.....depends on ahhnold and whether or not they can get the law changed to run a foreign born person. He looks like their current poster boy for the future more than anyone else, IMO.
Basically, both major parties have a dearth of any inspiring or credible candidates. All I see are yawners and media puppets. Thinkers are not wanted in those parties.
Guiliani scares me the most, I got an instant dislike to him way back when he was prosecutor. Serious poser, media whore and law n order loony. I also think he knows what's up with some of the finer details of 9-11 and is part of the coverup going down. Untrustworthy in other words. Also, he knows absolutely *nothing* about the nation or it's people outside of an extremely specialised niche of NYC, which although important, is not even close to being repesentative of the rest of the nation. He thinks (*like the NYC based network newsies mostly) that if you have barbed wire on your property it means you live at a "compound", that's the impression I get. Mr. Artificial Priveleged Living, out to lunch.
Hillary scares me the most next down the list, because she knows what's up, but still pushes some incredibly wacky themes, and is highly non-constitutional in many matters and has no concept of what nationalism is or what borders are for. She also has anecdotal street cred of being an insufferable neo royal wannabe, an elitists elitist.
I also think she's a serial crook, her past biz deals show that, even though she managed to skate on some of the allegations.
And Ron Brown and Vince Foster are still realities....She just might be a scosh worse than just a serial thief....
We already collect a ton of statistics on every aspect of business. We tie the M-whatever number supply of new dollars that are allowed to be created and added to the pool every year based on the top 100 traded commodities (and or services, whatever, to be exactly determined) of the past year, the true evolving business of the nation. This or that can fall off the list or be added to it. That solves the buggywhip problem, and how to fund government, because that's the first place the new dollars are introduced. It solves the hyper-inflation problem worries as no amount over that can be printed up or digitized, which would force fiscal responsibility back to government, a pay as you go plan. It would reflect actual produced wealth (money being historical portable barterable produced wealth), as opposed to what we have now which is future and ever compounding indebtedness, run through the loan sharks at the fed and below.
Government could still borrow money, but it would have to be *real* money if it absolutely had to (you would think not though, at that stage of the game), not IOUs for money and call it money like we do now.
The cash could get into circulation exactly how it does now, but again, eliminate the private for profit middle man skimming that goes on.
Remember, we already have a lot of dollars in circulation at this point, none of that is gone. for the new stuff every year, government employees get their checks,and it's spread out excactly like it is now so it's not all dumped at once on the market, they go out into the world and spend that money. Contractors and other providers of day to day to day goods and services to government, again, get their checks and it gets dispersed in their orgs, etc, back out into the economy just as it is now, again, gradually through the new year. Loans could be made directly through various governmental run not for profit services,just like we do now for what society has determined is a good idea, from normal student loans and small business loans to one to a person only home mortgages and so forth, and they are kept structured to always have the lowest possible interest rates, as higher interests are obviously stifling, and too low is counter productive and leads to stagnation and a lessening of worth with the real tangibles and it wouldn't relect the agreed upon new float of additional cash yearly. Private banks would be restricted to only loaning that which they *really* have, fractional reserve would be eliminated. No other industry can do it, private money lenders shouldn't be allowed to do it. It's a sanctioned form of..well, it's counterfeiting, using digits, it's just wrong. That would help to regulate what now passes for "prime", because that number on the governmental side it would be automatically set by what the years M-number would be determined to be. Private business is just that, let the market deal with it.
Tax code eliminated almost entirely because no laws would be necessary at the federal"income" level, private or corporate, because they get the money first to spend on the nations business. You keep your loot, invest or spend as you see fit.*
You can still have excise taxes,example, say at the border (I suggest reciprocal quid pro quo with any trading nation, let them set the rate, it's in their interest then to keep it low), useage taxes for direct infrastucture,(like our road tax with fuel for highway maintenance) and so on.
*I admit the first year transition period would be difficult with such a change. I propose a guaranteed, one-off, one time cash payout to individuals of their last years total taxes at the federal level (a returnto make the transition a little sweeter for everyone, and an indiucement for that last year to come clean on reporting to get a final true representation of what is really going on) and debt reduction/elimination,a one time, then it's over with payout to bond holders then no more bonds sold. It's a form of borrowing t
thanks. Dang if I can ever keep it straight. You'd think after thousands of books and tens of millions of words over my life so far I'd remember. Sigh, mental blockage. Gets worse as you get older too, words I know I used to be able to spell now leave me puzzled. Sucks. Anyway, wish we had a possessive that had no exceptions. If the noun owns it, it gets an apostrophe you would think, there's no logical reason for exceptions other than historical inertia.
yes, the fed does certainly "cash in" on it, I propose to cut them out of the deal because they aren't needed. We can use the same monetary units (nice "money" history lesson but I had that down like decades ago, thanks anyway), just eliminate the skim on the vig. They don't deserve it. They especially don't deserve it with "interest". it's beyond ludicrous.
that's point 1
point 2 We eliminate the tax law, because we don't need the "muscle" any longer because the money is no longer a tangible. The government, the US treasury, doesn't need to contract to the fed to "make money". They can do it themselves, or better "we" can do it ourselves. Government doesn't need to pay it's own employees than take away some of it, it's an absurd series of busywork shuffles. We don't need to make it even more absurd by forcing people to pay part of their money when the same exact governmental functions can be paid with the same exact governmental dollars directly, after they are created in the US treasury, without having to "borrow".
And yes, we'd still have to watch out for evil inflation, that's another subject, but it's addressable, I think I have a much better solution.
There are a few differing ways to get it into circulation, but frankly I am hurting typing now have to let it slide, I wrote another long rant, it's up above this one. Pity slashcode won't let us flag various people to posts, I would much rather have done one or two on this thread.
...that you posted has anything whatsoever to do with my original or subsequent posts. I maintain the sytem is as outlined, I am NOT disputing that.. I have a proposal, I keep getting back basic replies that are 7th grade civics lessons that I already got before most people here were born. What is the problem here? You honestly think I am not aware of how the sytem works??? I DARE you to actually quote me where I dispute any of the current reality in how our economic system and monetary system work NOW.
here you go, hope this works:
I FULLY ADMIT THAT THAT IS HOW IT WORKS NOW. NOW. YES YES YES. YOU ARE CORRECT.
IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH WHAT I WROTE, I OFFER A PROPOSED CHANGE. GET IT NOW?
Can we MOVE ON A LITTLE?
EGADS! I am sorry for yelling, but this is tarting to be a waste of time for me. I have yet to see anyone actually address what I wrote.
I will keep trying until I get tired of this. I honestly don'tknow how many different ways I can werite the same thing, but here goes.
I am proposing a significant CHANGE. That's it, it's really that simple. I am not arguing with anyone on how things are now, I am wondering out loud if a significant change would be cool, that's it. I outlined how to do it. Everything involved is non-hard. it involves eliminating unnecessary overhead and expense, for the same exact deal we have now, just cheaper and better and a lot more freedom for you and me and thee and thou. It's a simple concept, it isn't even that radical, just a more efficient way of doing what we are already doing, and it consists of eliminating the middleman and eliminating a few really glaring busywork paperwork obstacles that have been codigied into law, stuff that is no longer necessary because of the nature of the way of how we create money and get it into circulation. That's it in a nutshell. I tried, I really cannot make it any simpler than that, and I profusely apologize if anyone has taken personal affront, but GEEZ LOWEEZ this is like pulling teeth here.
It is how it is now, I propose something different, and I gave a quick overview of the why and how. Quick, but it's there. Can you SEE the difference now? Do these words have meanings?
again
I am PROPOSING an alternative, in a very short and general outline, by eliminating both the federal reserve and the income tax, BECAUSE OF THE FACT THAT I DON'T DISPUTE that the MONEY is artificially created. The AMOUNT in circulation should obviously be kept in some sort of balance with actual production and the level the US is at business wise (we already do this to a certain extent, I propose it could be better) and with legitimate government needs. I have thoughts on that as well but it is another tangential topic and this simple one is already apparently too hard to discuss.
again
My point is we can do this economy/government/pay for stuff without filtering it through the federal reserve, and without the redundancy of taxes and extensively convulted and harmful tax law at the federal level as regards "income".
Now if you or anyone can actually address what I am actually saying and proposing rather than completely ignoring it and introducing data that no one, least of all me, has disputed in any manner, it would be a *good thing*,I welcome it, rather than pasting or writing in economics I learned back in the 1950s about how our economic system works. PLEASE get beyond rehashing what "inflation" is and very trivial known to everyone here points. Address the actual words I used in my post, not what you think I said.
I'll make it even simpler, again, one of these will make the point eventually:
We get our money from created digits, that are either loaned/ borrowed into circulation via governmental paper sales or through loans through banks. Most of it is digitized, some of it is printed with printing presses. All of it is artificially created.
We have to start with that, or the discussion will
...how the system works currently. Umm, that isn't what I asked, I am fully aware of how the system works currently. this is why I propose an alternative, it's the entire point of my post. I asked you to prove, and I bolded it for emphasis, there was money before the fed created it out of thin air. From your post:
"They have to get the money from the Federal Reserve Bank."
You have stated this. I agree. Where did THAT money come from is the question now.
So see, you agree with me, we the people, our government, "gets our money from the federal reserve. I maintain this money is poof created and we could elilinate the fed and do it strictly with our treasury. I say the FEd as a middle man skimmer and gross loan shark is unethical, immoral, illegal, uneconomic, and general bad news, and that the tax system that goes along with it is completely nuts, horribly broken, makes no sense, is used to place restrictions on people more than anything else, and is not needed if you use ersatz fiat money, which we DO in this nation, I am not disputing that either.
My question I will keep repeating is, "where do THEY get it?"
I maintain it's poof created out of thin air, and that leads to skimming, redundancy and a governmental forced tax structure that is more command and control than for day to day function of government. I say we can do the same government without the fed. I say we can do it without income taxes, because all the money is poof created out of thin air.
Here's a hint, I've been ready with some direct pastes directly from the federal reserve itself on how money is created. With that in mind, I ask you again, directly, with no ambiguity, prove that the "money" existed before the federal reserve poof created it out of thin air.
Here's your quote again for a reminder:
"They have to get the money from the Federal Reserve Bank." Are you going to assert that a private bank miraculously has so much money in it's vaults that it can FUND the entire government, WITHOUT resorting to creating it out of thin air? This is binary, yes they do, no they don't. I maintain that "no they don't" that they create it out of nothing, profit from it immensely, trade what they create out of thin air for future promises of yours and mines labor in the form of bonds and various other government paper, and/or they use the fractional reserve banking system to loan debt into existence. I maintain it's loan sharking on a massive scale.
Now, your postion is that all this money pre exists,they got it, they don't need to create it from nothing, that it's in some big vault and has been there for a long time, and they "loan it to us". Proof, let's see it. I want to see some audit documentation, that goes back to day one of the creation of the "federal reserve bank", to prove they had the money to loan us. Round figures to the nearest million are OK for casual discussion purposes, but let's see the audit documentation.
Mr. AC, perhaps you didn't read the entire thread, all my replies, but I *own* 8 apple computers, have them right here in my home. I am an apple owner since the late 80's. I am obviously not "jealous of people who are able and willing to buy Apple's products." I am criticalof a device that is way over priced. But... if folks want to spend it, they can go right ahead. When and if apple gets real on the price for such a device and adds a few more practical features, I would consider it, but not at this point, I am not going to drop probably 300$ of a 400$ price tag on marketing hype. Perhaps you are embarassed now because you got suckered? No matter, people can purchase what they want,this or consumerism I will not dispute, companies charge what the market will bear of course, in fact, people noticed that they could compete, a LOT of companies noticed,and the whole point of the article was the explosion of alternatives, most of them a lot cheaper, and I would wager within another year or so they will be feature for feature as good or better as this particular apple product,or better, and a lot cheaper, because it's technically and economically possible to do so, right now, and a lot more people than me have noticed the too-obvious high price compared to this "miracle of miniaturization", which is really not all that miraculous any more, it is mundane in 2004. Two years ago it was slick, last year it was cool, now it is part of the herd. Granted, still a big part of the herd, but it is having stiffer and stiffer competition, as evidence the mini. they saw the need for a lower priced product,and I predict they will follow that tend based on outside marketing pressure. With their computers they are content for a niche market, with the ipod they decided to take on the world, with everyone as a potential customer, so this will be unsual for them in that sense, it's a completely different market and once past the honeymoon phase, which they are at now, they will be forced to compete. That means drop prices and add features.
...I stated that the OS has to be on the machine, vendor supplied, so it's installed and all the doo dads are supported. That is really the only sort of big breakthrough that might occur, IMO. Aftermarket installs just won't work past a limited small single digit percentage, at least when you are talking single home users in general. With business, and dedicated purposeful bought machines and admins it is much more possible and a more credible scenario for "mass adoption on the desktop".
...where the money is not just printed up out of thin air now.
Show me details of where "money" comes from. the actual digits, both electronic and paper and coin. I want to see detailed proof it's based on something other than just printed up paper or digitized up, created from nothing. We'll leave clad coins out because obviously they are metallic, and we'll both agree that paper and ink is paper and ink, what I am asking is proof that this money existed before the Fed decides to create it. Please provide references and an audit trail going way back that is viewable by the public. Proof, not rhetoric or indignation, actual bonafide proof that this money is something, that it's not as I assert just created out of thin air.
What I wrote, if you read it more carefully, would still address and provide your list of governmental services, it eliminates the redundancy and skimming aspect to the current system,it addressed the issue of inflation and what limits need to be put on the money supply in circulation, and is a lot closer to what we currently have as a system than what you might apparently think.
this is why I made a kool aid reference, people just haven't acknowledged where "money" comes from here. You have to start with the same set of data, my data suggests money that we have now is artificially created and is based on nothing more than force of government and inertia. If you or anyone can prove that these FRNs are based on anything else, or actually existed as money before they were created in a computer, I sure would like to see it.
and you also missed part of what I wrote as well. Respectfully, re-read it.
Government, through it's half governmental chartered private central bank, already "prints up" all the money, all of it. That is a declarative statement. It is based on absolutely nothing other than a determination of how much to create.
If you can prove otherwise, please do so.
I also mentioned that there needs to be a detailed effort to insure that the amount put into circulation is reflected on the totality of the previous economic cycle's tangible and intangible based "production", so as to avoid hyper inflation.
What we have now is a redundancy, a recursive economic system, where government does in fact print it up, create it out of thin air, then it "gets into" circulation through various means, one of the larger methods is through "lending" starting with the central bank system, down to the ersatz "private" banks, then it returns in various scam ways back to the origins, where it gets re loaned out. It is future debt based, not produced wealth based. Really, where do you think money in the form of federal reserve notes comes from? There is some huge vault someplace with money that was produced over the eons and for some reason we the people get to borrow it? Nope, it doesn't work that way. The Fed just creates it. "Government" gets it out, then takes it back, and in the middle attaches one million laws to it, when there's no need, it can just issue and spend what it needs to, within a constraint to not over inflate. It's exactly what we do now already, the change I propose is merely eliminating the humongous middleman skim that is going on, along with the governmental command and control aspects of tax code enforcement.
taxes were originally introduced as a way to fund governments-starting with "royal" type governments,well.. as a way to fund government. Government doesn't work or produce, but they need tangibles to exist, tangibles and power over it's citizenry, a way to have a carrot and a stick. "Taxes"-enforced removable of portable wealth from individuals to a collective known as government- gave them both, so they were adopted by governmnets far and wide since way back in the olden days.
That was then, this is now.
The reason why they were necessary to be collected back thenwas because "money" was tangible based back then, whether it was precious metal portable-wealth barter coins or actual "stuff" like food and firewood and cattle and so on. "Taxes" were collected using all those products.
Nowadays, we have a *completely* artifical monetary system where the "money" is created out of thin air. Literally created poof out of thin air as computer entries for most of it, and a much smaller percentage as printed up pieces of paper, where a hundred dollar "note" costs as much as a one dollar "note", and even the bulk of portable barter wealth "coinage" in common use is base metals based, ie, cheap relatively speaking to produce.
In a closer look, "taxes" are not needed on the general population at all. The only limit should be a rational limit of how much is introduced into circulation by the government so as to not over inflate beyond what has been reasonably produced and is "backed" as it were by the sum totality of goods and services produced in the last economic reporting cycle of choice.
"Taxes" are now used as a full bore command and control measure over the populations to keep the elite in power.
There is NO reason for taxes when the government prints up the money. None. Zero economic reason. there is a power wielding reason., but no economic reason. All the various tax schemes and codes at the federal "income" level, whether currently implemented or "proposed" by well meaning tax change advocates fail to address this glaringly obvious and undeniable data, and are a sham and a fraud and a mass fakeout, well meaning as they are.
For international trade there needs to be a rational multiple-tangibles based "money-trade-product" that can be used for trade, but at the interior domestic level inside a huge nation like the US, taxes are MORE archaic than buggywhips, just they have 99.999999% of the population completely faked out that they are "necessary", and that includes most of the high level political and economic "thinkers" out there who are widely published.
Until you change back from an artifical fiat currency system, taxes should just be totally abolished at the federal level. That is the only true tax "reform" needed.
Of course, "government" will need some new and improved carrot and stick combination to hold over their citizenry's heads, but that is another subject entirely.
I keep meaning to write a detailed paper on this "tax" mass societal fakeout run by the central bankers in almost all nations,especially in the US as we are a pretty important component of global trade, maybe I will soon, because this is really bugging me. It is the "emperor has no clothes" on viagra, steroids, jolt cola and crack.
I wish one of the larger third parties would adopt this as a campaign platform plank, it *would* get noticed perhaps.
...offering "free" google stuff, then a paid for "pro" version with lots more features. I don't know what a good price break range would be, but around 20$/year might work.
Eventually I bet we see a google OS that any joe windows user might be able to autoinstall over the net painlessly (taking peoples connections and bandwith into account of course). I would also wager they have beta versions of something like that kicking around goog intergalactic right now. If you take all the different pieces of google, both available now and rumored, it is inching pretty close to being a full OS right now.
I don't know but I think it's just someone has a way to spoof what his browser is to anyone collecting stats on a website. At first I thought it might be some sort of web bot, but googling finds me no information, so I am left with that other surmise, which could still be incorrect.
.....firefox in particular is easy to get folks to try, just I am worried it is another bandaid approach. I have not had any lucky getting people to try linux, changing entire operating systems is scary to folks. Even suggesting knoppix is hard, unless you are physically present and do it for them, most people won't make an attempt to go non-windows.
There will not be much in the way of "mass migration" until people can see linux (some decent os) running on a decent machine with lots of ram at the computer store and it comes pre installed, so that means major vendor support. The only reason I ever tried it is a friend of mine ran a small hosting company so he was more familiar with it and was kind enough to download and burn me a couple of disks, and I ALSO have a lot of spare machines kicking around. Being on dialup and/or only having one machine is a factor for millions of people, that and they don't know anyone running Linux. It becomes a chicken or the egg phenomenon then. People aren't going to run what they have never seen, the entire idea of "operating system" is still foreign to most people, all they know is "computer=internet=games=emails=..." but they honestly don't understand all the nuances. And it's because they purchase a package deal, the computer comes pre installed with the OS and apps so that's what they start with, and at the store, all the apps say "runs on XP" blah blah. they can't see it or touch it or play with it, so it's only a vague theory to them. Too many hoops to jump through. A browser a certain small percentage might try, but really, even that is a minority, people are more content to just put up with it and/or complain about it.
I honestly don't blame them, it is really not their fault they buy something brand new which is in reality 1995 with some shiny smeared on it and called 2004. It is sold as a brand new and improved product, unfortunately, it is still major league broken, and it is the *only* thing they see at the store and on the shelves. They are never told about it even when they take their computers in for "repair", they just get offered more bandaids, which I will include asd firefox on MS, spybot, antivir, adaware, zone alarm, and so on, those are all bandaids, they will never "solve" windows.
We need at least one major vendor to crack and offer, completely transparently, at least a choice, and it has to be advertised and on the shelves.
--my apologies. I rememered the story, but looking for the name I hit an incorrect spelling. Corrected it is General Rick Baccus. Google is still GIGO it appears;p
thanks for the reply. I wasn't familiar with any of those, but sometimes get requests from some of my friends to help them with windows "problems" even though I am not a windows guy. I looked those up, all seem to have fixes of lesser or greater complications, except for number 3 on the list, no google results. Is it misspelled or known under another name?
As an aside, it is simply mind boggling to me that people would put up with all that spyware stuff, or that all these big businesses and governments, who must get nailed with these malwares as well, they can't seem to deal with the real problem..... A simply amazing insight into human and societal nature. People are way too stubborn over the wrong things it appears.
"Doctor, it hurts me when I do this!" Doctor to patient --"Well, stop doing that!"
...was a very good rant. Nailed everything,and used decent analogies. In particular EULAS which are THE most lame bogus "contracts" out there that joe average has to deal with, least noticed, least understood, and most annoying in what "happens". Maybe someday a true "peoples class action" law suit will be filed against a few big konzernes over them, they need to be abolished. We need consumer protection, a standard warranty of useability and suitability for purpose.
2 hours (+ -) in a courtroom, real time. A clean install on a new machine, attach to the internet, watch with a traffic monitoring program. Show the judge and jury what happens. Then another hour of random surfing, and receiving email, again, show them what happens.
Would be fun to see for sure. Needs to go all the way to the supremes.
...anything like an anecdotal top ten best of the worst list for spyware? Purely for conversational and amusement purposes. There must be some that really stand out both in spyware "features" and in non-ease of removal.
it's slick, I'll give ya that. Just for 400 dineros it should have a lot more stuff built in. This is PDA/higher end cell phone range money. Even a multi band FM/MW/SW/Weather band OTA receiver would be a decent and cheap addition to the package, that wouldn't cost apple maybe 5 to 10 bucks tops extra, and add maybe an ounce or three to the weight. It's tunes and talk, audio, having a radio integral with it makes some sort of sense. Text messaging, not expensive to pull off either and it has a screen already.
I'm an old mac boy, defended them for a long time,still have..lemme think on this...8 working macs kicking around here, in this case, I'm gonna dis 'em. It ain't worth the price, it's gouging and marketing hype.
I don't care though, really, wasn't trying to start a jihad here or anything, something just rubs me the wrong way when I see folks getting ripped off, or when I think they are anyway.
yes, it would be, but I get several years a piece out of my phones first. I've checked, batts are pretty steep for the ones I have. And phones have gotten so cheap now, buy a last years model and they are practically free in a lot of cases. In fact one time two years ago the cell phone store just gave me a demo model for nothing, asked if I wanted it as they couldn't sell it because they had lost the box and paperwork for it.
I got nothing against the ipod except for it's price, I think it is in the ludicrous range. It looks like about 125$ would be closer to reality. But what do I know, zip about it.
Agreed the very small hard drive is cute, and it does a lot of stuff...but stilll... sorta spendy for what you get. I guess it just depends how much you make too, to me that's a LOT of cash for a strictly cheap toy thing, but I guess to a lot of other people it's almost throw away chump change, so there ya go. I'd pop 400 for a full fledged decent shape used laptop, or a new complete desktop, but no way for a little toy music box.
eh, to each their own, I'm sure I drop cash on things that other people could see no use for whatsoever, so I guess it all averages out.
...my idea of "budget". 59 clams makes more sense as budget, 200 dollars is not "budget". This review looks like "mid range" to me for joe home user... In fact even cheaper would be better. I was hoping for a review of real low end but still new and reasonably decent stuff, to see the best possible deal. To me, leaving out the RAM necessary skews the figures as well, because it's always a crapshoot if your old RAM is reusable. I'd like a decent hundred dollar upgrade, cpu/mobo and at least 256 ram, preferably more. Most likely the used market is the way to go there I guess.
prison abuse stories broke earlier than that with the general (General Rick Baucus) in charge of the prison (camp x ray) at guantanamo basically getting fired/quitting because he wouldn't condone torture. It was released in government spin doctor speak but that's what it said in essence. I remember reading about it. Also a lot of reports of torture and summary executions of prisoners, including a pretty large incident involving thousands at one go, during the early stages of the afghan war, many spooky types and specops fingered as being in attendance while the NA troops did the deeds. Maybe you remember, POWs locked in shipping containers, left out in the sun for a week, then the containers machine gunned, then opened up and any one remaining re-machine gunned, then your regular bulldozers and mass grave scene.
I think what would be more accurate is that US based mainstream establishment media first reported "officially" that perhaps some "abuse" of "dee-tain-EEs" occurred at abu ghabrib around such and such a date as indicated. That would be more correct. The US establishment press is *very* careful to never use the terms torture or prisoners of war, and is usually about a year to forever behind the scenes of real events. We get a pretty mild and uber massaged press experience in this nation. IMO of course. I'm a serious news junky since the late 50's, that is my take on it, we get at best the marshmallow fluff version of "the news", even on so called "investigaive journalism" shows and in print media reports. It's an opinion I have,nothing but, but I'll state it's at least a well formed one based on decades of anecdotal and experience, both reading/researching and a little bit of fourth estate action myself..
On the other hand, if you read or listen to US alternative and/or foreign press, such charges and news stories, etc have been reported since the very beginnings of the two for one respective middle eastern wars, and have been steadily arriving and have been quite common. Direct torture and execution, "outsourcing" of torture by arranging "detainees" to be flown to more "cooperative" countries, and so on. and I guess it's a bit of a quibble to call "collateral damage" torture, but that happens as well. Now ME, I'd call it torture, but that's also not something most americans want to admit to, especially officials. So they call it "collateral damage", although lately they even stopped doing that, it's just "today, xx insurgents and terrorists were reported killed".. and etc.
Anyway, nothing new, quite common, I got several aquaintainces pretty familiar with "harsh interrogation methods" back in the nam years. Further back you go the fresher guys memory was, it was not unusal in th e least to hear of such actions over a brew or two, now it's almost universally denied, especially in public for mass consumption, as the guys are much older and all respectable citizens and like that. Funny how time changes things I guess... It goes on. Oh well.
oh phooie. Get real, that's not what i said, you KNOW I meant in total, the whole package. There's no way in heck that those ipods are really worth that money, no way you can compare the volume of sum total of electronics in a desktop with what is in an ipod. There just isn't all that much "exotic" to it or unusal. And I don't care if it's smaller, small sized radios and various gadgets and whatnot have been out for decades now, it's just not that hard or expensive to manufacture them any longer. People pay that money because they got it to burn and got suckered into gross consumerism, not that it really costs apple all that much to make the thing, or they get them as gifts. I know I am in a minority here on slashdot being much older, but frankly, I know a lot of people, most of them adults,a lot of them wealthy enough to own multiple homes, cars, yachts, airplanes, etc, and I have *yet* to meet anyone who actually bought one of those things, so I am telling people why that is-they ain't worth it. Most adults can see that. Over priced junk. Look at who apple sells them to, what the advertising slant is. It's a fakeou man, look at it. Suckerism. Poorer people I know don't buy them because for 25 bucks you can get a good enough portable music player.
I am not disputing at all, let's be clear on that, what it does or apples engineering,it is what it is and it works as advertised,this is true facts, I just dispute that it is really worth that much, I would *bet* the markup on it is pretty high if you could get real numbers to look at. And I will repeat, I am not arguing marketing and "capitalism", I'm just saying a lot of people don't get sucked into "marketing" as readily as others it seems. If people weant to blow their cash on that, over pay by a factor of probably quadruple, let them, just proves the point about consumer faddism and the sucker principle and fanboyism.
I don't buy overpriced RIAA plastic disks either, they are way over priced for what they are. To me it's the same thing.
I know that is not a popular opinion here, to each their own, just wanted to put into the thread that IMO those media things are a ripoff price wise and half their "allure" is "me too!" consumer brainwashed faddism. I've seen it with other consumer products, so I see no need to be shy about pointing it out.
In my own small way, and I'm only one guy, I am in rebellion to our societies fixation and addiction to grossly over priced "entertainments", I think it's a 90% waste of time, unhealthy for people, wastes resources, both raw and economic, and gives people a skewed sense of priorities. So, as such, I write the occassional entertainment dissin piece. I think this "bread and circuses" fake out most people are addicted to is the #1 reason we have so many serious real problems around the nation and planet, so that's why I have a contrary opinion of them. Over priced, over hyped, over valued crap, ignore the important things, fixate on entertainment sports and games. Oh ya, that is so smart. Uh huh.
Slashdot Mirror
.....depends on ahhnold and whether or not they can get the law changed to run a foreign born person. He looks like their current poster boy for the future more than anyone else, IMO.
Basically, both major parties have a dearth of any inspiring or credible candidates. All I see are yawners and media puppets. Thinkers are not wanted in those parties.
Guiliani scares me the most, I got an instant dislike to him way back when he was prosecutor. Serious poser, media whore and law n order loony. I also think he knows what's up with some of the finer details of 9-11 and is part of the coverup going down. Untrustworthy in other words. Also, he knows absolutely *nothing* about the nation or it's people outside of an extremely specialised niche of NYC, which although important, is not even close to being repesentative of the rest of the nation. He thinks (*like the NYC based network newsies mostly) that if you have barbed wire on your property it means you live at a "compound", that's the impression I get. Mr. Artificial Priveleged Living, out to lunch.
Hillary scares me the most next down the list, because she knows what's up, but still pushes some incredibly wacky themes, and is highly non-constitutional in many matters and has no concept of what nationalism is or what borders are for. She also has anecdotal street cred of being an insufferable neo royal wannabe, an elitists elitist.
I also think she's a serial crook, her past biz deals show that, even though she managed to skate on some of the allegations.
And Ron Brown and Vince Foster are still realities....She just might be a scosh worse than just a serial thief....
reply is below in the thread, one place instead of many, I address those issues. thank you.
my idea on the dollar would be as follows.
We already collect a ton of statistics on every aspect of business. We tie the M-whatever number supply of new dollars that are allowed to be created and added to the pool every year based on the top 100 traded commodities (and or services, whatever, to be exactly determined) of the past year, the true evolving business of the nation. This or that can fall off the list or be added to it. That solves the buggywhip problem, and how to fund government, because that's the first place the new dollars are introduced. It solves the hyper-inflation problem worries as no amount over that can be printed up or digitized, which would force fiscal responsibility back to government, a pay as you go plan. It would reflect actual produced wealth (money being historical portable barterable produced wealth), as opposed to what we have now which is future and ever compounding indebtedness, run through the loan sharks at the fed and below.
Government could still borrow money, but it would have to be *real* money if it absolutely had to (you would think not though, at that stage of the game), not IOUs for money and call it money like we do now.
The cash could get into circulation exactly how it does now, but again, eliminate the private for profit middle man skimming that goes on.
Remember, we already have a lot of dollars in circulation at this point, none of that is gone. for the new stuff every year, government employees get their checks,and it's spread out excactly like it is now so it's not all dumped at once on the market, they go out into the world and spend that money. Contractors and other providers of day to day to day goods and services to government, again, get their checks and it gets dispersed in their orgs, etc, back out into the economy just as it is now, again, gradually through the new year. Loans could be made directly through various governmental run not for profit services,just like we do now for what society has determined is a good idea, from normal student loans and small business loans to one to a person only home mortgages and so forth, and they are kept structured to always have the lowest possible interest rates, as higher interests are obviously stifling, and too low is counter productive and leads to stagnation and a lessening of worth with the real tangibles and it wouldn't relect the agreed upon new float of additional cash yearly. Private banks would be restricted to only loaning that which they *really* have, fractional reserve would be eliminated. No other industry can do it, private money lenders shouldn't be allowed to do it. It's a sanctioned form of..well, it's counterfeiting, using digits, it's just wrong. That would help to regulate what now passes for "prime", because that number on the governmental side it would be automatically set by what the years M-number would be determined to be. Private business is just that, let the market deal with it.
Tax code eliminated almost entirely because no laws would be necessary at the federal"income" level, private or corporate, because they get the money first to spend on the nations business. You keep your loot, invest or spend as you see fit.*
You can still have excise taxes,example, say at the border (I suggest reciprocal quid pro quo with any trading nation, let them set the rate, it's in their interest then to keep it low), useage taxes for direct infrastucture,(like our road tax with fuel for highway maintenance) and so on.
*I admit the first year transition period would be difficult with such a change. I propose a guaranteed, one-off, one time cash payout to individuals of their last years total taxes at the federal level (a returnto make the transition a little sweeter for everyone, and an indiucement for that last year to come clean on reporting to get a final true representation of what is really going on) and debt reduction/elimination,a one time, then it's over with payout to bond holders then no more bonds sold. It's a form of borrowing t
thanks. Dang if I can ever keep it straight. You'd think after thousands of books and tens of millions of words over my life so far I'd remember. Sigh, mental blockage. Gets worse as you get older too, words I know I used to be able to spell now leave me puzzled. Sucks. Anyway, wish we had a possessive that had no exceptions. If the noun owns it, it gets an apostrophe you would think, there's no logical reason for exceptions other than historical inertia.
yes, the fed does certainly "cash in" on it, I propose to cut them out of the deal because they aren't needed. We can use the same monetary units (nice "money" history lesson but I had that down like decades ago, thanks anyway), just eliminate the skim on the vig. They don't deserve it. They especially don't deserve it with "interest". it's beyond ludicrous.
that's point 1
point 2
We eliminate the tax law, because we don't need the "muscle" any longer because the money is no longer a tangible. The government, the US treasury, doesn't need to contract to the fed to "make money". They can do it themselves, or better "we" can do it ourselves. Government doesn't need to pay it's own employees than take away some of it, it's an absurd series of busywork shuffles. We don't need to make it even more absurd by forcing people to pay part of their money when the same exact governmental functions can be paid with the same exact governmental dollars directly, after they are created in the US treasury, without having to "borrow".
And yes, we'd still have to watch out for evil inflation, that's another subject, but it's addressable, I think I have a much better solution.
There are a few differing ways to get it into circulation, but frankly I am hurting typing now have to let it slide, I wrote another long rant, it's up above this one. Pity slashcode won't let us flag various people to posts, I would much rather have done one or two on this thread.
akk, nice ranting man. later.
...that you posted has anything whatsoever to do with my original or subsequent posts. I maintain the sytem is as outlined, I am NOT disputing that.. I have a proposal, I keep getting back basic replies that are 7th grade civics lessons that I already got before most people here were born. What is the problem here? You honestly think I am not aware of how the sytem works??? I DARE you to actually quote me where I dispute any of the current reality in how our economic system and monetary system work NOW.
here you go, hope this works:
I FULLY ADMIT THAT THAT IS HOW IT WORKS NOW. NOW. YES YES YES. YOU ARE CORRECT.
IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH WHAT I WROTE, I OFFER A PROPOSED CHANGE. GET IT NOW?
Can we MOVE ON A LITTLE?
EGADS! I am sorry for yelling, but this is tarting to be a waste of time for me. I have yet to see anyone actually address what I wrote.
I will keep trying until I get tired of this. I honestly don'tknow how many different ways I can werite the same thing, but here goes.
I am proposing a significant CHANGE. That's it, it's really that simple. I am not arguing with anyone on how things are now, I am wondering out loud if a significant change would be cool, that's it. I outlined how to do it. Everything involved is non-hard. it involves eliminating unnecessary overhead and expense, for the same exact deal we have now, just cheaper and better and a lot more freedom for you and me and thee and thou. It's a simple concept, it isn't even that radical, just a more efficient way of doing what we are already doing, and it consists of eliminating the middleman and eliminating a few really glaring busywork paperwork obstacles that have been codigied into law, stuff that is no longer necessary because of the nature of the way of how we create money and get it into circulation. That's it in a nutshell. I tried, I really cannot make it any simpler than that, and I profusely apologize if anyone has taken personal affront, but GEEZ LOWEEZ this is like pulling teeth here.
It is how it is now, I propose something different, and I gave a quick overview of the why and how. Quick, but it's there. Can you SEE the difference now? Do these words have meanings?
again
I am PROPOSING an alternative, in a very short and general outline, by eliminating both the federal reserve and the income tax, BECAUSE OF THE FACT THAT I DON'T DISPUTE that the MONEY is artificially created. The AMOUNT in circulation should obviously be kept in some sort of balance with actual production and the level the US is at business wise (we already do this to a certain extent, I propose it could be better) and with legitimate government needs. I have thoughts on that as well but it is another tangential topic and this simple one is already apparently too hard to discuss.
again
My point is we can do this economy/government/pay for stuff without filtering it through the federal reserve, and without the redundancy of taxes and extensively convulted and harmful tax law at the federal level as regards "income".
Now if you or anyone can actually address what I am actually saying and proposing rather than completely ignoring it and introducing data that no one, least of all me, has disputed in any manner, it would be a *good thing*,I welcome it, rather than pasting or writing in economics I learned back in the 1950s about how our economic system works. PLEASE get beyond rehashing what "inflation" is and very trivial known to everyone here points. Address the actual words I used in my post, not what you think I said.
I'll make it even simpler, again, one of these will make the point eventually:
We get our money from created digits, that are either loaned/ borrowed into circulation via governmental paper sales or through loans through banks. Most of it is digitized, some of it is printed with printing presses. All of it is artificially created.
We have to start with that, or the discussion will
...how the system works currently. Umm, that isn't what I asked, I am fully aware of how the system works currently. this is why I propose an alternative, it's the entire point of my post. I asked you to prove, and I bolded it for emphasis, there was money before the fed created it out of thin air. From your post:
"They have to get the money from the Federal Reserve Bank."
You have stated this. I agree. Where did THAT money come from is the question now.
So see, you agree with me, we the people, our government, "gets our money from the federal reserve. I maintain this money is poof created and we could elilinate the fed and do it strictly with our treasury. I say the FEd as a middle man skimmer and gross loan shark is unethical, immoral, illegal, uneconomic, and general bad news, and that the tax system that goes along with it is completely nuts, horribly broken, makes no sense, is used to place restrictions on people more than anything else, and is not needed if you use ersatz fiat money, which we DO in this nation, I am not disputing that either.
My question I will keep repeating is, "where do THEY get it?"
I maintain it's poof created out of thin air, and that leads to skimming, redundancy and a governmental forced tax structure that is more command and control than for day to day function of government. I say we can do the same government without the fed. I say we can do it without income taxes, because all the money is poof created out of thin air.
Here's a hint, I've been ready with some direct pastes directly from the federal reserve itself on how money is created. With that in mind, I ask you again, directly, with no ambiguity, prove that the "money" existed before the federal reserve poof created it out of thin air.
Here's your quote again for a reminder:
"They have to get the money from the Federal Reserve Bank." Are you going to assert that a private bank miraculously has so much money in it's vaults that it can FUND the entire government, WITHOUT resorting to creating it out of thin air? This is binary, yes they do, no they don't. I maintain that "no they don't" that they create it out of nothing, profit from it immensely, trade what they create out of thin air for future promises of yours and mines labor in the form of bonds and various other government paper, and/or they use the fractional reserve banking system to loan debt into existence. I maintain it's loan sharking on a massive scale.
Now, your postion is that all this money pre exists,they got it, they don't need to create it from nothing, that it's in some big vault and has been there for a long time, and they "loan it to us". Proof, let's see it. I want to see some audit documentation, that goes back to day one of the creation of the "federal reserve bank", to prove they had the money to loan us. Round figures to the nearest million are OK for casual discussion purposes, but let's see the audit documentation.
Mr. AC, perhaps you didn't read the entire thread, all my replies, but I *own* 8 apple computers, have them right here in my home. I am an apple owner since the late 80's. I am obviously not "jealous of people who are able and willing to buy Apple's products." I am criticalof a device that is way over priced. But... if folks want to spend it, they can go right ahead. When and if apple gets real on the price for such a device and adds a few more practical features, I would consider it, but not at this point, I am not going to drop probably 300$ of a 400$ price tag on marketing hype. Perhaps you are embarassed now because you got suckered? No matter, people can purchase what they want,this or consumerism I will not dispute, companies charge what the market will bear of course, in fact, people noticed that they could compete, a LOT of companies noticed,and the whole point of the article was the explosion of alternatives, most of them a lot cheaper, and I would wager within another year or so they will be feature for feature as good or better as this particular apple product,or better, and a lot cheaper, because it's technically and economically possible to do so, right now, and a lot more people than me have noticed the too-obvious high price compared to this "miracle of miniaturization", which is really not all that miraculous any more, it is mundane in 2004. Two years ago it was slick, last year it was cool, now it is part of the herd. Granted, still a big part of the herd, but it is having stiffer and stiffer competition, as evidence the mini. they saw the need for a lower priced product,and I predict they will follow that tend based on outside marketing pressure. With their computers they are content for a niche market, with the ipod they decided to take on the world, with everyone as a potential customer, so this will be unsual for them in that sense, it's a completely different market and once past the honeymoon phase, which they are at now, they will be forced to compete. That means drop prices and add features.
...I stated that the OS has to be on the machine, vendor supplied, so it's installed and all the doo dads are supported. That is really the only sort of big breakthrough that might occur, IMO. Aftermarket installs just won't work past a limited small single digit percentage, at least when you are talking single home users in general. With business, and dedicated purposeful bought machines and admins it is much more possible and a more credible scenario for "mass adoption on the desktop".
...where the money is not just printed up out of thin air now.
Show me details of where "money" comes from. the actual digits, both electronic and paper and coin. I want to see detailed proof it's based on something other than just printed up paper or digitized up, created from nothing. We'll leave clad coins out because obviously they are metallic, and we'll both agree that paper and ink is paper and ink, what I am asking is proof that this money existed before the Fed decides to create it. Please provide references and an audit trail going way back that is viewable by the public. Proof, not rhetoric or indignation, actual bonafide proof that this money is something, that it's not as I assert just created out of thin air.
What I wrote, if you read it more carefully, would still address and provide your list of governmental services, it eliminates the redundancy and skimming aspect to the current system,it addressed the issue of inflation and what limits need to be put on the money supply in circulation, and is a lot closer to what we currently have as a system than what you might apparently think.
this is why I made a kool aid reference, people just haven't acknowledged where "money" comes from here. You have to start with the same set of data, my data suggests money that we have now is artificially created and is based on nothing more than force of government and inertia. If you or anyone can prove that these FRNs are based on anything else, or actually existed as money before they were created in a computer, I sure would like to see it.
and you also missed part of what I wrote as well. Respectfully, re-read it.
Government, through it's half governmental chartered private central bank, already "prints up" all the money, all of it. That is a declarative statement. It is based on absolutely nothing other than a determination of how much to create.
If you can prove otherwise, please do so.
I also mentioned that there needs to be a detailed effort to insure that the amount put into circulation is reflected on the totality of the previous economic cycle's tangible and intangible based "production", so as to avoid hyper inflation.
What we have now is a redundancy, a recursive economic system, where government does in fact print it up, create it out of thin air, then it "gets into" circulation through various means, one of the larger methods is through "lending" starting with the central bank system, down to the ersatz "private" banks, then it returns in various scam ways back to the origins, where it gets re loaned out. It is future debt based, not produced wealth based. Really, where do you think money in the form of federal reserve notes comes from? There is some huge vault someplace with money that was produced over the eons and for some reason we the people get to borrow it? Nope, it doesn't work that way. The Fed just creates it. "Government" gets it out, then takes it back, and in the middle attaches one million laws to it, when there's no need, it can just issue and spend what it needs to, within a constraint to not over inflate. It's exactly what we do now already, the change I propose is merely eliminating the humongous middleman skim that is going on, along with the governmental command and control aspects of tax code enforcement.
taxes were originally introduced as a way to fund governments-starting with "royal" type governments,well.. as a way to fund government. Government doesn't work or produce, but they need tangibles to exist, tangibles and power over it's citizenry, a way to have a carrot and a stick. "Taxes"-enforced removable of portable wealth from individuals to a collective known as government- gave them both, so they were adopted by governmnets far and wide since way back in the olden days.
That was then, this is now.
The reason why they were necessary to be collected back thenwas because "money" was tangible based back then, whether it was precious metal portable-wealth barter coins or actual "stuff" like food and firewood and cattle and so on. "Taxes" were collected using all those products.
Nowadays, we have a *completely* artifical monetary system where the "money" is created out of thin air. Literally created poof out of thin air as computer entries for most of it, and a much smaller percentage as printed up pieces of paper, where a hundred dollar "note" costs as much as a one dollar "note", and even the bulk of portable barter wealth "coinage" in common use is base metals based, ie, cheap relatively speaking to produce.
In a closer look, "taxes" are not needed on the general population at all. The only limit should be a rational limit of how much is introduced into circulation by the government so as to not over inflate beyond what has been reasonably produced and is "backed" as it were by the sum totality of goods and services produced in the last economic reporting cycle of choice.
"Taxes" are now used as a full bore command and control measure over the populations to keep the elite in power.
There is NO reason for taxes when the government prints up the money. None. Zero economic reason. there is a power wielding reason., but no economic reason. All the various tax schemes and codes at the federal "income" level, whether currently implemented or "proposed" by well meaning tax change advocates fail to address this glaringly obvious and undeniable data, and are a sham and a fraud and a mass fakeout, well meaning as they are.
For international trade there needs to be a rational multiple-tangibles based "money-trade-product" that can be used for trade, but at the interior domestic level inside a huge nation like the US, taxes are MORE archaic than buggywhips, just they have 99.999999% of the population completely faked out that they are "necessary", and that includes most of the high level political and economic "thinkers" out there who are widely published.
Until you change back from an artifical fiat currency system, taxes should just be totally abolished at the federal level. That is the only true tax "reform" needed.
Of course, "government" will need some new and improved carrot and stick combination to hold over their citizenry's heads, but that is another subject entirely.
I keep meaning to write a detailed paper on this "tax" mass societal fakeout run by the central bankers in almost all nations,especially in the US as we are a pretty important component of global trade, maybe I will soon, because this is really bugging me. It is the "emperor has no clothes" on viagra, steroids, jolt cola and crack.
I wish one of the larger third parties would adopt this as a campaign platform plank, it *would* get noticed perhaps.
...offering "free" google stuff, then a paid for "pro" version with lots more features. I don't know what a good price break range would be, but around 20$/year might work.
Eventually I bet we see a google OS that any joe windows user might be able to autoinstall over the net painlessly (taking peoples connections and bandwith into account of course). I would also wager they have beta versions of something like that kicking around goog intergalactic right now. If you take all the different pieces of google, both available now and rumored, it is inching pretty close to being a full OS right now.
I don't know but I think it's just someone has a way to spoof what his browser is to anyone collecting stats on a website. At first I thought it might be some sort of web bot, but googling finds me no information, so I am left with that other surmise, which could still be incorrect.
.....firefox in particular is easy to get folks to try, just I am worried it is another bandaid approach. I have not had any lucky getting people to try linux, changing entire operating systems is scary to folks. Even suggesting knoppix is hard, unless you are physically present and do it for them, most people won't make an attempt to go non-windows.
There will not be much in the way of "mass migration" until people can see linux (some decent os) running on a decent machine with lots of ram at the computer store and it comes pre installed, so that means major vendor support. The only reason I ever tried it is a friend of mine ran a small hosting company so he was more familiar with it and was kind enough to download and burn me a couple of disks, and I ALSO have a lot of spare machines kicking around. Being on dialup and/or only having one machine is a factor for millions of people, that and they don't know anyone running Linux. It becomes a chicken or the egg phenomenon then. People aren't going to run what they have never seen, the entire idea of "operating system" is still foreign to most people, all they know is "computer=internet=games=emails=..." but they honestly don't understand all the nuances. And it's because they purchase a package deal, the computer comes pre installed with the OS and apps so that's what they start with, and at the store, all the apps say "runs on XP" blah blah. they can't see it or touch it or play with it, so it's only a vague theory to them. Too many hoops to jump through. A browser a certain small percentage might try, but really, even that is a minority, people are more content to just put up with it and/or complain about it.
I honestly don't blame them, it is really not their fault they buy something brand new which is in reality 1995 with some shiny smeared on it and called 2004. It is sold as a brand new and improved product, unfortunately, it is still major league broken, and it is the *only* thing they see at the store and on the shelves. They are never told about it even when they take their computers in for "repair", they just get offered more bandaids, which I will include asd firefox on MS, spybot, antivir, adaware, zone alarm, and so on, those are all bandaids, they will never "solve" windows.
We need at least one major vendor to crack and offer, completely transparently, at least a choice, and it has to be advertised and on the shelves.
--my apologies. I rememered the story, but looking for the name I hit an incorrect spelling. Corrected it is General Rick Baccus. Google is still GIGO it appears ;p
Here is a Link to links about him.
thanks for the reply. I wasn't familiar with any of those, but sometimes get requests from some of my friends to help them with windows "problems" even though I am not a windows guy. I looked those up, all seem to have fixes of lesser or greater complications, except for number 3 on the list, no google results. Is it misspelled or known under another name?
As an aside, it is simply mind boggling to me that people would put up with all that spyware stuff, or that all these big businesses and governments, who must get nailed with these malwares as well, they can't seem to deal with the real problem..... A simply amazing insight into human and societal nature. People are way too stubborn over the wrong things it appears.
"Doctor, it hurts me when I do this!"
Doctor to patient --"Well, stop doing that!"
guess I'll have to check back next week though to fool with it. Thanks for your efforts, I played with your christmas stuff last year. TOOO much fun!
didja see this browser in your stats called "woo woo!"
what is that???
...was a very good rant. Nailed everything,and used decent analogies. In particular EULAS which are THE most lame bogus "contracts" out there that joe average has to deal with, least noticed, least understood, and most annoying in what "happens". Maybe someday a true "peoples class action" law suit will be filed against a few big konzernes over them, they need to be abolished. We need consumer protection, a standard warranty of useability and suitability for purpose.
2 hours (+ -) in a courtroom, real time. A clean install on a new machine, attach to the internet, watch with a traffic monitoring program. Show the judge and jury what happens. Then another hour of random surfing, and receiving email, again, show them what happens.
Would be fun to see for sure. Needs to go all the way to the supremes.
...anything like an anecdotal top ten best of the worst list for spyware? Purely for conversational and amusement purposes. There must be some that really stand out both in spyware "features" and in non-ease of removal.
it's slick, I'll give ya that. Just for 400 dineros it should have a lot more stuff built in. This is PDA/higher end cell phone range money. Even a multi band FM/MW/SW/Weather band OTA receiver would be a decent and cheap addition to the package, that wouldn't cost apple maybe 5 to 10 bucks tops extra, and add maybe an ounce or three to the weight. It's tunes and talk, audio, having a radio integral with it makes some sort of sense. Text messaging, not expensive to pull off either and it has a screen already.
I'm an old mac boy, defended them for a long time,still have..lemme think on this...8 working macs kicking around here, in this case, I'm gonna dis 'em. It ain't worth the price, it's gouging and marketing hype.
I don't care though, really, wasn't trying to start a jihad here or anything, something just rubs me the wrong way when I see folks getting ripped off, or when I think they are anyway.
yes, it would be, but I get several years a piece out of my phones first. I've checked, batts are pretty steep for the ones I have. And phones have gotten so cheap now, buy a last years model and they are practically free in a lot of cases. In fact one time two years ago the cell phone store just gave me a demo model for nothing, asked if I wanted it as they couldn't sell it because they had lost the box and paperwork for it.
I got nothing against the ipod except for it's price, I think it is in the ludicrous range. It looks like about 125$ would be closer to reality. But what do I know, zip about it.
Agreed the very small hard drive is cute, and it does a lot of stuff...but stilll... sorta spendy for what you get. I guess it just depends how much you make too, to me that's a LOT of cash for a strictly cheap toy thing, but I guess to a lot of other people it's almost throw away chump change, so there ya go. I'd pop 400 for a full fledged decent shape used laptop, or a new complete desktop, but no way for a little toy music box.
eh, to each their own, I'm sure I drop cash on things that other people could see no use for whatsoever, so I guess it all averages out.
...my idea of "budget". 59 clams makes more sense as budget, 200 dollars is not "budget". This review looks like "mid range" to me for joe home user... In fact even cheaper would be better. I was hoping for a review of real low end but still new and reasonably decent stuff, to see the best possible deal. To me, leaving out the RAM necessary skews the figures as well, because it's always a crapshoot if your old RAM is reusable. I'd like a decent hundred dollar upgrade, cpu/mobo and at least 256 ram, preferably more. Most likely the used market is the way to go there I guess.
prison abuse stories broke earlier than that with the general (General Rick Baucus) in charge of the prison (camp x ray) at guantanamo basically getting fired/quitting because he wouldn't condone torture. It was released in government spin doctor speak but that's what it said in essence. I remember reading about it. Also a lot of reports of torture and summary executions of prisoners, including a pretty large incident involving thousands at one go, during the early stages of the afghan war, many spooky types and specops fingered as being in attendance while the NA troops did the deeds. Maybe you remember, POWs locked in shipping containers, left out in the sun for a week, then the containers machine gunned, then opened up and any one remaining re-machine gunned, then your regular bulldozers and mass grave scene.
I think what would be more accurate is that US based mainstream establishment media first reported "officially" that perhaps some "abuse" of "dee-tain-EEs" occurred at abu ghabrib around such and such a date as indicated. That would be more correct. The US establishment press is *very* careful to never use the terms torture or prisoners of war, and is usually about a year to forever behind the scenes of real events. We get a pretty mild and uber massaged press experience in this nation. IMO of course. I'm a serious news junky since the late 50's, that is my take on it, we get at best the marshmallow fluff version of "the news", even on so called "investigaive journalism" shows and in print media reports. It's an opinion I have,nothing but, but I'll state it's at least a well formed one based on decades of anecdotal and experience, both reading/researching and a little bit of fourth estate action myself..
On the other hand, if you read or listen to US alternative and/or foreign press, such charges and news stories, etc have been reported since the very beginnings of the two for one respective middle eastern wars, and have been steadily arriving and have been quite common. Direct torture and execution, "outsourcing" of torture by arranging "detainees" to be flown to more "cooperative" countries, and so on. and I guess it's a bit of a quibble to call "collateral damage" torture, but that happens as well. Now ME, I'd call it torture, but that's also not something most americans want to admit to, especially officials. So they call it "collateral damage", although lately they even stopped doing that, it's just "today, xx insurgents and terrorists were reported killed".. and etc.
Anyway, nothing new, quite common, I got several aquaintainces pretty familiar with "harsh interrogation methods" back in the nam years. Further back you go the fresher guys memory was, it was not unusal in th e least to hear of such actions over a brew or two, now it's almost universally denied, especially in public for mass consumption, as the guys are much older and all respectable citizens and like that. Funny how time changes things I guess... It goes on. Oh well.
What would be "news" would be if it didn't occur.
oh phooie. Get real, that's not what i said, you KNOW I meant in total, the whole package. There's no way in heck that those ipods are really worth that money, no way you can compare the volume of sum total of electronics in a desktop with what is in an ipod. There just isn't all that much "exotic" to it or unusal. And I don't care if it's smaller, small sized radios and various gadgets and whatnot have been out for decades now, it's just not that hard or expensive to manufacture them any longer. People pay that money because they got it to burn and got suckered into gross consumerism, not that it really costs apple all that much to make the thing, or they get them as gifts. I know I am in a minority here on slashdot being much older, but frankly, I know a lot of people, most of them adults,a lot of them wealthy enough to own multiple homes, cars, yachts, airplanes, etc, and I have *yet* to meet anyone who actually bought one of those things, so I am telling people why that is-they ain't worth it. Most adults can see that. Over priced junk. Look at who apple sells them to, what the advertising slant is. It's a fakeou man, look at it. Suckerism. Poorer people I know don't buy them because for 25 bucks you can get a good enough portable music player.
I am not disputing at all, let's be clear on that, what it does or apples engineering,it is what it is and it works as advertised,this is true facts, I just dispute that it is really worth that much, I would *bet* the markup on it is pretty high if you could get real numbers to look at. And I will repeat, I am not arguing marketing and "capitalism", I'm just saying a lot of people don't get sucked into "marketing" as readily as others it seems. If people weant to blow their cash on that, over pay by a factor of probably quadruple, let them, just proves the point about consumer faddism and the sucker principle and fanboyism.
I don't buy overpriced RIAA plastic disks either, they are way over priced for what they are. To me it's the same thing.
I know that is not a popular opinion here, to each their own, just wanted to put into the thread that IMO those media things are a ripoff price wise and half their "allure" is "me too!" consumer brainwashed faddism. I've seen it with other consumer products, so I see no need to be shy about pointing it out.
In my own small way, and I'm only one guy, I am in rebellion to our societies fixation and addiction to grossly over priced "entertainments", I think it's a 90% waste of time, unhealthy for people, wastes resources, both raw and economic, and gives people a skewed sense of priorities. So, as such, I write the occassional entertainment dissin piece. I think this "bread and circuses" fake out most people are addicted to is the #1 reason we have so many serious real problems around the nation and planet, so that's why I have a contrary opinion of them. Over priced, over hyped, over valued crap, ignore the important things, fixate on entertainment sports and games. Oh ya, that is so smart. Uh huh.