what I see are cycles of poverty reinforced by decisions that aren't made by the children. They don't choose for their moms to drink a little while they're pregnant, or not eat enough or see the doctor enough because of poverty (the Republicans have been chipping away at WIC for ages). They don't pick their underfunded schools with their 49 student class sizes full of special ed kids that disrupt the class every 5 minutes (if they try to go to the nice districts their parents get in trouble, a woman went to jail for it, google it). They don't choose to come from broken homes with no father because he had no job because it was shipped off to Mexico when free trade kicked in. They pick none of that
Put another way, why is it that after 250 years of bad discussions being made before their born that when a kid turns 18 their suppose to magically ignore all that, reach for their boot straps and solve all their problems? As a teacher you must know it's physically to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, right?
I'm serious. There is such a thing as being right, you know? Yes, people are out to get you, but you can't let that get in the way of using the tools that are available to you. What's the old saying: The greatest trick the devil ever played was convincing you he didn't exist. Well the greatest trick the Right Wing every played was convincing you to abandon gov't out of fear. They right wing haven't abandoned gov't. They use it to their advantage. Here's another way to think of it. Imagine there's an open crate of fully loaded automatic rifles. There's a couple guys running around shooting people. Do you look at the rifles and say "I'm not gonna pick that up, I might shoot my eye out!". That's gov't. A powerful, dangerous tool. But a tool that's going to get used whether you like it or not.
As for the dems aren't even close to the level of the Republicans, though plenty have tried. But I'll take what I can get. Bernie Sanders is a good start.
if you can afford a PC. Lots of families can't. They've gotten so cheap we forgot that there are real poor in this country for whom $200 might as well be $200,000. 62% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck.
On another note, you're unusually bright (assuming you learned on your own). Either that or you just happen to have access to some really, really good magazines. Or both. Either way what do you do if you hit a wall for whatever reason and there isn't a Magazine there for you? If you have a mentor you'll get past it, but odds are if you're one of those dirt poor kids you don't have that.
I guess there's always your bootstraps. It's telling that the metaphor we use for self reliance is physically impossible. Could it be that almost nobody really makes it on their own? For all it makes us uncomfortable maybe, just maybe, there is something to the phrase "You didn't build it".
to know CS on the standardized tests. In the wealthier districts this'll be no big deal. The parents will buy their kids laptops to do their homework and hire tutors to get them through the tough spots. In the working class neighborhoods they'll be a few years while they kids have enough computers and then they'll start to break down. After that the grants that the companies gave in exchange for us paying to train their employees will have run out and those kids will be screwed. This is how it works. Don't like it? Tough. That's American Politics.
Now, if you know how to get the blue collar types to stop giving a rat's ass about social issues, stop blaming Unions for their troubles and get them voting for popularist economic policies that are in their best interest again please let me know. The way all this stuff (public schools, social welfare, safety nets, minimum wage, the Civil Rights movement) got through was these folks were organized through their churches. The right wing noticed that and formed an alliance between the social conservatives and the corporate right. Southern Strategy, Starve the Beast, etc. It's been downhill since then.
That was going to be their model. Thing is, Amazon has been building up same day service for the last 5 years. They're working on Autonomous vehicles too. Meanwhile Walmart has grocery delivery, even for 'free' at my company, but they charge a premium for all the items you buy and you don't get to pick your produce so the value isn't really there.
It's looking more and more like online will kill brick and mortar. What I'm wondering is what's going to happen to all those property owners when it does. They guys Walmart & co lease their buildings from are billionaires after all. They make their living renting out the space. All that property is set to become worthless in 20 years. 30 tops. I can't see those guys going quietly into the good night. I'm actually a bit scared. They've got crazy money and power, and their backs will be at the wall. I could see some pretty awful things coming out of that, sort of like how the health insurance biz spends a few billion dollars every time the specter of single payer comes up and we end up with a compromise that is somehow worse...
Communism doesn't work. It involves a large scale transfer of ownership of the means of production to the working class, and it's been shown that in the battle between the military and ruling class that ensues when you try to do that it all falls apart.
This folks is why I'm a Democratic Socialist. You can live however the heck you want so long as you're not causing pain and suffering to others. Trouble is the 1% will _always_ cause pain and suffering, because as you and I are diminished they are raised. It really is a Zero sum game, but for social status and political power rather than raw economics.
Nice talking points you got there though. Did you get 'em from Rush Limbaugh? You know he just got 'em from Karl Rove right?
China and the Soviet Union are not, were not and never were Communist. They were fascist dictatorships that happen to borrow rhetoric from popularists like Karl Marx. Jeez, it's 2015. Do we still believe in McCarthyism? Maybe if it weighed the same as a duck...
30 years of outsourcing and declining wages is stressing us out. A race to the bottom where everybody takes a piece of you on the way down is stressing us out. Having to pick a breakfast cereal? Not so much. This doesn't even qualify as a "first world problem".
Next question please.
as "prison staff" instead of just "prison". So let me answer your point again:
Still nothing. Private prisons are profit centers driven by graft and corruption, mostly by Dick Cheney (seriously, look it up, he's heavily invested in them and a substantial amount of his fortune is derived from them). The costs are just passed onto the tax payer. Worse, the entire _point_ of the system _is_ the costs. It's all there to raise more money for everyone dipping their beaks in. Want to raise the fees? Go right ahead. We'll raise taxes higher and borrow as much money needed to be 'tough on crime'. Meanwhile the people you're 'punishing' will be laughing all the way to the bank while they pocket the money from the fees one way or another. Either by investing in private prisons or the phone companies that service them or both.
They're employees. They get paid to work there. Business expenses don't come out of their pay. Their pay is the lowest amount the owners can pay and still get employees. You think private prisons are mom and pop shops or something?
It's the first time in a long time I've heard us doing something that has a net positive outcome for prisoners. Americans just love to hurt and punish people that aren't their own, especially the lower castes. This sort of thing used to be politically unthinkable. I know Obama is done, but this sort of thing would normally sink the next Democrat's election campaign. Everyone's terrified of suffering the same fate as Dukakis. E.g. losing to someone who had no business winning because you were 'soft on crime'...
Prison staff would just use their cell phone or (worst case) wait till their shift is over since, well, it's not like they're prisoners or anything. You're also assuming the wage slaves working for $15/hr at a prison have any pull, which is just silly.
This is why I hate 'simple' solutions. The sound good but are almost always unworkable. Yours was a little easier to point out the problems with, try doing the same with something like Supply Side Economics...
It's totally sensible policy. Higher recidivism means higher profits for private prisons and the industry around them. You gotta keep those non-violent offenders coming back. You can't make good money off just the violent psychos, too expensive to house and you'll never get your fees out of 'em since they're crazy.
it was texture deformation:P. Seriously though, there are glide emulators out that that'll run Tomb Raider 1 in hardware accel mode. Sadly the Gog doesn't use the best of the bunch (nGlide) so if you want that you'll have to hack it in yourself.
there's an entire generation of gamers who haven't played these games. They've got a ton of design work already done and there's a hardcore fan base that'll generate buzz (good or bad, it's still buzz). This is what happens when modern games get too expensive to make. Pixel Shaders are a bitch to program and that's how you do HD and not have it look awful.
I did get a chuckle out of EA's boss calling out Ubisoft for all their HD remakes though. EA, the company that cranked out the same damn Madden/Fifa/NBA Live game every year since 2009. Companies live and die on either their back catalog or strong licenses that keeps 'em going (remember THQ?). Capcom and Sega have managed to get by, but Konami? Their weak back catalog has sadly doomed them to a live time of Pachinko machines & mobile...
the large amount of diesel gas stored on site in a populated area? Not sure if that's actually a problem or not, since I don't know what they mean by 'large'. There's plenty of safe ways to store it (we have gas stations after all) but they're expensive and I'd worry about corner cutting. Then again I"m a yank and here in the states those kind of corners get cut all the time due to poor gov't oversight & lack of funding for the regulators.
It was lack of oversight and funding combined with old tech and a profound lack of understanding of the risks due to a still very new technology.
The exact same can be said about any large organization. The difference is that at least with gov't you take a good chunk of the profit motive out. Traditionally Gov't jobs don't pay well but are safe. You get good benefits and retirement. There are folks that want to change that so they can undermine the good gov't does. Google the phrase "Starve the Beast" and maybe even "Southern Strategy".
The way I see gov't, especially central gov't is this: It's a tool. A dangerous tool. But what other tool has the raw power to stand up to a mega corp?
" or we'll cut funding to the safety controls in the name of 'cutting waste and pork' until there's an accident". Google the phrase "Starve the Beast" will ya?
Nuclear hits everybody, rich or poor. If you're even upper middle class you can easily avoid coal death by living in the suburbs.
The trouble I have with nukes is that everyone in the world believes in the myth of gov't inefficiency. That means sooner or later a perfectly safe gov't run nuclear plant will either get turned over to a businessman who'll cut safety until there's an accident or we'll cut funding to the safety controls in the name of 'cutting waste and pork' until there's an accident. With coal when this happens a bunch of workers I don't know die. With nukes when it happens I get cancer. Yeah, I'd like to live in a world where those workers don't die and I don't get cancer, but I don't:(...
It's hospital. I'd like to think that some testing, training and thought goes into new processing and equipment. Some of that... oh what's it called... Scientific method?
If you want to go guzzle snake oil in libertarian paradise go right ahead. I've got some lovely homeopathy that'll cure what ails you. Just $199.99 a dose.
Slashdot Mirror
or Canada. Or Anywhere else with single payer. Seriously, are you just trolling or do you actually believe that?
Single payer. Book it done.
what I see are cycles of poverty reinforced by decisions that aren't made by the children. They don't choose for their moms to drink a little while they're pregnant, or not eat enough or see the doctor enough because of poverty (the Republicans have been chipping away at WIC for ages). They don't pick their underfunded schools with their 49 student class sizes full of special ed kids that disrupt the class every 5 minutes (if they try to go to the nice districts their parents get in trouble, a woman went to jail for it, google it). They don't choose to come from broken homes with no father because he had no job because it was shipped off to Mexico when free trade kicked in. They pick none of that
Put another way, why is it that after 250 years of bad discussions being made before their born that when a kid turns 18 their suppose to magically ignore all that, reach for their boot straps and solve all their problems? As a teacher you must know it's physically to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, right?
I'm serious. There is such a thing as being right, you know? Yes, people are out to get you, but you can't let that get in the way of using the tools that are available to you. What's the old saying: The greatest trick the devil ever played was convincing you he didn't exist. Well the greatest trick the Right Wing every played was convincing you to abandon gov't out of fear. They right wing haven't abandoned gov't. They use it to their advantage. Here's another way to think of it. Imagine there's an open crate of fully loaded automatic rifles. There's a couple guys running around shooting people. Do you look at the rifles and say "I'm not gonna pick that up, I might shoot my eye out!". That's gov't. A powerful, dangerous tool. But a tool that's going to get used whether you like it or not.
As for the dems aren't even close to the level of the Republicans, though plenty have tried. But I'll take what I can get. Bernie Sanders is a good start.
if you can afford a PC. Lots of families can't. They've gotten so cheap we forgot that there are real poor in this country for whom $200 might as well be $200,000. 62% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck.
On another note, you're unusually bright (assuming you learned on your own). Either that or you just happen to have access to some really, really good magazines. Or both. Either way what do you do if you hit a wall for whatever reason and there isn't a Magazine there for you? If you have a mentor you'll get past it, but odds are if you're one of those dirt poor kids you don't have that.
I guess there's always your bootstraps. It's telling that the metaphor we use for self reliance is physically impossible. Could it be that almost nobody really makes it on their own? For all it makes us uncomfortable maybe, just maybe, there is something to the phrase "You didn't build it".
The stores are filthy, under stocked and the wait in line is twice as long (though Target is catching up in that last one :( ).
to know CS on the standardized tests. In the wealthier districts this'll be no big deal. The parents will buy their kids laptops to do their homework and hire tutors to get them through the tough spots. In the working class neighborhoods they'll be a few years while they kids have enough computers and then they'll start to break down. After that the grants that the companies gave in exchange for us paying to train their employees will have run out and those kids will be screwed. This is how it works. Don't like it? Tough. That's American Politics.
Now, if you know how to get the blue collar types to stop giving a rat's ass about social issues, stop blaming Unions for their troubles and get them voting for popularist economic policies that are in their best interest again please let me know. The way all this stuff (public schools, social welfare, safety nets, minimum wage, the Civil Rights movement) got through was these folks were organized through their churches. The right wing noticed that and formed an alliance between the social conservatives and the corporate right. Southern Strategy, Starve the Beast, etc. It's been downhill since then.
That was going to be their model. Thing is, Amazon has been building up same day service for the last 5 years. They're working on Autonomous vehicles too. Meanwhile Walmart has grocery delivery, even for 'free' at my company, but they charge a premium for all the items you buy and you don't get to pick your produce so the value isn't really there.
It's looking more and more like online will kill brick and mortar. What I'm wondering is what's going to happen to all those property owners when it does. They guys Walmart & co lease their buildings from are billionaires after all. They make their living renting out the space. All that property is set to become worthless in 20 years. 30 tops. I can't see those guys going quietly into the good night. I'm actually a bit scared. They've got crazy money and power, and their backs will be at the wall. I could see some pretty awful things coming out of that, sort of like how the health insurance biz spends a few billion dollars every time the specter of single payer comes up and we end up with a compromise that is somehow worse...
Communism doesn't work. It involves a large scale transfer of ownership of the means of production to the working class, and it's been shown that in the battle between the military and ruling class that ensues when you try to do that it all falls apart.
This folks is why I'm a Democratic Socialist. You can live however the heck you want so long as you're not causing pain and suffering to others. Trouble is the 1% will _always_ cause pain and suffering, because as you and I are diminished they are raised. It really is a Zero sum game, but for social status and political power rather than raw economics.
Nice talking points you got there though. Did you get 'em from Rush Limbaugh? You know he just got 'em from Karl Rove right?
China and the Soviet Union are not, were not and never were Communist. They were fascist dictatorships that happen to borrow rhetoric from popularists like Karl Marx. Jeez, it's 2015. Do we still believe in McCarthyism? Maybe if it weighed the same as a duck...
30 years of outsourcing and declining wages is stressing us out. A race to the bottom where everybody takes a piece of you on the way down is stressing us out. Having to pick a breakfast cereal? Not so much. This doesn't even qualify as a "first world problem". Next question please.
as "prison staff" instead of just "prison". So let me answer your point again:
Still nothing. Private prisons are profit centers driven by graft and corruption, mostly by Dick Cheney (seriously, look it up, he's heavily invested in them and a substantial amount of his fortune is derived from them). The costs are just passed onto the tax payer. Worse, the entire _point_ of the system _is_ the costs. It's all there to raise more money for everyone dipping their beaks in. Want to raise the fees? Go right ahead. We'll raise taxes higher and borrow as much money needed to be 'tough on crime'. Meanwhile the people you're 'punishing' will be laughing all the way to the bank while they pocket the money from the fees one way or another. Either by investing in private prisons or the phone companies that service them or both.
They're employees. They get paid to work there. Business expenses don't come out of their pay. Their pay is the lowest amount the owners can pay and still get employees. You think private prisons are mom and pop shops or something?
It's the first time in a long time I've heard us doing something that has a net positive outcome for prisoners. Americans just love to hurt and punish people that aren't their own, especially the lower castes. This sort of thing used to be politically unthinkable. I know Obama is done, but this sort of thing would normally sink the next Democrat's election campaign. Everyone's terrified of suffering the same fate as Dukakis. E.g. losing to someone who had no business winning because you were 'soft on crime'...
Prison staff would just use their cell phone or (worst case) wait till their shift is over since, well, it's not like they're prisoners or anything. You're also assuming the wage slaves working for $15/hr at a prison have any pull, which is just silly.
This is why I hate 'simple' solutions. The sound good but are almost always unworkable. Yours was a little easier to point out the problems with, try doing the same with something like Supply Side Economics...
It's totally sensible policy. Higher recidivism means higher profits for private prisons and the industry around them. You gotta keep those non-violent offenders coming back. You can't make good money off just the violent psychos, too expensive to house and you'll never get your fees out of 'em since they're crazy.
it was texture deformation :P. Seriously though, there are glide emulators out that that'll run Tomb Raider 1 in hardware accel mode. Sadly the Gog doesn't use the best of the bunch (nGlide) so if you want that you'll have to hack it in yourself.
there's an entire generation of gamers who haven't played these games. They've got a ton of design work already done and there's a hardcore fan base that'll generate buzz (good or bad, it's still buzz). This is what happens when modern games get too expensive to make. Pixel Shaders are a bitch to program and that's how you do HD and not have it look awful.
I did get a chuckle out of EA's boss calling out Ubisoft for all their HD remakes though. EA, the company that cranked out the same damn Madden/Fifa/NBA Live game every year since 2009. Companies live and die on either their back catalog or strong licenses that keeps 'em going (remember THQ?). Capcom and Sega have managed to get by, but Konami? Their weak back catalog has sadly doomed them to a live time of Pachinko machines & mobile...
for privately owned cars. So around here we get in the habit of calling any liquid fuel 'gas'.
the large amount of diesel gas stored on site in a populated area? Not sure if that's actually a problem or not, since I don't know what they mean by 'large'. There's plenty of safe ways to store it (we have gas stations after all) but they're expensive and I'd worry about corner cutting. Then again I"m a yank and here in the states those kind of corners get cut all the time due to poor gov't oversight & lack of funding for the regulators.
and I've also considered the well documented negative psychological effects. I've also considered why Japan has the highest first world suicide rate.
It was lack of oversight and funding combined with old tech and a profound lack of understanding of the risks due to a still very new technology.
The exact same can be said about any large organization. The difference is that at least with gov't you take a good chunk of the profit motive out. Traditionally Gov't jobs don't pay well but are safe. You get good benefits and retirement. There are folks that want to change that so they can undermine the good gov't does. Google the phrase "Starve the Beast" and maybe even "Southern Strategy".
The way I see gov't, especially central gov't is this: It's a tool. A dangerous tool. But what other tool has the raw power to stand up to a mega corp?
" or we'll cut funding to the safety controls in the name of 'cutting waste and pork' until there's an accident". Google the phrase "Starve the Beast" will ya?
Nuclear hits everybody, rich or poor. If you're even upper middle class you can easily avoid coal death by living in the suburbs.
:(...
The trouble I have with nukes is that everyone in the world believes in the myth of gov't inefficiency. That means sooner or later a perfectly safe gov't run nuclear plant will either get turned over to a businessman who'll cut safety until there's an accident or we'll cut funding to the safety controls in the name of 'cutting waste and pork' until there's an accident. With coal when this happens a bunch of workers I don't know die. With nukes when it happens I get cancer. Yeah, I'd like to live in a world where those workers don't die and I don't get cancer, but I don't
It's hospital. I'd like to think that some testing, training and thought goes into new processing and equipment. Some of that... oh what's it called... Scientific method?
If you want to go guzzle snake oil in libertarian paradise go right ahead. I've got some lovely homeopathy that'll cure what ails you. Just $199.99 a dose.