The people in the middle (like me, and mine) get just about nothing from the government, but the government is in our pockets, taking about 1/3 of our wages every week.
If you really want to see what "getting nothing from the government" looks like, go to Somalia.
We, the working people, don't benefit from food stamps, free housing, free utilities...
Really? What do you imagine would happen if people who receive food stamps now were denied benefits? If people who got "free housing" or "free utilities" didn't receive those benefits? Do you think the crime rate would stay at relatively low levels, or do you think it would skyrocket?
Fact of the matter is, we're all in this together. I'm part of the middle class, but I also recognize that most of us are one disease or disaster away from being ruined. So I don't mind paying to help take care of other people and raise their standard of living up to what could be considered an acceptable minimum. All I would ask is that those who are financially well-off pay it forward, too.
Why can't America just face the reality as it is - that it is spending way too much money than it is making??
The United States had the best credit record in the world until Congress fucked that up during the last debt ceiling fiasco. We are, and always have been, a nation that both "spends more than it makes" and a nation that pays its debts.
How long do you think America can keep spending the money it doesn't have?
We've been doing a pretty good job of it the last 200 years or so. The debt is lower today as a percentage of gross domestic product than it was after World War II.
All of us balance our own checkbook at the end of every single month, and try our best to live within our means. Why can't America?
Because the rules work a little differently when you're a sovereign nation. Stop trying to compare it to your household banking.
However, it isn't clear that liability for a spaceflight that begins and ends in New Mexico falls under the Interstate Commerce Clause.
Any launch from New Mexico is going to fly over other states, if not other countries, on its way to orbit. So yes, the interstate commerce clause could certainly apply if a New Mexico-launched rocket explodes and rains debris over Texas and Louisiana.
Should be fine for polar orbital launches, though, right? A lot of satellites could take advantage of that, particularly reconnaissance satellites, weather satellites and GPS (whose satellites aren't polar, though most of them follow a non-equitorial orbit).
If you do something illegal and get caught, you mean.
News flash: Criminals are, generally speaking, dumb people who usually make the mistake of thinking they're smarter than they actually are. So no, I mean exactly what I wrote.
An eagle tosses it's young out of the nest not to kill or out of malice but to teach them how to fly on their own.
When humans try this, it doesn't kill the young. Probably because we don't build our nests high enough off the ground. I'll leave it up to you to determine whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Fair enough. Out of 56 launches, ULA has had one partial failure, in 2007: the upper stage of an Atlas V rocket cut out early, so the NRO satellite didn't reach its proper orbit. That equates to a failure rate of less than 2 percent, so either someone's launching a lot of duds or the OP pulled the 5- to 10-percent figure out of his ass.
After more than half a century of big rockets, they still crash far too often.
Do you have a citation to back up your claim? United Launch Alliance has a pretty good record, from what I recall. Who else launches rockets, and what are their failure rates?
And this folks is precisely why we never get anything done anymore...
No, this is why New Mexico apparently isn't serious about having a spaceport. I know Colorado already has a robust space industry and would probably welcome the opportunity to host a spaceport if New Mexico doesn't want to do it.
Basically, once the game has been installed, it can never be installed on another console again, thereby killing off the second hand game market.
The PC gamer has never had access to the secondhand game market. Sounds like Sony's decided to level the playing field. Not a very good business decision, but as a PC gamer, I don't much mind.
"And some of them join because they believe the Constitution and what it represents matters enough to risk their lives defending it" by killing other people.
Sometimes that's the only option. I have nothing but loathing for the leaders who decided the Iraq war was a good idea, but sending the Peace Corps would not have been the proper response to Sept. 11, and the Peace Corps would not have been the right tool to kill Osama bin Laden.
Military force should be a last resort, but it still has a place, and that doesn't take away from the nobility of those who choose to risk their lives defending the ideals embodied in the Constitution.
It is resourceful and clever, at least for their age; this you cannot deny.
Yeah, Pol Pot was pretty resourceful and clever, too. Doesn't mean I'd invite him over for dinner.
Why were the children so eager to stay online that they resorted to drugging the parents?
Irrelevant. The kids chose to do something remarkably stupid. I teach my kid that actions -- good and bad -- have consequences. You do something illegal, you get arrested.
Or perhaps the girl is partially psychopathic, and only did what she deemed was logical (I should point out that being a psychopath is not a crime).
No, but drugging someone else is illegal. You do something illegal, you get arrested.
Beyond that, most computers running Windows can be set up with parental controls that automatically lock the computer down at a certain time. I use this on my son's PC -- it kicks him off automatically about an hour before his bedtime and is also locked down during school hours.
I'm actually with you on most of this. But the Constitution flat-out prohibits the government from passing any law that would eliminate access and ownership of firearms. So let's look at licensing.
To use the/. car analogy, if you want to buy a small car, you need a regular driver's license. If you want to drive a semi or a bus, you need a commercial driver's license, which involves a much more rigorous procedure.
So, if you want to own a handgun or a rifle that's not semi-automatic, one should have to demonstrate basic proficiency (regular license). For semi-automatic rifles, etc., one should have to go through a much more intensive licensing process, maybe one that includes mental screening (CDL).
I hate pennies.. they are evil and need to be banished from the earth. But Americans would scream blue murder if the gubmint tried to take their precious away.
Just tell them the pennies will be melted down to make ammunition for troops in Afghanistan. Problem solved!
APA!? arn't those the same assholes that at one time also preached that "homosexuality as a mental disorder"
Right up until 1979. Which is actually kind of progressive when you put it in context with things like Don't Ask Don't Tell, the Defense of Marriage Act, etc.
For the newcomers to this discussion, Anon most likely is referring to Jack Thompson, an asshat whose tirades ultimately got him permanently disbarred in 2008 by the Florida Supreme Court.
Anecdotally, I stopped playing Grand Theft Auto after I noticed I was starting to drive more aggressively in real life. So your argument has me thinking about whether I should let my 12-year-old kid play games like Skyrim, Fallout, Mass Effect, etc., or tell him to stick with Minecraft.
Slashdot Mirror
Ummm, you know that the top 1% contributes more than 35% of taxes already, right?
And they pocket 80 percent of the nation's income. Something's not right about that equation, don't you think?
The people in the middle (like me, and mine) get just about nothing from the government, but the government is in our pockets, taking about 1/3 of our wages every week.
If you really want to see what "getting nothing from the government" looks like, go to Somalia.
We, the working people, don't benefit from food stamps, free housing, free utilities ...
Really? What do you imagine would happen if people who receive food stamps now were denied benefits? If people who got "free housing" or "free utilities" didn't receive those benefits? Do you think the crime rate would stay at relatively low levels, or do you think it would skyrocket?
Fact of the matter is, we're all in this together. I'm part of the middle class, but I also recognize that most of us are one disease or disaster away from being ruined. So I don't mind paying to help take care of other people and raise their standard of living up to what could be considered an acceptable minimum. All I would ask is that those who are financially well-off pay it forward, too.
Why can't America just face the reality as it is - that it is spending way too much money than it is making??
The United States had the best credit record in the world until Congress fucked that up during the last debt ceiling fiasco. We are, and always have been, a nation that both "spends more than it makes" and a nation that pays its debts.
How long do you think America can keep spending the money it doesn't have?
We've been doing a pretty good job of it the last 200 years or so. The debt is lower today as a percentage of gross domestic product than it was after World War II.
All of us balance our own checkbook at the end of every single month, and try our best to live within our means. Why can't America?
Because the rules work a little differently when you're a sovereign nation. Stop trying to compare it to your household banking.
"Espionage" in what sense, exactly? He wasn't in the employ of a foreign government.
However, it isn't clear that liability for a spaceflight that begins and ends in New Mexico falls under the Interstate Commerce Clause.
Any launch from New Mexico is going to fly over other states, if not other countries, on its way to orbit. So yes, the interstate commerce clause could certainly apply if a New Mexico-launched rocket explodes and rains debris over Texas and Louisiana.
Should be fine for polar orbital launches, though, right? A lot of satellites could take advantage of that, particularly reconnaissance satellites, weather satellites and GPS (whose satellites aren't polar, though most of them follow a non-equitorial orbit).
If you do something illegal and get caught, you mean.
News flash: Criminals are, generally speaking, dumb people who usually make the mistake of thinking they're smarter than they actually are. So no, I mean exactly what I wrote.
Sounds like a very thick and very heavy last straw.
Like ... the kind of last straw you would use to drink a milkshake.
An eagle tosses it's young out of the nest not to kill or out of malice but to teach them how to fly on their own.
When humans try this, it doesn't kill the young. Probably because we don't build our nests high enough off the ground. I'll leave it up to you to determine whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Fair enough. Out of 56 launches, ULA has had one partial failure, in 2007: the upper stage of an Atlas V rocket cut out early, so the NRO satellite didn't reach its proper orbit. That equates to a failure rate of less than 2 percent, so either someone's launching a lot of duds or the OP pulled the 5- to 10-percent figure out of his ass.
After more than half a century of big rockets, they still crash far too often.
Do you have a citation to back up your claim? United Launch Alliance has a pretty good record, from what I recall. Who else launches rockets, and what are their failure rates?
And this folks is precisely why we never get anything done anymore...
No, this is why New Mexico apparently isn't serious about having a spaceport. I know Colorado already has a robust space industry and would probably welcome the opportunity to host a spaceport if New Mexico doesn't want to do it.
Basically, once the game has been installed, it can never be installed on another console again, thereby killing off the second hand game market.
The PC gamer has never had access to the secondhand game market. Sounds like Sony's decided to level the playing field. Not a very good business decision, but as a PC gamer, I don't much mind.
"And some of them join because they believe the Constitution and what it represents matters enough to risk their lives defending it" by killing other people.
Sometimes that's the only option. I have nothing but loathing for the leaders who decided the Iraq war was a good idea, but sending the Peace Corps would not have been the proper response to Sept. 11, and the Peace Corps would not have been the right tool to kill Osama bin Laden.
Military force should be a last resort, but it still has a place, and that doesn't take away from the nobility of those who choose to risk their lives defending the ideals embodied in the Constitution.
Inside the U.S., a good number of large vehicles and convoys are moved by train.
It is resourceful and clever, at least for their age; this you cannot deny.
Yeah, Pol Pot was pretty resourceful and clever, too. Doesn't mean I'd invite him over for dinner.
Why were the children so eager to stay online that they resorted to drugging the parents?
Irrelevant. The kids chose to do something remarkably stupid. I teach my kid that actions -- good and bad -- have consequences. You do something illegal, you get arrested.
Or perhaps the girl is partially psychopathic, and only did what she deemed was logical (I should point out that being a psychopath is not a crime).
No, but drugging someone else is illegal. You do something illegal, you get arrested.
Beyond that, most computers running Windows can be set up with parental controls that automatically lock the computer down at a certain time. I use this on my son's PC -- it kicks him off automatically about an hour before his bedtime and is also locked down during school hours.
I frequently pull all nighters to play video games. There is nothing wrong with that.
You're also an adult capable of making an educated decision, weighing the consequences (pro and con) before you act, I presume.
I'm actually with you on most of this. But the Constitution flat-out prohibits the government from passing any law that would eliminate access and ownership of firearms. So let's look at licensing.
To use the /. car analogy, if you want to buy a small car, you need a regular driver's license. If you want to drive a semi or a bus, you need a commercial driver's license, which involves a much more rigorous procedure.
So, if you want to own a handgun or a rifle that's not semi-automatic, one should have to demonstrate basic proficiency (regular license). For semi-automatic rifles, etc., one should have to go through a much more intensive licensing process, maybe one that includes mental screening (CDL).
I hate pennies .. they are evil and need to be banished from the earth. But Americans would scream blue murder if the gubmint tried to take their precious away.
Just tell them the pennies will be melted down to make ammunition for troops in Afghanistan. Problem solved!
APA!? arn't those the same assholes that at one time also preached that "homosexuality as a mental disorder"
Right up until 1979. Which is actually kind of progressive when you put it in context with things like Don't Ask Don't Tell, the Defense of Marriage Act, etc.
John Elway seems to be doing OK for himself.
For the newcomers to this discussion, Anon most likely is referring to Jack Thompson, an asshat whose tirades ultimately got him permanently disbarred in 2008 by the Florida Supreme Court.
But Fallout is a violent video game, too! Just duck and cover, I guess?
All that said, here's a more non-biased look at the pro and con on whether violent video games translate into real-world violence.
Anecdotally, I stopped playing Grand Theft Auto after I noticed I was starting to drive more aggressively in real life. So your argument has me thinking about whether I should let my 12-year-old kid play games like Skyrim, Fallout, Mass Effect, etc., or tell him to stick with Minecraft.