and the political pressure would quickly build to switch this country over to government-backed health plans like every other developed country on this planet.
Clinton wanted do that... nationalize the health-care system. He failed, and that's a damned good thing when you get right down to it. Not because I think our present system is worth it: I just don't believe that replacing one set of humanoid leeches with another, even bigger set of the same creatures is wise.
There's a major problem with nationwide government programs in the United States: our bureaucracy cannot be trusted. Neither can the people making the rules the bureaucrats enforce. Hell, those bloodsuckers can't even keep their sticky fingers out of Medicare funding: do you really think they'd do any better if we went all the way and nationalized everything? Face it, the odds of the United States Federal Government doing anything but completely botching the job are remote at best. Worse yet, whatever plan they did come up with might be "fair" (or at least fairer than what we have now) but you can bet your bottom dollar that our rapidly de-industrializing nation won't be able to afford the waste and fraud. Don't believe me? Just Google "medicare fraud". It's utterly appalling, and getting worse by the minute.
It is also not reasonable to say, "like every other developed country on this planet" as if we should be able to implement a national health-care system without a hitch. Many of those nations (take Germany for example) have far more efficient and trustworthy bureaucracies than America has had for a long, long time. Some years ago I spent endless hours dealing with Medicare and Social Security for a family member, and it was a bloody nightmare. Seriously, they drag things out in the hope that you'll die before they have to give you any benefits. Those assholes are the very last people I'd want running my health care, but you just know that Congress would consider them the "logical" choice because of their "vast experience" in running such programs.
Forget it. Turning to the Feds for a quick solution to a systemic problem is pointless. We need to fix Congress and corporate America first, in that order. Once we've done that, health care may take care of itself.
Most of the nerds on this site have, at best, only a vague idea of what quantum mechanics actually is. Me, for example. So in order to appear productive we resort to stupid jokes, hoping to keep the ball rolling long enough for an informed individual to get fed up and provide some real entertainment.
Actually, no... The Pirate Bay is breaking no laws it its country of origin, so that's really a bad example. Granted, they've moved their servers elsewhere and replicated them because they don't trust their lawmakers to have a backbone. Still, the fact that The Pirate Bay torques off the self-appointed copyright cops in the USA or anywhere else is irrelevant to any discussion on copyright. Furthermore, I've yet to read a single Slashdot comment seriously advocating the abolition of copyright, but what we do want to see is some balance returned to the system. Your lobbyist friends have caused some serious harm to United States copyright law by their illicit activities. Given the quantity of bad law resulting from their efforts (hell, it was shown that MPAA lawyers drafted the DMCA!) you can't excuse what they've been doing as being either within the spirit or the letter of the Constitution. It's abusive, amoral and wrong.
Furthermore, there are a lot of ways to look at lobbying. Petitioning for redress of grievances was never intended to apply to corporate entities, since at the time the Constitution was written corporations didn't have the rights of individuals. At least, that's my understanding, presumably someone with a legal background will correct me. Regardless, you can make your case that no lobbying should be considered "illegal", but the reality is that something has to be done because lobbying (illegal or otherwise) has resulted in serious imbalance between the rights of individuals vs. the rights of corporations in this country. Do you really believe that your Congressman will listen to your personal feelings on any issue? Of course not: the best they'll do is get a feeling for what their constituents want, and if that doesn't conflict with what their corporate sponsors want, you might get a good law.
My belief is that lobbying should be illegal, period. You want to write your Congressman and convince him of the merits of your position? Great, go for it. You want to wine him, and dine him, and give him free hookers and expensive vacations? Want to write him checks? Sorry... that crosses the line between "redress of grievances" to "undue influence" and "corruption" and that is illegal.
Then perhaps we need to provide more visas for good programmers.
More short term thinking, which unfortunately is proving to be very popular nowadays (to our detriment.) What we need to do is train more people from our own population. You know... like every other country does, at least the ones that need programmers. Having a temporary shortage of trained talent is not unusual in any field, but simply opening the floodgates to foreign workers is not a good solution. It sure as hell didn't work for medicine, and it sure as hell isn't working for software. Look, if there's a demand, the supply will take care of itself. That's the way it has always been. However, that takes time, time that American corporations (many of which are no longer run by or for Americans) is unwilling to invest. Nor are they willing to pay competitive wages to domestic professionals. So, not only are they sell-outs, but they're cheapass sell-outs as well.
There's a reason that nations (all of them) have limits placed upon immigration. It's because those governments are pledged to put their own people first. Ours has forgotten that.
Well, actually that enthusiastic modding-up was mostly +n Funny, which indicates that the mods have more of a sense of humor than the rest of you over-analytical types. More to the point, however, Congress is making deals with a known corrupt organization (there, is that better?)... but then again Congress itself has, since Colonial times, also been a known corrupt organization. Had it not been for the malfeasance of various members of Congress over the past century, copyright and patent law wouldn't be in their current state of disarray, and SoundExchange, in its current form, would never have been suffered to exist.
Who says it is? If that is true, maybe the flood of H1B visas isn't having the positive effect that proponents insisted that it would. Gee, maybe we should stop the ongoing decimation of our domestic workforce by corrupt trade practices. That would be a start.
More to the point, why should software developers be any different than, say, car mechanics, doctors, scientists, lawyers, musicians or anyone else? Being truly competent (much less exceptional) in any complex field is a fortuitous combination of training, experience and talent. Time and money provide the first two, and can produce at best a merely competent worker. Being the very best requires actual talent, but talent is a rarity in any area of human endeavor. That's why the top people in any sophisticated profession command top dollar.
Maybe he meant "distribution" not "storage". Storage of electric power is nowhere near as efficient as storage of chemical energy, i.e. batteries are nowhere near as energy-dense as a tank of gasoline. Not that the power grids of most industrialized nations could withstand the introduction of fifty or sixty million electric vehicles anyway.
The ACLU does do some good, but this is one issue upon which I believe they are full of little red ants. Now, I think we can agree that criminals should be given the same rights to a fair trial as any other citizen. That's why we have a Justice System. On the other hand, if you break into my house when I'm around odds are you'll be in need of medical care by the time I'm finished with you. And if you threaten anyone important to me, I can pretty much assure you that you'll be in much greater need of an undertaker than a defense attorney.
Depends. Those cave men would be unlikely to have the slightest idea of what was going to happen to them. The same could be true of us. People are often fairly unintelligent individually, and collectively we can become complete morons.
No kidding. Most real deals are made on the golf course, not in the boardroom, thereby keeping anything that's not quite aboveboard completely off the record. Too bad the Feds don't make CEOs keep minutes of their golf meetings.
They have improved models that are capable of simply tuning a man out and continuing on with whatever household chores need to be done. You might want to look into an upgrade.
Don't get cocky, world. You're not far behind. If you think the lethal mix of corporate influence and institutionalized corruption doesn't exist in your country, you're sadly mistaken.
Slashdot Mirror
and the political pressure would quickly build to switch this country over to government-backed health plans like every other developed country on this planet.
... nationalize the health-care system. He failed, and that's a damned good thing when you get right down to it. Not because I think our present system is worth it: I just don't believe that replacing one set of humanoid leeches with another, even bigger set of the same creatures is wise.
Clinton wanted do that
There's a major problem with nationwide government programs in the United States: our bureaucracy cannot be trusted. Neither can the people making the rules the bureaucrats enforce. Hell, those bloodsuckers can't even keep their sticky fingers out of Medicare funding: do you really think they'd do any better if we went all the way and nationalized everything? Face it, the odds of the United States Federal Government doing anything but completely botching the job are remote at best. Worse yet, whatever plan they did come up with might be "fair" (or at least fairer than what we have now) but you can bet your bottom dollar that our rapidly de-industrializing nation won't be able to afford the waste and fraud. Don't believe me? Just Google "medicare fraud". It's utterly appalling, and getting worse by the minute.
It is also not reasonable to say, "like every other developed country on this planet" as if we should be able to implement a national health-care system without a hitch. Many of those nations (take Germany for example) have far more efficient and trustworthy bureaucracies than America has had for a long, long time. Some years ago I spent endless hours dealing with Medicare and Social Security for a family member, and it was a bloody nightmare. Seriously, they drag things out in the hope that you'll die before they have to give you any benefits. Those assholes are the very last people I'd want running my health care, but you just know that Congress would consider them the "logical" choice because of their "vast experience" in running such programs.
Forget it. Turning to the Feds for a quick solution to a systemic problem is pointless. We need to fix Congress and corporate America first, in that order. Once we've done that, health care may take care of itself.
Most of the nerds on this site have, at best, only a vague idea of what quantum mechanics actually is. Me, for example. So in order to appear productive we resort to stupid jokes, hoping to keep the ball rolling long enough for an informed individual to get fed up and provide some real entertainment.
Actually, no ... The Pirate Bay is breaking no laws it its country of origin, so that's really a bad example. Granted, they've moved their servers elsewhere and replicated them because they don't trust their lawmakers to have a backbone. Still, the fact that The Pirate Bay torques off the self-appointed copyright cops in the USA or anywhere else is irrelevant to any discussion on copyright. Furthermore, I've yet to read a single Slashdot comment seriously advocating the abolition of copyright, but what we do want to see is some balance returned to the system. Your lobbyist friends have caused some serious harm to United States copyright law by their illicit activities. Given the quantity of bad law resulting from their efforts (hell, it was shown that MPAA lawyers drafted the DMCA!) you can't excuse what they've been doing as being either within the spirit or the letter of the Constitution. It's abusive, amoral and wrong.
... that crosses the line between "redress of grievances" to "undue influence" and "corruption" and that is illegal.
Furthermore, there are a lot of ways to look at lobbying. Petitioning for redress of grievances was never intended to apply to corporate entities, since at the time the Constitution was written corporations didn't have the rights of individuals. At least, that's my understanding, presumably someone with a legal background will correct me. Regardless, you can make your case that no lobbying should be considered "illegal", but the reality is that something has to be done because lobbying (illegal or otherwise) has resulted in serious imbalance between the rights of individuals vs. the rights of corporations in this country. Do you really believe that your Congressman will listen to your personal feelings on any issue? Of course not: the best they'll do is get a feeling for what their constituents want, and if that doesn't conflict with what their corporate sponsors want, you might get a good law.
My belief is that lobbying should be illegal, period. You want to write your Congressman and convince him of the merits of your position? Great, go for it. You want to wine him, and dine him, and give him free hookers and expensive vacations? Want to write him checks? Sorry
Then perhaps we need to provide more visas for good programmers.
... like every other country does, at least the ones that need programmers. Having a temporary shortage of trained talent is not unusual in any field, but simply opening the floodgates to foreign workers is not a good solution. It sure as hell didn't work for medicine, and it sure as hell isn't working for software. Look, if there's a demand, the supply will take care of itself. That's the way it has always been. However, that takes time, time that American corporations (many of which are no longer run by or for Americans) is unwilling to invest. Nor are they willing to pay competitive wages to domestic professionals. So, not only are they sell-outs, but they're cheapass sell-outs as well.
More short term thinking, which unfortunately is proving to be very popular nowadays (to our detriment.) What we need to do is train more people from our own population. You know
There's a reason that nations (all of them) have limits placed upon immigration. It's because those governments are pledged to put their own people first. Ours has forgotten that.
Well, actually that enthusiastic modding-up was mostly +n Funny, which indicates that the mods have more of a sense of humor than the rest of you over-analytical types. More to the point, however, Congress is making deals with a known corrupt organization (there, is that better?) ... but then again Congress itself has, since Colonial times, also been a known corrupt organization. Had it not been for the malfeasance of various members of Congress over the past century, copyright and patent law wouldn't be in their current state of disarray, and SoundExchange, in its current form, would never have been suffered to exist.
Why is it so hard to find good programmers?
Who says it is? If that is true, maybe the flood of H1B visas isn't having the positive effect that proponents insisted that it would. Gee, maybe we should stop the ongoing decimation of our domestic workforce by corrupt trade practices. That would be a start.
More to the point, why should software developers be any different than, say, car mechanics, doctors, scientists, lawyers, musicians or anyone else? Being truly competent (much less exceptional) in any complex field is a fortuitous combination of training, experience and talent. Time and money provide the first two, and can produce at best a merely competent worker. Being the very best requires actual talent, but talent is a rarity in any area of human endeavor. That's why the top people in any sophisticated profession command top dollar.
Or used to, at any rate.
Wired also points out that this is the same organization illegally lobbying for terrestrial radio royalties through 'third party' shell groups.
Huh. Congress making deals with a known criminal organization. Who would have even thought that was possible?
No, sometimes it resembles nothing so much as Warm Piss.
Yeah ... The Great Time Machine Hoax. I read that a long, long time ago and for some unaccountable reason that line stuck in my head.
I was referring to RIAA/MPAA and Homeland Security types wanting to put people in a real jail.
Yeah ... you might end up with a Crack in the World.
Maybe he meant "distribution" not "storage". Storage of electric power is nowhere near as efficient as storage of chemical energy, i.e. batteries are nowhere near as energy-dense as a tank of gasoline. Not that the power grids of most industrialized nations could withstand the introduction of fifty or sixty million electric vehicles anyway.
Hey!
I'm left-handed you insensitive clod!
The ACLU does do some good, but this is one issue upon which I believe they are full of little red ants. Now, I think we can agree that criminals should be given the same rights to a fair trial as any other citizen. That's why we have a Justice System. On the other hand, if you break into my house when I'm around odds are you'll be in need of medical care by the time I'm finished with you. And if you threaten anyone important to me, I can pretty much assure you that you'll be in much greater need of an undertaker than a defense attorney.
Depends. Those cave men would be unlikely to have the slightest idea of what was going to happen to them. The same could be true of us. People are often fairly unintelligent individually, and collectively we can become complete morons.
No kidding. Most real deals are made on the golf course, not in the boardroom, thereby keeping anything that's not quite aboveboard completely off the record. Too bad the Feds don't make CEOs keep minutes of their golf meetings.
Come Monday, no more Indiana University searches will be powered by computer-driven Google. Only by people-powered ChaCha.
If they took a page (ahem!) out of Google's book and used pigeons instead.
Everything you send offsite should be encrypted, and anyone accessing your computer should be jailed somehow.
The problem is, a lot of the people trying to access your computer nowadays want to put you in jail somehow.
When Bowdoin switched over to Exchange e-mail ...
... I'm sorry.
Oh
Privacy is a policy issue, not a technological one.
Actually it's both. And the means to preserve privacy often involve both.
They have improved models that are capable of simply tuning a man out and continuing on with whatever household chores need to be done. You might want to look into an upgrade.
You mean you're going to invade us next?
OOOOhhh, I am sooooo scared!!!
Uninformed Remark #0002.
Next!
You're right, come to think of it the US has actually stopped enforcing it's borders, so by default the rest of the world is in the US' domain.
Uninformed Remark #0001.
The question that should be on all our minds whether Slashdot qualifies as one of those.
Don't get cocky, world. You're not far behind. If you think the lethal mix of corporate influence and institutionalized corruption doesn't exist in your country, you're sadly mistaken.