "entitlement" here - your view on how taxes should be spent is no less an "entitlement mentality" than anyone else's.
It's the mobile market according to Slashdot, don't you know: it consists of Apple (with apparently greater than 50% share), with the rest filled by Google, and then RIM. Windows is only mentioned to make the Iphones look better. No other company exists. Although I'm gobsmacked that they referenced Nokia for once.
although I think it'd be a pretty big stretch to call the RAZR a "smartphone"...Certainly by today's standards
That makes no sense. No smartphone of the past, even the best on the market of the time, would be a smartphone by "today's standards". The original Iphone certainly wouldn't either, for example.
And anyhow, if it isn't a smartphone, that just proves the point even more - if even years old non-smartphones had GPS, there's certainly nothing special about a modern high end smartphone having it.
smartphones (phones able to run fairly sophisticated apps)
The RAZR could run "apps". Phones running software has been standard on bog standard phones since 2005 or earlier. Of course you've qualified it with "fairly sophisicated", but that's a completely ill-defined way to distinguish them. Obviously as time goes on, all phones become more sophisticated in terms of what they can run.
I see no evidence that more people have smartphones today - people are still buying in the low end of the market too. Of course, more people have more advanced phones, but that's because of progress, and not necessarily that people are buying in a different market, or spending more money on them.
Last time I looked, we already had factories and refineries on Earth, which is what the OP was talking about.
Perhaps his "f" key got lost in the same place as your shift key.
You forgot to post a reference to the US murder rate - remind me again, please?
(And yes, I'm aware that some countries manage to have lower murder rates even with guns allowed, but the US is not one of those countries. So how US citizens behave is of interest, when we're talking about all US citizens walking around with guns.)
Oh yes, and let's also compare that murder rate, to the number of people murdered by these imaginary terrorist operated drones.
Great, let's just have everyone shooting everyone. The point of interest is, how do the deaths resulting from guns, compare to the deaths caused by hypothetical terrorrr. Seriously, "But please won't somebody think about the terrorists" scaremongering is never accepted by people here, why is it any different for this argument?
So if it's now different to now, how is the OP's suggestion any different to now?
I wear a watch so I don't have to dig around in my pocket or bag for my phone just to quickly glance at the time. (Or have to get my phone, if I'm at home, which may be in a different room.)
Also it still works when my phone has drained its battery because I forgot the regular recharge it needs. And for people who ever go swimming, there are obvious advantages there too.
But I wonder what technological breakthrough took so long that wrist-phones only show up now.
I remember as a child, "books of the future" showed people wearing small computers as their watches. They were almost right, except it was the phone that turned into a computer, not the watch.
Even when the technology can make powerful computers the size of the watch, I think many people would still rather have something with a larger screen/keyboard size, that they can still carry (i.e., a phone). Indeed, it's not uncommon for me to know people who no longer wear watches at all, because they have a phone.