Took the words out of my mouth. Most people do realize there are third party candidates. They just don't support those candidate views, at least not more than they support the views of the mainstream candidates.
I voted for Nader last time around, but I did that mainly to send a message, as I don't think Nader has what it takes to run the country. After listening to Kerry in the debates last night I think he might have won my vote. Kerry seems to be going a lot farther toward affordable health care than Gore, and he's got a plan to pay for it, roll back the tax cuts that Bush gave to the top 2% of income earners. I don't think we'd have had this kind of talk coming from our Presidential candidate if it hadn't been for Nader in 2000, almost certainly not, because Gore would have won and would be running for re-election in 2004, having made the same minor changes to the health care system that Bush has made.
I think the third party candidates have some good points of view, and I think Badnarik has about as many good ideas as Nader (don't know anything about Cobb), but neither of them is a viable candidate to actually run the United States.
As long as they're taking the tax-benefits, they're NOT like an ordinary private corporation in the least!
If Libertarians get their way they'll be exactly the same, though. Is Badnarik taking the position that because the corporation doesn't pay their taxes that gives him the right to trespass on their property? Doesn't sound very Libertarian to me.
The fact that the presidential debates are run by the two parties who just happen to be the only two parties that get invited to these debates suggests a bit of a conflict of interest, dont you think?
You're acting as though there is only one company trying to run a presidential debate. The Citizens' Debate Commission sponsored a debate too. No one showed up.
These presidential debates need to be run by a disinterested third party, one that is not tied to ANY political parties, and one that answers to the PEOPLE of the US.
And should we force the candidates to show up to these debates, too?
Why does it matter who you think should be in the debates? If Badnarik thought he should be in the the Jeopardy Tournament of Champions, does that give him the right to trespass on the property of the recording studio and demand a seat?
The debates are just a popular TV show, after all.
No, a private corporation is in charge of a private debate between two candidates. The Democrat and Republican parties are simply exercising their right to free association. No one forces you to watch it.
Yeah, but can I use this software to back up my email on my local drive? Interestingly, now that a whole bunch of slashdotters are going to be sending Google into bankruptcy, this might be even more necessary.
Not sure if you've heard this, but Google News is still beta because the lawyers won't let them release a non-beta version. [http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20040929-425 6.html]
Disk space is pretty inexpensive, but the kind of bandwidth this filessystem will likely use isn't. I'm sure google is already spending more on bandwidth than hard drive space. With people transferring all these files without even looking at an ad, it's bound to cost them a lot of money.
Microsoft has a market cap of roughly $300 billion and is one of the largest companies by market capitalization. It only costs $1000 of MSFT stock to get crudely the equivalent vote power of a US citizen.
Even ignoring the electoral college and bicameral congress, and the fact that I live in Florida, there were only about 100,000,000 voters in 2000. So that'd be $3000.
And as you alluded to, that just takes care of Microsoft. The government accounts for roughly 30% of the spending in the United States, so I'd have to but up that share of 30% of all companies, public and private, just to get the power I have in the government. And that's without any constitutional rights. Even if all companies were public (they're not), I couldn't afford it. And since most companies aren't public, I don't even have a choice. Finally, if the government decided to privatize everything, many other people would rush to buy corporate shares too, so the market caps would skyrocket.
Yes, you're right. I'd rather some poor kid in India got the kidney instead of you too. I just provided it as a good counterexample to your claim.
But it doesn't provide a counterexample to anything.
But wouldn't it then be more effective to hasten that private effort by a few decades than continue to discard money on a government manned program that doesn't do anything?
Your question assumes too many things that aren't true. It assumes that the government manned program doesn't do anything. It assumes that private effort will do something. Finally, it assumes that if private efforts succeed, the government will stop. None of those are likely to be true. I'd much rather have this money spent on making the government programs better than have it spent by proprietary, for-profit, private corporations.
So X-15 cost $300 million in 1969 dollars while Spaceship One cost $25 million and has already earned $10 million in prize money and is licensed to the Virgin Group (and could be worth up to $21.4 million over the next 15 years). Let's not forget merchandizing.
I'd add the cost of the prize money, not subtract it. But if you're going to count all the research costs of the X-15, shouldn't you count them for both projects, since the research benefitted both of them?
I don't see why government should be better. Just because I can vote and have a little power doesn't mean that I get more benefit. After all, I can purchase shares in a corporation if I wish to get a similar level of power, right?
If it's a public corporation and you have bajillions of dollars, sure.
Hypothetical example. You need a new kidney and are currently living on machine (highly unpleasant from what I hear). Someone in India who happens to be compatible with you dies in a car accident. Within six hours, one of those kidneys is in you.
So some rich kid in the US gets a kidney instead of some poor kid in India? And this makes the world better some how? I don't have health care, so surely I'm not the one who's going to get the supersonically flown kidney.
Reinventing the wheel is necessary when the wheel hasn't been properly developed or used.
So far I haven't seen anything which shows that to be the case. Maybe in another decade or two private industry will outdo the government. But right now they're decades behind.
I'd much rather see this research go into the work the government is doing. At the very least give it to a non-profit organization. "FSF wins the Y-Prize for being the first non-profit in space! All research is released under the GPL." Now that'd be something to be excited about.
It proved several meaningful things. First, that private industry could on a shoe-string budget without government support do the same thing that an expensive government program could do. Namely, launch several people into space.
The first two flights proved that. Well, maybe not the shoe-string budget part. It did cost what, $25 million dollars, about as much as it cost the government to do it back in the stone ages?
Second, before now no one has built a reusable craft that has launched twice within two weeks (actually within five days!). That's new!
Even if no one has built a reusable craft that has launched twice within two weeks and reached a height of 62.5 miles each time... So what? It's a completely arbitrary restriction.
It's cool and all, kudos to the team that made it happen, but it's a rather small step for mankind (and depending if you'd prefer the government or large corporations controlling space flight arguably a step backward).
Who aside from career bureaucrats prefers a situation in which government or large corporations control space flight? Maybe being related to a career bureaucrat? My imagination just isn't very good here.
Oh, I think you misunderstood. My "or" was meant to be an "exclusive or". In my opinion this event is shifting the control of space flight from the government to large corporations. Personally, I'd rather have governments in control than large corporations. At least I can vote for the government.
Well, how long does it take to go from say Japan to New York City? Maybe 20-30 hours at subsonic speeds? A suborbital path cuts the actual travel time down to less than an hour (though there may be considerable delays on both ends). You can move people or cargo this way.
And how does this make my life any better? I get my Nintendo games 25 hours earlier? Again, the benefit is to the rich, the ones who can afford to pay for this. Because there's no way this type of travel is going to be cheaper than the 20-30 hour method.
Second, space tourism is a need and one for which people are willing to take risks and pay money.
It's not a need (until we destroy the earth). It's a luxury.
Of course, if we keep pouring millions of dollars of resources into toys like this, that day (Earth's destruction) will probably come sooner.
Why?
Well, my thought was that this was true because the Earth's resources are not infinite. But, if we really can come up with cheap, safe transportation into space, then we could probably get enough resources from space to outweigh this. Nuclear power plants on the moon, anyone? Solar panels at the least...
The thing is, this project hasn't made things any cheaper. The X-15 missions cost roughly the same amount, and surely they could be done much cheaper today. NASA uses the space shuttle to get into space because that's the most efficient way it has to do it. Surely if an X-15 could do it more efficiently they'd be doing things that way.
If you were really interesting in fixing problems on Earth, you would welcome research that would help fix these problems.
I do welcome new research. Whatever new research these missions have produced, which aren't encumbered by trade secrets and patents, are to be applauded. But these missions seem to be mainly just reinventing the wheel.
In any case, apparently exempt organizations can get the list for free, and any seller who only calls people with a pre-existing business relationship or prior authorization is exempt. So I just signed up for a copy of the list. I'll see in 3 days if I was accepted.
I wasn't aware they had to pay, but I'm sure it is not an insurmountable sum for these telemarketing companies to pay.
"Data for up to five area codes will be available for free. Beyond that, there is an annual fee of $25 per area code of data, with a maximum annual fee of $7,375 for the entire U.S. database." Sure, it's not a problem for large telemarketing companies. But the little guy is effectively shut out, and can't even call people who want telephone solicitations. In fact, "it's also against the law for a seller to call (or cause a telemarketer to call) any person whose number is within a given area code unless the seller first has paid the annual fee for access to the portion of the registry that includes numbers within that area code." (http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/dncbiz alrt.htm) So I can't even answer an out-of-state newspaper ad for a contract sale without paying the govt for a useless list!
I mean, in theory, if someone tells you not to call them, even by placing their number on a list, then calling them is harassment. But the implementation of this law could use a lot of work to get my full support.
Also, the government probably looks at the fee not as an income generator, but as a prod to maybe think about getting into a more legitimate line of business.
Now that there's a do not call list, I'm not sure what's illegitimate about calling people who aren't on it.
We have a right to speak, but NO one has any obligation to listen!
Exactly where between choosing to answer the phone and choosing to hang up did you get forced to listen to anything?
I'm forced to get off my butt, to get out of the shower, to run back into the house and hear someone say, "Buy what I'm selling" even after I notified them that I do not want them to call.
The fact of the matter is you're still exaggerating your point. Telemarketers don't force you to pick up the phone. They don't even force you to have a phone in the first place.
He is not exaggerating the point at all. 20 out of 21 phone calls to my house were telemarketers. I couldn't answer the phone. I had to screen each one.
I fail to see where any of what you said implies that telemarketers force you to listen.
It is amazing to me how so many people interpret their right to free speech as a right to an audience.
I really don't think anyone is doing that.
You mean besides the businesses who were claiming that free speech means people shouldn't be able to stop them from calling?
The right to call someone is not the same thing as the right to an audience. And no business is saying that people shouldn't be able to stop them from calling. They're simply saying that there shouldn't be a law against them calling.
I tend to think of my phone as an extension of my house. It is my property, and I should be able to tell people to stay away unless they have my invitation or a legal prerogative to be there (e.g. law officers). Much like I can put up a sign saying "No solicitors" or "No trespassers" on my property, I should be able to have a similar method of protecting the phone access to my home.
I tend to agree with this. The only real problem I have with this law is I believe the companies are forced to pay for the no call list. This is a bit unfair, like forcing me to pay to see whether or not you had a "no solicitors" sign. But that's not a huge deal, so for the most part I'm in favor of this law.
On last comment, the right to commercial speech is limited.
The right to noncommercial speech is limited too.
At one time it was completely non-existent.
Before the Constitution was passed, perhaps.
You seem to be under the impression that commercial speech and the speech of citizens are somehow synonymous. They are not.
Commercial speech is generally made by citizens.
The government has full legal authority to regulate commercial speech.
Of course they don't. Their legal authority is limited by the first amendment. How can you say that commercial speech rights are limited, and then say that they are nonexistent? Pick one.
That is exactly why the list does not apply to political or non-profit groups.
Wrong. The reason the list doesn't apply to political or non-profit groups is because this law is based on the interstate commerce clause.
You don't seem to understand the purpose of a phone.
A phone has many purposes. Personally I don't choose to use the "make an annoying ring whenever some random person dials my number" feature.
What if a friend from decades past tried to call me. She has a new last name because she's married. I want to be able to answer that call without being harassed by a phone solicitor.
She could always leave a message. For me it's not worth it receiving even just the wrong numbers I get to my phone just so my long lost friend who has gotten married and changed her last name can reach me without leaving a message. But if you want the loud annoying ring feature, feel free to use it. Just don't claim that anyone is ''forcing'' you to use it.
Can you explain how the list violates commercial speech but yet the machine does not?
1) I never said the list violates commercial speech. 2) The list is set up by a government law, whereas the machine is set up by a private citizen. 3) etc.
The two cases are fundamentally different. Junk television programs are incapable of creating a nuisance unless you take a deliberate action (turn on the TV and tune in that channel); junk phone calls are capable of creating a nuisance without any such action on your part
Turn on the TV and tune in that channel as opposed to plug in the phone and turn on your ringer? I don't see a fundamental difference.
(indeed, the only way to avoid the nuisance is to disconnect the phone, which simply creates a different nuisance of being unable to receive legitimate calls)
Likewise, disconnecting your TV is generally a bigger nuisance than watching nudity.
Who am I kidding, nudity isn't a nuisance! But I can see how some people would consider it to be.
You're welcome to your opinion, but people who have significant understanding of the space industry understand that this is a big deal.
This particular flight was completely meaningless.
And who cares about the career bureaucrats for which this is a "step back"?
I don't remember mentioning anything about career bureaucrats.
Pfft. There's a lot of things that started as rich peoples' toys, but aren't now. Someone has to start buying a product before it can become affordable.
A product usually has to fill an actual need to become affordable. Maybe when we destroy the earth space travel will be more than a luxury. Of course, if we keep pouring millions of dollars of resources into toys like this, that day will probably come sooner.
The vast majority of phone solicitors get around caller ID quite easily.
I've never seen a telemarketer who can pop up the number of someone I want to hear from.
And secondly, there is no way in heck that I'm going to pay for a phone and get only half the use out of it.
That's fine. Set up your phone to make an annoying ringing noise whenever some random person wants to reach you. You've got that right.
Your argument is that people should not be able to decide if they don't want commercial calls.
No it isn't.
That's exactly what the list is, people deciding to place their number on a list which retailers are not supposed to call.
You didn't read my post, did you? I think the do-not-call list is a good idea.
You also argue that when faced with phone solicitations, people can either stop taking all calls or simply hang up.
Of course they can.
Right now you are deciding that you don't want me to call, that's why you are not giving out your number.
Actually, I don't care if you call me. I'm mainly just paranoid that you could get my address through my phone number, and I've taken a lot of steps to keep my address very difficult to figure out.
And I'm not sure why, as you are well within your rights to not answer you phone or to simply hang up when I call.
Also, you asked for my home phone number, and I don't have a home phone. I use a cell phone for all my calls.
Why do phone solicitors have more rights than me?!
I don't give phone solicitors my number either. And you have every right to call me. I never said you didn't.
Here is an analogy. I've seen for sale a device you can connect to your phone to which blocks unwanted calls. It's sort of like an answering machine. Here is how it works: when someone calls, the device answers the call for you. Only after the caller enters a password would the phone actually ring. Thus, someone who used the device could effectively block calls from all solicitors.
Do you think this product is also violative of a businesses' right to commercial speech?
Slashdot Mirror
Took the words out of my mouth. Most people do realize there are third party candidates. They just don't support those candidate views, at least not more than they support the views of the mainstream candidates.
I voted for Nader last time around, but I did that mainly to send a message, as I don't think Nader has what it takes to run the country. After listening to Kerry in the debates last night I think he might have won my vote. Kerry seems to be going a lot farther toward affordable health care than Gore, and he's got a plan to pay for it, roll back the tax cuts that Bush gave to the top 2% of income earners. I don't think we'd have had this kind of talk coming from our Presidential candidate if it hadn't been for Nader in 2000, almost certainly not, because Gore would have won and would be running for re-election in 2004, having made the same minor changes to the health care system that Bush has made.
I think the third party candidates have some good points of view, and I think Badnarik has about as many good ideas as Nader (don't know anything about Cobb), but neither of them is a viable candidate to actually run the United States.
As long as they're taking the tax-benefits, they're NOT like an ordinary private corporation in the least!
If Libertarians get their way they'll be exactly the same, though. Is Badnarik taking the position that because the corporation doesn't pay their taxes that gives him the right to trespass on their property? Doesn't sound very Libertarian to me.
The fact that the presidential debates are run by the two parties who just happen to be the only two parties that get invited to these debates suggests a bit of a conflict of interest, dont you think?
You're acting as though there is only one company trying to run a presidential debate. The Citizens' Debate Commission sponsored a debate too. No one showed up.
These presidential debates need to be run by a disinterested third party, one that is not tied to ANY political parties, and one that answers to the PEOPLE of the US.
And should we force the candidates to show up to these debates, too?
Lyndon LaRouche certainly doesn't think so.
Why does it matter who you think should be in the debates? If Badnarik thought he should be in the the Jeopardy Tournament of Champions, does that give him the right to trespass on the property of the recording studio and demand a seat?
The debates are just a popular TV show, after all.
No, a private corporation is in charge of a private debate between two candidates. The Democrat and Republican parties are simply exercising their right to free association. No one forces you to watch it.
Yeah, but can I use this software to back up my email on my local drive? Interestingly, now that a whole bunch of slashdotters are going to be sending Google into bankruptcy, this might be even more necessary.
Not sure if you've heard this, but Google News is still beta because the lawyers won't let them release a non-beta version. [http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20040929-425 6.html]
disk space is pretty inexpensive
Disk space is pretty inexpensive, but the kind of bandwidth this filessystem will likely use isn't. I'm sure google is already spending more on bandwidth than hard drive space. With people transferring all these files without even looking at an ad, it's bound to cost them a lot of money.
You really are not supposed to bring your own pens, but I dont think people really care about that.
Oh sure. Say that when the Supreme Court declares Bush the winner again.
Microsoft has a market cap of roughly $300 billion and is one of the largest companies by market capitalization. It only costs $1000 of MSFT stock to get crudely the equivalent vote power of a US citizen.
Even ignoring the electoral college and bicameral congress, and the fact that I live in Florida, there were only about 100,000,000 voters in 2000. So that'd be $3000.
And as you alluded to, that just takes care of Microsoft. The government accounts for roughly 30% of the spending in the United States, so I'd have to but up that share of 30% of all companies, public and private, just to get the power I have in the government. And that's without any constitutional rights. Even if all companies were public (they're not), I couldn't afford it. And since most companies aren't public, I don't even have a choice. Finally, if the government decided to privatize everything, many other people would rush to buy corporate shares too, so the market caps would skyrocket.
Yes, you're right. I'd rather some poor kid in India got the kidney instead of you too. I just provided it as a good counterexample to your claim.
But it doesn't provide a counterexample to anything.
But wouldn't it then be more effective to hasten that private effort by a few decades than continue to discard money on a government manned program that doesn't do anything?
Your question assumes too many things that aren't true. It assumes that the government manned program doesn't do anything. It assumes that private effort will do something. Finally, it assumes that if private efforts succeed, the government will stop. None of those are likely to be true. I'd much rather have this money spent on making the government programs better than have it spent by proprietary, for-profit, private corporations.
So X-15 cost $300 million in 1969 dollars while Spaceship One cost $25 million and has already earned $10 million in prize money and is licensed to the Virgin Group (and could be worth up to $21.4 million over the next 15 years). Let's not forget merchandizing.
I'd add the cost of the prize money, not subtract it. But if you're going to count all the research costs of the X-15, shouldn't you count them for both projects, since the research benefitted both of them?
I don't see why government should be better. Just because I can vote and have a little power doesn't mean that I get more benefit. After all, I can purchase shares in a corporation if I wish to get a similar level of power, right?
If it's a public corporation and you have bajillions of dollars, sure.
Hypothetical example. You need a new kidney and are currently living on machine (highly unpleasant from what I hear). Someone in India who happens to be compatible with you dies in a car accident. Within six hours, one of those kidneys is in you.
So some rich kid in the US gets a kidney instead of some poor kid in India? And this makes the world better some how? I don't have health care, so surely I'm not the one who's going to get the supersonically flown kidney.
Reinventing the wheel is necessary when the wheel hasn't been properly developed or used.
So far I haven't seen anything which shows that to be the case. Maybe in another decade or two private industry will outdo the government. But right now they're decades behind.
I'd much rather see this research go into the work the government is doing. At the very least give it to a non-profit organization. "FSF wins the Y-Prize for being the first non-profit in space! All research is released under the GPL." Now that'd be something to be excited about.
It proved several meaningful things. First, that private industry could on a shoe-string budget without government support do the same thing that an expensive government program could do. Namely, launch several people into space.
The first two flights proved that. Well, maybe not the shoe-string budget part. It did cost what, $25 million dollars, about as much as it cost the government to do it back in the stone ages?
Second, before now no one has built a reusable craft that has launched twice within two weeks (actually within five days!). That's new!
Even if no one has built a reusable craft that has launched twice within two weeks and reached a height of 62.5 miles each time... So what? It's a completely arbitrary restriction.
Who aside from career bureaucrats prefers a situation in which government or large corporations control space flight? Maybe being related to a career bureaucrat? My imagination just isn't very good here.
Oh, I think you misunderstood. My "or" was meant to be an "exclusive or". In my opinion this event is shifting the control of space flight from the government to large corporations. Personally, I'd rather have governments in control than large corporations. At least I can vote for the government.
Well, how long does it take to go from say Japan to New York City? Maybe 20-30 hours at subsonic speeds? A suborbital path cuts the actual travel time down to less than an hour (though there may be considerable delays on both ends). You can move people or cargo this way.
And how does this make my life any better? I get my Nintendo games 25 hours earlier? Again, the benefit is to the rich, the ones who can afford to pay for this. Because there's no way this type of travel is going to be cheaper than the 20-30 hour method.
Second, space tourism is a need and one for which people are willing to take risks and pay money.
It's not a need (until we destroy the earth). It's a luxury.
Why?
Well, my thought was that this was true because the Earth's resources are not infinite. But, if we really can come up with cheap, safe transportation into space, then we could probably get enough resources from space to outweigh this. Nuclear power plants on the moon, anyone? Solar panels at the least...
The thing is, this project hasn't made things any cheaper. The X-15 missions cost roughly the same amount, and surely they could be done much cheaper today. NASA uses the space shuttle to get into space because that's the most efficient way it has to do it. Surely if an X-15 could do it more efficiently they'd be doing things that way.
If you were really interesting in fixing problems on Earth, you would welcome research that would help fix these problems.
I do welcome new research. Whatever new research these missions have produced, which aren't encumbered by trade secrets and patents, are to be applauded. But these missions seem to be mainly just reinventing the wheel.
Not all TVs let you change from one channel to another without hitting all the channels in between.
Many prey on the meek, lonely and timid.
So guilt by association?
In any case, apparently exempt organizations can get the list for free, and any seller who only calls people with a pre-existing business relationship or prior authorization is exempt. So I just signed up for a copy of the list. I'll see in 3 days if I was accepted.
I wasn't aware they had to pay, but I'm sure it is not an insurmountable sum for these telemarketing companies to pay.
"Data for up to five area codes will be available for free. Beyond that, there is an annual fee of $25 per area code of data, with a maximum annual fee of $7,375 for the entire U.S. database." Sure, it's not a problem for large telemarketing companies. But the little guy is effectively shut out, and can't even call people who want telephone solicitations. In fact, "it's also against the law for a seller to call (or cause a telemarketer to call) any person whose number is within a given area code unless the seller first has paid the annual fee for access to the portion of the registry that includes numbers within that area code." (http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/dncbiz alrt.htm) So I can't even answer an out-of-state newspaper ad for a contract sale without paying the govt for a useless list!
I mean, in theory, if someone tells you not to call them, even by placing their number on a list, then calling them is harassment. But the implementation of this law could use a lot of work to get my full support.
Also, the government probably looks at the fee not as an income generator, but as a prod to maybe think about getting into a more legitimate line of business.
Now that there's a do not call list, I'm not sure what's illegitimate about calling people who aren't on it.
Let's summarize the thread, then:
We have a right to speak, but NO one has any obligation to listen!
Exactly where between choosing to answer the phone and choosing to hang up did you get forced to listen to anything?
I'm forced to get off my butt, to get out of the shower, to run back into the house and hear someone say, "Buy what I'm selling" even after I notified them that I do not want them to call.
The fact of the matter is you're still exaggerating your point. Telemarketers don't force you to pick up the phone. They don't even force you to have a phone in the first place.
He is not exaggerating the point at all. 20 out of 21 phone calls to my house were telemarketers. I couldn't answer the phone. I had to screen each one.
I fail to see where any of what you said implies that telemarketers force you to listen.
It is amazing to me how so many people interpret their right to free speech as a right to an audience.
I really don't think anyone is doing that.
You mean besides the businesses who were claiming that free speech means people shouldn't be able to stop them from calling?
The right to call someone is not the same thing as the right to an audience. And no business is saying that people shouldn't be able to stop them from calling. They're simply saying that there shouldn't be a law against them calling.
I tend to think of my phone as an extension of my house. It is my property, and I should be able to tell people to stay away unless they have my invitation or a legal prerogative to be there (e.g. law officers). Much like I can put up a sign saying "No solicitors" or "No trespassers" on my property, I should be able to have a similar method of protecting the phone access to my home.
I tend to agree with this. The only real problem I have with this law is I believe the companies are forced to pay for the no call list. This is a bit unfair, like forcing me to pay to see whether or not you had a "no solicitors" sign. But that's not a huge deal, so for the most part I'm in favor of this law.
The fact that one TV channel has stuff you don't want to see does not prevent your from seeing stuff you do want to see on another channel.
Maybe...
However, turning off the phone to avoid telemarketers does prevent you from receiving legitimate calls.
My phone is set to ring only when people I want to talk to call me.
On last comment, the right to commercial speech is limited.
The right to noncommercial speech is limited too.
At one time it was completely non-existent.
Before the Constitution was passed, perhaps.
You seem to be under the impression that commercial speech and the speech of citizens are somehow synonymous. They are not.
Commercial speech is generally made by citizens.
The government has full legal authority to regulate commercial speech.
Of course they don't. Their legal authority is limited by the first amendment. How can you say that commercial speech rights are limited, and then say that they are nonexistent? Pick one.
That is exactly why the list does not apply to political or non-profit groups.
Wrong. The reason the list doesn't apply to political or non-profit groups is because this law is based on the interstate commerce clause.
You don't seem to understand the purpose of a phone.
A phone has many purposes. Personally I don't choose to use the "make an annoying ring whenever some random person dials my number" feature.
What if a friend from decades past tried to call me. She has a new last name because she's married. I want to be able to answer that call without being harassed by a phone solicitor.
She could always leave a message. For me it's not worth it receiving even just the wrong numbers I get to my phone just so my long lost friend who has gotten married and changed her last name can reach me without leaving a message. But if you want the loud annoying ring feature, feel free to use it. Just don't claim that anyone is ''forcing'' you to use it.
Can you explain how the list violates commercial speech but yet the machine does not?
1) I never said the list violates commercial speech. 2) The list is set up by a government law, whereas the machine is set up by a private citizen. 3) etc.
You seem inconsistent in your belief.
You seem to do nothing but set up strawmen.
The two cases are fundamentally different. Junk television programs are incapable of creating a nuisance unless you take a deliberate action (turn on the TV and tune in that channel); junk phone calls are capable of creating a nuisance without any such action on your part
Turn on the TV and tune in that channel as opposed to plug in the phone and turn on your ringer? I don't see a fundamental difference.
(indeed, the only way to avoid the nuisance is to disconnect the phone, which simply creates a different nuisance of being unable to receive legitimate calls)
Likewise, disconnecting your TV is generally a bigger nuisance than watching nudity.
Who am I kidding, nudity isn't a nuisance! But I can see how some people would consider it to be.
You're welcome to your opinion, but people who have significant understanding of the space industry understand that this is a big deal.
This particular flight was completely meaningless.
And who cares about the career bureaucrats for which this is a "step back"?
I don't remember mentioning anything about career bureaucrats.
Pfft. There's a lot of things that started as rich peoples' toys, but aren't now. Someone has to start buying a product before it can become affordable.
A product usually has to fill an actual need to become affordable. Maybe when we destroy the earth space travel will be more than a luxury. Of course, if we keep pouring millions of dollars of resources into toys like this, that day will probably come sooner.
It is amazing to me how so many people interpret their right to free speech as a right to an audience.
I really don't think anyone is doing that.
Do you even have a phone?!
Not a home phone.
The vast majority of phone solicitors get around caller ID quite easily.
I've never seen a telemarketer who can pop up the number of someone I want to hear from.
And secondly, there is no way in heck that I'm going to pay for a phone and get only half the use out of it.
That's fine. Set up your phone to make an annoying ringing noise whenever some random person wants to reach you. You've got that right.
Your argument is that people should not be able to decide if they don't want commercial calls.
No it isn't.
That's exactly what the list is, people deciding to place their number on a list which retailers are not supposed to call.
You didn't read my post, did you? I think the do-not-call list is a good idea.
You also argue that when faced with phone solicitations, people can either stop taking all calls or simply hang up.
Of course they can.
Right now you are deciding that you don't want me to call, that's why you are not giving out your number.
Actually, I don't care if you call me. I'm mainly just paranoid that you could get my address through my phone number, and I've taken a lot of steps to keep my address very difficult to figure out.
And I'm not sure why, as you are well within your rights to not answer you phone or to simply hang up when I call.
Also, you asked for my home phone number, and I don't have a home phone. I use a cell phone for all my calls.
Why do phone solicitors have more rights than me?!
I don't give phone solicitors my number either. And you have every right to call me. I never said you didn't.
Here is an analogy. I've seen for sale a device you can connect to your phone to which blocks unwanted calls. It's sort of like an answering machine. Here is how it works: when someone calls, the device answers the call for you. Only after the caller enters a password would the phone actually ring. Thus, someone who used the device could effectively block calls from all solicitors.
Do you think this product is also violative of a businesses' right to commercial speech?
No, I don't.