Another reason why the Midwest is cheaper is that there may not be ANY jobs you'd want in a particular area. OR, if you do land a job in that area, and you do lose it eventually, you'll have to move since the 1st job you had was a fluke... you'll be facing years of job searching in the area to recover, otherwise.
I say this from Toledo OH. The economy here is still crashing, kind of a like a slow waltz around the toilet bowl, but ever descending into a nasty pit.
Make sure you understand if the Midwest area you move to is actually a "dead end" area like Toledo. If so, then don't take the job. Places like Toledo have a permanently underemployed population. Please, for the love of god, don't add to the problem.
It's us -- the middle class who works for a living -- who are going to have to pay more taxes to cover the shortfall.
No, we're NOT. We're going to lie, cheat and steal to make up for it. Tax evasion is at epidemic levels. Corporations AND individuals are doing all they can to cheat their way out of paying.
What you meant to say was:
Fewer and fewer people will have to shoulder more and more of the tax burden, until the entire system collapses into a mafia-like affair where bribery will be common.
I don't know about you, but I've already made inquiries about pulling an outright fraud if my Social Security is privatized to some degree. Here's how it may work: Some of your SS fraction must go into a 401(k)-like account. This account can be under the aegis of a criminal friend who registers himself as a broker, pays the fees, etc. He'll take in your SS funds, keep a percentage, pay you the rest as cash, and then (here's the key part of the fraud) simply issues false reports to the government about how much SS money is in these "accounts".
Obviously there are a great many details to work out, and we don't know yet what those are. But we are doing the groundwork for fooling the government in order to recover our own SS money.
I have no moral problems with this since it's MY MONEY. The government only wants to privatize SS since it will support the stock market, which still hasn't collapsed enough to completely deflate the bubble it was in. It's not being planned for any moral reason. SS privatization was seriously considered back in Clinton's time (obviously)... so it's only a matter of time when it happens, across one Democrat or Republican administration or another.
Like many Americans, I simply want OUT of the SS system. These next 4 years of a criminal Presidency and a crony Congress will be a massive, dark cloud, but we little guys can find many silver linings in all that blackness. Criminality will become so common that it will be acculturated.
I doubt your conclusions about retirement age. My age group, even as it ages, still has an average expected death age of 72. As time passes, the retirement age keeps increasing. When I started working, it was 65. 20 years later, it's 67. At this rate, by the time I try to retire, I'll probably never be able to, since the retirement age will be increased above the avg death age.
I don't know about you, but if my government expects me to work until I die, then I start making sure (1) I'm armed, and (2) I lie, cheat and steal for make up for the current lying, cheating and stealing the government is doing to me.
It's even worse that that, of course. Even if the retirement age stayed 65 for me, I can clearly see the trend of un- and under-employment for the last 15 working years. Hence, not only will Social Security be "there" for me, but I must plan on being involuntarily retired earlier due to a fucked up labor situation.
I have friends who are going through this now. After 55 yrs of age, your ability to find another job is much less than anyone is comfortable admitting. Companies plainly practice age discrimination. The IT workers are also seeing this happen. Experience in the IT field is becoming a liability. Employers are consistently choosing youngers workers simply because they are cheaper. After 15 years or so, those workers are thrown out for the younger set.
This can only end badly. Tax evasion is now an epidemic. If you'd look around with your eyes open, you'd see this.
About your SS payments: I don't know if that's entirely true. There are documented cases where Mexicans who have worked in America for some time, paying SS, have returned to Mexico, and upon the American retirement age, applied (or sued) for SS benefits and got them. Perhaps you need to do a bit more research into this.
On a personal note, I don't have much problem about you collecting. You paid into it; hence, you should either receive the legal benefit, or the SS administration should return your money.
It really makes me wonder. I can see that bw is a serious impediment to using video as text is used now. Lack of bw forces video into serialized information, which is much like accessing your computer's RAM like it was a paper tape unit. {Whirrrrr!} Only the most slovenly Internet sloucher can afford right now to spend the time using a videoblog like a textblog is used.
However, if common bw increases 10-100 fold over what we have now, will actual videoblogs be possible if we can use innovative features like context-searches and other indexing tools? On top of that, video proceeds at its own pace, so some sort of speed-change tool will have to become common... kind of like FF/REV buttons on a VCR, but snazzier.
Fuck Christ -- Capitalism is America's religion. All who speak ill of it are subject to public outrage. I spoke of things being "very good for entrepreneurs" and the favorable "pour[ing of] fuel upon America's great economic engine of small businesses", but what happens once I started to laugh at the Capitalists?... yes, I got demonized immediately.
You're right. The short-sighted, no-morals, money-grubbing sociopaths are the ones who have long earned my ire. The man down the street with his little shop is a person whose sensibilites I respect. All the big corporations can burn right to the fucking waterline as far as I'm concerned. You know what the temperature in my home is right now? 60 degrees F. Why? BECAUSE I CAN FUCK THE "COLUMBIA GAS CO." AS MUCH AS I CAN. I'll show them who's boss around here. They can try to raise rates through the roof, and I will still survive. I just wish more Americans felt like me, and learned to live a frugal life as appropriate to resist the forces of Capitalist evil. We need to bankrupt our corporations if they can't learn to live in a society as we all must.
I agree. There's nothing better for a competition environment than a company trying to get rid of customers. Once these original companies start to die off from their exclusionary practices (which always expand to include much of their customer base), we can look forward to getting the pieces of their business for "fire sale" prices. This will be very good for entrepreneurs to obtain business equipment they could not otherwise get, and this will pour fuel upon America's great economic engine of small businesses.
I heartily encourage all businesses to commit the suicide of classifying customers. Once you classify, then the MBA geniuses can't restrain themselves from taking the next step of treating these classes differently, and then -- drunk on the heady brew of their alleged successes -- they'll take the further step of excluding the "underperforming" classes. With only a couple classes of customer left over, they'll be too exposed to risk, and will eventually suffer a catastrophe from something as simple as a small group of "preferred" customers taking their business elesewhere for a 0.1% price difference.
Haw haw haw! I love watching the Capitalists cutting their own throats! Lete me grab a bag of fucking popcorn as I sit there with a throbbing erection and a big smile on my face. Capitalists are so stupid! We see this proven time and time again.
Everything you said makes her a "stock darling". Wall Street loves people like her. Show us that you really hold people like her in contempt by not buying their stock. Note that this also means that you have to check your 401k, mutual funds, and all other institutional exposures of your wealth. Chances are, through such mechanisms, you are personally investing in HP, hence you are only supporting the problem. *
Carly and her ilk cannot be stopped or even slowed down, if we keep supporting them where it counts: stocks. HP could lose half their customers now, and Carly et al will just fire 30% of HP's workforce, pay themselves a bonus, and bask in the admiration of Wall Street. Evil like Carly's is something that has to be starved out.
* Why do you think Clinton and Bush are for privatizing Social Security? To keep the stock bubble booming!
Check. I worked for Fifth Third Bank, and the Dell GX270 computers started to come in with asset tags made to FTB's specification, and then started to come in pre-loaded with our default backoffice software loads. I'm sure this kind of thing will continue, in my opinion, until techs like me are replaced with a combination of 800# + a travelling monkey-tech. I wouldn't exactly call this innovation, however. I just call it expanding one's services in order to capture or retain market share. You do that kind of thing for things like a saturated market in which you simply can't compete on price.
Yes, I did. However, this thing with your statement:
[n]o American government has ever been remotely socialist; it's all right-wing
... fails to identify that there's a lot of socialist policy in all levels of American government. If there are degrees of Capitalism, then by definition the remainder is some degree of Socialism. Look at the Federal gas tax... on a balance, some states pay in, others get paid. All schemes to redistribute wealth are Socialist schemes.
What you may have intended to convey is that this "free market" crap is gaining significant mental market share... even amongst the population sectors which are suffering from it.
do you seriously think that the risk from terrorism is an issue in the move by US companies to offshore
The phrase "risk from terrorism" encapsulates a lot of meaning. In that broad sense, how else do you explain the explosion of offshoring, nearshoring and outsourcing that has occured after 911?
The broad sense I'm talking about isn't the sadly Republican simplicity of "you'll get bombed". I'm talking about social stability. America was a good place to stash your money and pursue businesses, since it was stable. That is no longer true. The 911 attacks and the extreme American response have simply made America a bad investment. America's socialist trends are now no longer moderated by that historical stability... hence, we have significant capital flight.
a lot of people allowed terrorism to affect their way of life [... so] terrorism has definitely won
I agree. Americans won't admit that OBL and his species of Saudi terrorist have utterly made their point clear to the Arab world: America is an Empire and will act accordingly when told to butt out of the Arab-Jew conflict, and to get out of the Middle East as well. In a very significant sense, the terrorists made significant gains and are currently winning whatever war they imagined they were fighting. America is progressively embracing Fascism, since their efforts have been so successful.
my attitude is let *them* get stung
You know, that's an important point. Many Americans are disconnecting from government. Merely voting for a tax-cutting, free-market, violent administration only demonstrates the American desire to have nothing to do with fellow citizens and the rest of the world. I maintain that even with all the actual evil (in the biblical sense) that the Bush administration has done and intends to do, it will also have the side effect of removing government power from the common man and embed it within government's only constituents nowadays: corporations. This is a focusing, making government power more intense but much more narrow. In short, you will never expect to receive a welfare check, but you will find tax evasion very easy to do.
Tony Blair... [i]ncompetent prick
I think that like Bush, Blair is very competent in attempting to pursue the policies of Empire. I could follow the same rationale, in finding a successful murderer-burglar and then supporting his endeavours. In short, it's a matter of morals, not competency. It's quite obvious that Blair will risk much internal dissent in his vision of the future. It was no different when he was playing the Clinton clone.
True, the outsourcing method did start achieving refinement in the 1990s. It was in no small way due to the pervasiveness of the Internet, which convinces people that they have more managerial control across the world... but it is undeniable that the Clintonesque business environment also offered significant advantages for those willing to become global instead of national.
But, outsourcing really swelled as a fad after the 911 attacks. I think of outsourcing and offshoring now as a businessman selling short on America... by drawing down his investments in America and moving them to safer areas ("safer" = safer for growth and safer for profit retention). Any Socialist movement whatsoever in America will continue to repulse businessmen in this new mentality, and hence cause even further capital flight.
Something that goes along with "the devil made me do it" is "idle hands are the devil's playground". It could be said that today's children, young adults and even 20-somethings simply have too much time on their hands as opposed to the previous Western eras when they at least had chores to do, and many of those chores were executed on a farm (a vast labor sink if there ever was one).
I don't think video games should be demonized nonetheless. Idle folk have to find something useful, engaging and of social benefit to do. Playing CouterStrike day after day, only means you are probably a sociopath, not that the video game itself is a terrible thing.
Point: I didn't raise Ohio's recent Issue 1, which had the broadest wording of all 11 States in denying non-heterosexual marriage. I voted against it, of course, as anyone interested in appropriate personal liberty would do. But the fundies are going on the attack, and they won.
That fact ALONE makes you some sad-looking bitchbastard with egg all over your face from being just fucking wrong. Furthermore: freedom, liberty, equality... these are not franchises dependent upon the fundies for support. They are supposed to be a secular guarantee. The rights of man exist even if this "god" doesn't.
I'm not inflating the problem. People here really believe that GWB is the best American President of all time. If I see another bumper sticker with "God Bless the Troops", I'm gonna puke.
Even so, there's a reason why this religio-patriotic fundie shit is happening, in that the area is sinking even further into a non-productive economic mire. Have you ever been to Detroit? It looks like a nuke hit it. But that's just it: a nuke DID hit it... an economic one. It's as if in the 1970s onward, that Johnson's "War on Poverty" was exactly reversed, and a "War on Workers" proceeded.
The workers here in Toledo (who remain) soldier onward, just like the ones in Detroit did (and continue to do)... but with increasing tax loads (they just voted to continue them, like morons) and decreasing prosperous jobs, they are headed for a Detroit future. Banruptcies will set another record year here in Lucas County, and I can only imagine that doing that for 3 years running can only spell doom soon.
The Midwest does NOT need for people to wage war on it. That has fully half of the problem. Despite rising fundamentalism, the Middies don't need any further contempt, since that leads directly to acts of spite, like absentee ownership (most banks in Toledo are owned by Cincinatti corporations (which are in turn probably board-controlled by Coasters)), diversion of opportunity, and a focusing of low-order economic involvement.
Even so, I've had as much as I can stand. I've fought the good fight, now I'm leaving. Toledo will have to soldier on without me, soon enough.
Well, you can see what I think about that. Less amusingly, I can say with all honesty that all decent folk should stay away from Midwestern places like Toledo. A very real, cultural undercurrent of absolutely insane patriotic-religious fundamentalism is rising here, much like what has happened in the Middle East for the last 50 years in all their poverty (and for the same reasons). Those who speak sense in the Midwest today are under a rising threat of a lynching. There's no hope for it. Just stay the fuck out, as I work to save money and get the fuck out myself.
Our Moon has a name, our Sun has a name, and for that matter, our planet has more than one name (Terra, Earth). Pretentious or not, the use of names is relatively innocuous... and may indicate a background of being well-read. Considering how many millions just put Bush back in the White House, being well-read is not a positive attribute in America.
Let me see if I understand this... a Dutch prosecutor put his entire computer out in the trash for anyone to come by and take? Firing's too good for him. Anyone in his position should know security procedures for document handling. Are you sure he didn't break Dutch law?
That seems logical, but considering the current state of robotics falls far short of being able to autonomously (or even remotely) create a Human base upon the Moon, it is farcical. I say "farcical" since the resources used to make an "Apollo Program" to get robotics to that point, will consume the economic resources to get people to the Moon anyway. If you're going to make an investment to send people into space permanently, you must soon enough send people into space to do everything that can be done with Human presence. This was exactly my point, in that Americans are no longer able to see this truth.
We just don't have the robots to do what you think is possible, hence men have to go. They may well live in glorified tin cans, covered by bulldozed regolith, but they will build all the rest... with some robot assistance, which is the extent of the technology for now and the foreseeable future.
America lost courage and vision. Sending robots to Luna is another symptom of that loss. What does Humanity need further from the Moon?... more rock samples? Why? We've rock samples already. But that still doesn't answer the "why".
The answer to "why" is not "why not" or "because we can", since those are silly answers when it costs billions to get them. The real answer is "because we're going back there to stay". A larger answer is "because Humanity is expanding into space and the Moon is a good manufacturing center for it".
And if you're going back to Luna to stay, then there's no point in sending robots... since you'll send yourself along to do all the exploring, surveying and construction. If you need robots for occasional and supporting use upon the Lunar surface, then you'll BUILD THEM out of the massive ore body known as the Lunar regolith.
America has waged war on the world for decades, sending in troops for brushfire wars. The American CIA has also been involved worldwide for many decades, toppling governments, assassinating influential people, and in general making these areas safe for takeover by American and British corporations.
If you don't know that, you must be indulging in willful ignorance. If you know that and disagree that America has earned violent reprisals from such Imperial acts, then you're just being an Imperial asshole yourself -- incapable of admitting how murderous your government really is.
America is the world's leading terrorist nation and rogue state. The only thing that seperates Kissinger from Pinochet is the American military... since both are under various indictments for war crimes. And might doesn't make right in any moral sense. Which nation demanded exclusion for its citizens from the Int'l Criminal Court? Oh yeah, that's right, America.
Your attitude of ignorance or dismissal has definitely started World War III. Who invaded Iraq in 2002? Oh yeah, that's right, America. Who invaded Afghanistan and, 3 years later, hasn't solved anything there? Oh yeah, that's right, again America.
"75% of Bush voters": If you'd bother to remain informed, instead of choking down the daily propaganda cock of Fox News, you'd have caught the recent poll results which said that about 75% of Bush voters STILL think Iraq was WMD-heaven, and STILL think that Iraq had ties to Al-Qaeda. These voters are completely insane since they live in an "America is great" fantasy world... much like you. Let's repeat the facts:
1. Iraq was no threat to America. Hussein was impotent in the Arab states and the nation was well disarmed after 1991.
2. Bush had publicly stated in 2002 that Osama bin Laden was no longer a priority for him. To date, bin Laden is still not captured, and Al-Qaeda is now as active as it ever was.
3. The invasion of Iraq was actively planned by the Bush team well before 911. To summarize, they were just waiting for a pretext, and American stupidity, fear and lassitude after 911 gave them one.
You're just wrong. Even worse, you plainly know you're wrong. You still want to send the US military across the world to murder people for oil and Israel, while crowing about the bullshit -- the covering falsehoods of "deposing dictators", "stopping WMD programs", and of course "fighting the War on ______" (Communism, Drugs, Terror... whatever cover story that Hypercapitalism needs this decade to continue its bloody work). The body counts rise while Americans pointedly don't bother to even care. This can only end badly, and in that end, it really doesn't matter who nukes whom... everyone will suffer. The entire world is suffering from America's attacks upon the Middle East. The usual American over-reaction is giving "terrorism" all the social fuel it needs to wage its own form of war across the globe. Only a fool hands power to his enemies in such a fashion... but since it's Christian fanatics vs. Mulsim fanatics, I can only expect this to continue to the bitter end.
The Spaniards had the right idea: pull out of the Imperial military adventure, and treat terrorism as a police matter. As we speak, Spain is investigating and prosecuting their bombers. If only America had the moral fortitude to pursue such a goal.
Isn't it time for you to go and attack another country that had nothing to do with 911? The world is watching, Ace. America condemns itself with every such act, as you condemn yourself with every such utterance in support of it.
You frighten me. Really.
Well, you now have a Homeland Security Department... so, call them up and report me so your Gestapo can round me up, ignore the writ of habeas corpus as they've done for many, and let me die in detention. You have a
What you may have implied is that currency volatility between two of the most stable nations on Earth (which share the world's longest, unfortified border) is in fact a sign of marked instability. I think that the USA and Canada both have deep-seated instabilities that are strongly related to a failure of their publics to rein in the worst excesses of Capitalism.
Your attitude has started a conventional form of World War III, and has granted explicit moral permission to kill Americans at home and abroad in various acts of vengeance.
And just think... all this could have been averted if your Beloved Leader King George had actually tried to find and prosecute Osama bin Laden instead of following his family's pet peeve against Saddam Hussein. Iraq had nothing to do with 911, and Hussein is hardly any different a leader than the Saudi royal family or other dictators that the US has supported over the years for Imperial reasons (which included Hussein, BTW).
You aren't fooling anyone except about 75% of Bush voters. But Bush voters don't matter when the world has already judged your asinine Imperial policies. What I'm waiting for now is a suitcase nuke to go off somewhere in NYC... and then all your vicious military intercessions come to an abrupt end. Enjoy what YOU have while you can.
If you want to "remove a dictator", go get your own rifle, get your own butt over there, and don't spend a dime of my tax money doing it. Hussein was always the Iraqis' problem, not mine, hence you have no right to make it "our problem". Fucknut.
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Another reason why the Midwest is cheaper is that there may not be ANY jobs you'd want in a particular area. OR, if you do land a job in that area, and you do lose it eventually, you'll have to move since the 1st job you had was a fluke ... you'll be facing years of job searching in the area to recover, otherwise.
I say this from Toledo OH. The economy here is still crashing, kind of a like a slow waltz around the toilet bowl, but ever descending into a nasty pit.
Make sure you understand if the Midwest area you move to is actually a "dead end" area like Toledo. If so, then don't take the job. Places like Toledo have a permanently underemployed population. Please, for the love of god, don't add to the problem.
It's us -- the middle class who works for a living -- who are going to have to pay more taxes to cover the shortfall.
... so it's only a matter of time when it happens, across one Democrat or Republican administration or another.
No, we're NOT. We're going to lie, cheat and steal to make up for it. Tax evasion is at epidemic levels. Corporations AND individuals are doing all they can to cheat their way out of paying.
What you meant to say was:
Fewer and fewer people will have to shoulder more and more of the tax burden, until the entire system collapses into a mafia-like affair where bribery will be common.
I don't know about you, but I've already made inquiries about pulling an outright fraud if my Social Security is privatized to some degree. Here's how it may work: Some of your SS fraction must go into a 401(k)-like account. This account can be under the aegis of a criminal friend who registers himself as a broker, pays the fees, etc. He'll take in your SS funds, keep a percentage, pay you the rest as cash, and then (here's the key part of the fraud) simply issues false reports to the government about how much SS money is in these "accounts".
Obviously there are a great many details to work out, and we don't know yet what those are. But we are doing the groundwork for fooling the government in order to recover our own SS money.
I have no moral problems with this since it's MY MONEY. The government only wants to privatize SS since it will support the stock market, which still hasn't collapsed enough to completely deflate the bubble it was in. It's not being planned for any moral reason. SS privatization was seriously considered back in Clinton's time (obviously)
Like many Americans, I simply want OUT of the SS system. These next 4 years of a criminal Presidency and a crony Congress will be a massive, dark cloud, but we little guys can find many silver linings in all that blackness. Criminality will become so common that it will be acculturated.
I doubt your conclusions about retirement age. My age group, even as it ages, still has an average expected death age of 72. As time passes, the retirement age keeps increasing. When I started working, it was 65. 20 years later, it's 67. At this rate, by the time I try to retire, I'll probably never be able to, since the retirement age will be increased above the avg death age.
I don't know about you, but if my government expects me to work until I die, then I start making sure (1) I'm armed, and (2) I lie, cheat and steal for make up for the current lying, cheating and stealing the government is doing to me.
It's even worse that that, of course. Even if the retirement age stayed 65 for me, I can clearly see the trend of un- and under-employment for the last 15 working years. Hence, not only will Social Security be "there" for me, but I must plan on being involuntarily retired earlier due to a fucked up labor situation.
I have friends who are going through this now. After 55 yrs of age, your ability to find another job is much less than anyone is comfortable admitting. Companies plainly practice age discrimination. The IT workers are also seeing this happen. Experience in the IT field is becoming a liability. Employers are consistently choosing youngers workers simply because they are cheaper. After 15 years or so, those workers are thrown out for the younger set.
This can only end badly. Tax evasion is now an epidemic. If you'd look around with your eyes open, you'd see this.
About your SS payments: I don't know if that's entirely true. There are documented cases where Mexicans who have worked in America for some time, paying SS, have returned to Mexico, and upon the American retirement age, applied (or sued) for SS benefits and got them. Perhaps you need to do a bit more research into this.
On a personal note, I don't have much problem about you collecting. You paid into it; hence, you should either receive the legal benefit, or the SS administration should return your money.
It really makes me wonder. I can see that bw is a serious impediment to using video as text is used now. Lack of bw forces video into serialized information, which is much like accessing your computer's RAM like it was a paper tape unit. {Whirrrrr!} Only the most slovenly Internet sloucher can afford right now to spend the time using a videoblog like a textblog is used.
... kind of like FF/REV buttons on a VCR, but snazzier.
However, if common bw increases 10-100 fold over what we have now, will actual videoblogs be possible if we can use innovative features like context-searches and other indexing tools? On top of that, video proceeds at its own pace, so some sort of speed-change tool will have to become common
What, did you want me to send you a memo? You decide your level of involvement! Now you've had as new experience!!
Fuck Christ -- Capitalism is America's religion. All who speak ill of it are subject to public outrage. I spoke of things being "very good for entrepreneurs" and the favorable "pour[ing of] fuel upon America's great economic engine of small businesses", but what happens once I started to laugh at the Capitalists? ... yes, I got demonized immediately.
You're right. The short-sighted, no-morals, money-grubbing sociopaths are the ones who have long earned my ire. The man down the street with his little shop is a person whose sensibilites I respect. All the big corporations can burn right to the fucking waterline as far as I'm concerned. You know what the temperature in my home is right now? 60 degrees F. Why? BECAUSE I CAN FUCK THE "COLUMBIA GAS CO." AS MUCH AS I CAN. I'll show them who's boss around here. They can try to raise rates through the roof, and I will still survive. I just wish more Americans felt like me, and learned to live a frugal life as appropriate to resist the forces of Capitalist evil. We need to bankrupt our corporations if they can't learn to live in a society as we all must.
I agree. There's nothing better for a competition environment than a company trying to get rid of customers. Once these original companies start to die off from their exclusionary practices (which always expand to include much of their customer base), we can look forward to getting the pieces of their business for "fire sale" prices. This will be very good for entrepreneurs to obtain business equipment they could not otherwise get, and this will pour fuel upon America's great economic engine of small businesses.
I heartily encourage all businesses to commit the suicide of classifying customers. Once you classify, then the MBA geniuses can't restrain themselves from taking the next step of treating these classes differently, and then -- drunk on the heady brew of their alleged successes -- they'll take the further step of excluding the "underperforming" classes. With only a couple classes of customer left over, they'll be too exposed to risk, and will eventually suffer a catastrophe from something as simple as a small group of "preferred" customers taking their business elesewhere for a 0.1% price difference.
Haw haw haw! I love watching the Capitalists cutting their own throats! Lete me grab a bag of fucking popcorn as I sit there with a throbbing erection and a big smile on my face. Capitalists are so stupid! We see this proven time and time again.
Wow. What a captain of industry.
Everything you said makes her a "stock darling". Wall Street loves people like her. Show us that you really hold people like her in contempt by not buying their stock. Note that this also means that you have to check your 401k, mutual funds, and all other institutional exposures of your wealth. Chances are, through such mechanisms, you are personally investing in HP, hence you are only supporting the problem. *
Carly and her ilk cannot be stopped or even slowed down, if we keep supporting them where it counts: stocks. HP could lose half their customers now, and Carly et al will just fire 30% of HP's workforce, pay themselves a bonus, and bask in the admiration of Wall Street. Evil like Carly's is something that has to be starved out.
* Why do you think Clinton and Bush are for privatizing Social Security? To keep the stock bubble booming!
Check. I worked for Fifth Third Bank, and the Dell GX270 computers started to come in with asset tags made to FTB's specification, and then started to come in pre-loaded with our default backoffice software loads. I'm sure this kind of thing will continue, in my opinion, until techs like me are replaced with a combination of 800# + a travelling monkey-tech. I wouldn't exactly call this innovation, however. I just call it expanding one's services in order to capture or retain market share. You do that kind of thing for things like a saturated market in which you simply can't compete on price.
perhaps you meant 'socialist' as shorthand
... fails to identify that there's a lot of socialist policy in all levels of American government. If there are degrees of Capitalism, then by definition the remainder is some degree of Socialism. Look at the Federal gas tax ... on a balance, some states pay in, others get paid. All schemes to redistribute wealth are Socialist schemes.
... even amongst the population sectors which are suffering from it.
... hence, we have significant capital flight.
... [i]ncompetent prick
Yes, I did. However, this thing with your statement:
[n]o American government has ever been remotely socialist; it's all right-wing
What you may have intended to convey is that this "free market" crap is gaining significant mental market share
do you seriously think that the risk from terrorism is an issue in the move by US companies to offshore
The phrase "risk from terrorism" encapsulates a lot of meaning. In that broad sense, how else do you explain the explosion of offshoring, nearshoring and outsourcing that has occured after 911?
The broad sense I'm talking about isn't the sadly Republican simplicity of "you'll get bombed". I'm talking about social stability. America was a good place to stash your money and pursue businesses, since it was stable. That is no longer true. The 911 attacks and the extreme American response have simply made America a bad investment. America's socialist trends are now no longer moderated by that historical stability
a lot of people allowed terrorism to affect their way of life [... so] terrorism has definitely won
I agree. Americans won't admit that OBL and his species of Saudi terrorist have utterly made their point clear to the Arab world: America is an Empire and will act accordingly when told to butt out of the Arab-Jew conflict, and to get out of the Middle East as well. In a very significant sense, the terrorists made significant gains and are currently winning whatever war they imagined they were fighting. America is progressively embracing Fascism, since their efforts have been so successful.
my attitude is let *them* get stung
You know, that's an important point. Many Americans are disconnecting from government. Merely voting for a tax-cutting, free-market, violent administration only demonstrates the American desire to have nothing to do with fellow citizens and the rest of the world. I maintain that even with all the actual evil (in the biblical sense) that the Bush administration has done and intends to do, it will also have the side effect of removing government power from the common man and embed it within government's only constituents nowadays: corporations. This is a focusing, making government power more intense but much more narrow. In short, you will never expect to receive a welfare check, but you will find tax evasion very easy to do.
Tony Blair
I think that like Bush, Blair is very competent in attempting to pursue the policies of Empire. I could follow the same rationale, in finding a successful murderer-burglar and then supporting his endeavours. In short, it's a matter of morals, not competency. It's quite obvious that Blair will risk much internal dissent in his vision of the future. It was no different when he was playing the Clinton clone.
True, the outsourcing method did start achieving refinement in the 1990s. It was in no small way due to the pervasiveness of the Internet, which convinces people that they have more managerial control across the world ... but it is undeniable that the Clintonesque business environment also offered significant advantages for those willing to become global instead of national.
... by drawing down his investments in America and moving them to safer areas ("safer" = safer for growth and safer for profit retention). Any Socialist movement whatsoever in America will continue to repulse businessmen in this new mentality, and hence cause even further capital flight.
But, outsourcing really swelled as a fad after the 911 attacks. I think of outsourcing and offshoring now as a businessman selling short on America
Something that goes along with "the devil made me do it" is "idle hands are the devil's playground". It could be said that today's children, young adults and even 20-somethings simply have too much time on their hands as opposed to the previous Western eras when they at least had chores to do, and many of those chores were executed on a farm (a vast labor sink if there ever was one).
I don't think video games should be demonized nonetheless. Idle folk have to find something useful, engaging and of social benefit to do. Playing CouterStrike day after day, only means you are probably a sociopath, not that the video game itself is a terrible thing.
This'll take 4 seconds to deflate.
... these are not franchises dependent upon the fundies for support. They are supposed to be a secular guarantee. The rights of man exist even if this "god" doesn't.
Point: I didn't raise Ohio's recent Issue 1, which had the broadest wording of all 11 States in denying non-heterosexual marriage. I voted against it, of course, as anyone interested in appropriate personal liberty would do. But the fundies are going on the attack, and they won.
That fact ALONE makes you some sad-looking bitchbastard with egg all over your face from being just fucking wrong. Furthermore: freedom, liberty, equality
I'm not inflating the problem. People here really believe that GWB is the best American President of all time. If I see another bumper sticker with "God Bless the Troops", I'm gonna puke.
... an economic one. It's as if in the 1970s onward, that Johnson's "War on Poverty" was exactly reversed, and a "War on Workers" proceeded.
... but with increasing tax loads (they just voted to continue them, like morons) and decreasing prosperous jobs, they are headed for a Detroit future. Banruptcies will set another record year here in Lucas County, and I can only imagine that doing that for 3 years running can only spell doom soon.
The Midwest does NOT need for people to wage war on it. That has fully half of the problem. Despite rising fundamentalism, the Middies don't need any further contempt, since that leads directly to acts of spite, like absentee ownership (most banks in Toledo are owned by Cincinatti corporations (which are in turn probably board-controlled by Coasters)), diversion of opportunity, and a focusing of low-order economic involvement.
Even so, there's a reason why this religio-patriotic fundie shit is happening, in that the area is sinking even further into a non-productive economic mire. Have you ever been to Detroit? It looks like a nuke hit it. But that's just it: a nuke DID hit it
The workers here in Toledo (who remain) soldier onward, just like the ones in Detroit did (and continue to do)
Even so, I've had as much as I can stand. I've fought the good fight, now I'm leaving. Toledo will have to soldier on without me, soon enough.
I live in Toledo, Ohio. Let me tell you about it:
...
Well, you can see what I think about that. Less amusingly, I can say with all honesty that all decent folk should stay away from Midwestern places like Toledo. A very real, cultural undercurrent of absolutely insane patriotic-religious fundamentalism is rising here, much like what has happened in the Middle East for the last 50 years in all their poverty (and for the same reasons). Those who speak sense in the Midwest today are under a rising threat of a lynching. There's no hope for it. Just stay the fuck out, as I work to save money and get the fuck out myself.
Our Moon has a name, our Sun has a name, and for that matter, our planet has more than one name (Terra, Earth). Pretentious or not, the use of names is relatively innocuous ... and may indicate a background of being well-read. Considering how many millions just put Bush back in the White House, being well-read is not a positive attribute in America.
In short, go fuck yourself.
Let me see if I understand this ... a Dutch prosecutor put his entire computer out in the trash for anyone to come by and take? Firing's too good for him. Anyone in his position should know security procedures for document handling. Are you sure he didn't break Dutch law?
That seems logical, but considering the current state of robotics falls far short of being able to autonomously (or even remotely) create a Human base upon the Moon, it is farcical. I say "farcical" since the resources used to make an "Apollo Program" to get robotics to that point, will consume the economic resources to get people to the Moon anyway. If you're going to make an investment to send people into space permanently, you must soon enough send people into space to do everything that can be done with Human presence. This was exactly my point, in that Americans are no longer able to see this truth.
... with some robot assistance, which is the extent of the technology for now and the foreseeable future.
We just don't have the robots to do what you think is possible, hence men have to go. They may well live in glorified tin cans, covered by bulldozed regolith, but they will build all the rest
America lost courage and vision. Sending robots to Luna is another symptom of that loss. What does Humanity need further from the Moon? ... more rock samples? Why? We've rock samples already. But that still doesn't answer the "why".
... since you'll send yourself along to do all the exploring, surveying and construction. If you need robots for occasional and supporting use upon the Lunar surface, then you'll BUILD THEM out of the massive ore body known as the Lunar regolith.
The answer to "why" is not "why not" or "because we can", since those are silly answers when it costs billions to get them. The real answer is "because we're going back there to stay". A larger answer is "because Humanity is expanding into space and the Moon is a good manufacturing center for it".
And if you're going back to Luna to stay, then there's no point in sending robots
America has waged war on the world for decades, sending in troops for brushfire wars. The American CIA has also been involved worldwide for many decades, toppling governments, assassinating influential people, and in general making these areas safe for takeover by American and British corporations.
... since both are under various indictments for war crimes. And might doesn't make right in any moral sense. Which nation demanded exclusion for its citizens from the Int'l Criminal Court? Oh yeah, that's right, America.
... much like you. Let's repeat the facts:
... whatever cover story that Hypercapitalism needs this decade to continue its bloody work). The body counts rise while Americans pointedly don't bother to even care. This can only end badly, and in that end, it really doesn't matter who nukes whom ... everyone will suffer. The entire world is suffering from America's attacks upon the Middle East. The usual American over-reaction is giving "terrorism" all the social fuel it needs to wage its own form of war across the globe. Only a fool hands power to his enemies in such a fashion ... but since it's Christian fanatics vs. Mulsim fanatics, I can only expect this to continue to the bitter end.
... so, call them up and report me so your Gestapo can round me up, ignore the writ of habeas corpus as they've done for many, and let me die in detention. You have a
If you don't know that, you must be indulging in willful ignorance. If you know that and disagree that America has earned violent reprisals from such Imperial acts, then you're just being an Imperial asshole yourself -- incapable of admitting how murderous your government really is.
America is the world's leading terrorist nation and rogue state. The only thing that seperates Kissinger from Pinochet is the American military
Your attitude of ignorance or dismissal has definitely started World War III. Who invaded Iraq in 2002? Oh yeah, that's right, America. Who invaded Afghanistan and, 3 years later, hasn't solved anything there? Oh yeah, that's right, again America.
"75% of Bush voters": If you'd bother to remain informed, instead of choking down the daily propaganda cock of Fox News, you'd have caught the recent poll results which said that about 75% of Bush voters STILL think Iraq was WMD-heaven, and STILL think that Iraq had ties to Al-Qaeda. These voters are completely insane since they live in an "America is great" fantasy world
1. Iraq was no threat to America. Hussein was impotent in the Arab states and the nation was well disarmed after 1991.
2. Bush had publicly stated in 2002 that Osama bin Laden was no longer a priority for him. To date, bin Laden is still not captured, and Al-Qaeda is now as active as it ever was.
3. The invasion of Iraq was actively planned by the Bush team well before 911. To summarize, they were just waiting for a pretext, and American stupidity, fear and lassitude after 911 gave them one.
You're just wrong. Even worse, you plainly know you're wrong. You still want to send the US military across the world to murder people for oil and Israel, while crowing about the bullshit -- the covering falsehoods of "deposing dictators", "stopping WMD programs", and of course "fighting the War on ______" (Communism, Drugs, Terror
The Spaniards had the right idea: pull out of the Imperial military adventure, and treat terrorism as a police matter. As we speak, Spain is investigating and prosecuting their bombers. If only America had the moral fortitude to pursue such a goal.
Isn't it time for you to go and attack another country that had nothing to do with 911? The world is watching, Ace. America condemns itself with every such act, as you condemn yourself with every such utterance in support of it.
You frighten me. Really.
Well, you now have a Homeland Security Department
What you may have implied is that currency volatility between two of the most stable nations on Earth (which share the world's longest, unfortified border) is in fact a sign of marked instability. I think that the USA and Canada both have deep-seated instabilities that are strongly related to a failure of their publics to rein in the worst excesses of Capitalism.
Your attitude has started a conventional form of World War III, and has granted explicit moral permission to kill Americans at home and abroad in various acts of vengeance.
... all this could have been averted if your Beloved Leader King George had actually tried to find and prosecute Osama bin Laden instead of following his family's pet peeve against Saddam Hussein. Iraq had nothing to do with 911, and Hussein is hardly any different a leader than the Saudi royal family or other dictators that the US has supported over the years for Imperial reasons (which included Hussein, BTW).
... and then all your vicious military intercessions come to an abrupt end. Enjoy what YOU have while you can.
And just think
You aren't fooling anyone except about 75% of Bush voters. But Bush voters don't matter when the world has already judged your asinine Imperial policies. What I'm waiting for now is a suitcase nuke to go off somewhere in NYC
We can hardly blame Bush exclusively when the average American consumer is well contributing to the $45B monthly trade deficit.
If you want to "remove a dictator", go get your own rifle, get your own butt over there, and don't spend a dime of my tax money doing it. Hussein was always the Iraqis' problem, not mine, hence you have no right to make it "our problem". Fucknut.