Sloppy handwritting is the result of lazy instructors allowing lazier students to get by with sloppy handwritting.
Not always. Around 15 kids out of a thousand in America have a form of autism that includes dysgraphia, which is a form of nerve damage that doesn't allow them to hold their hand steady, let alone a pencil. That's why the US Military now teaches their snipers to fire with the gun on something solid, like a tripod. Same issue.
For kids with dysgraphia, penmenship *has* to be an optional course- but a good school will replace it with high-speed typing, and require at least 30 WPM to get the same credit. And no amount of teaching will change it- the problem is in the network connection between the brain and the fingers. Usually around 12% packet loss for me.
Get a *really* competent network administrator and some modern media-savvy teachers, and the textbook issue will take care of itself. Heck, you could probably even reduce the poundage in kids backpacks by replacing the laptops with modern 3G cell phones, reducing repetitive strain injuries to young, growing spinal columns the way the current textbook system works.
If private industry were not viable, then what stocks could people own that would be paying out dividends?
Private industry is not viable for American-born workers; we're too expensive and have priced ourselves out of the market. Or to put it another way- C-level executives and stockholders have become so greedy, there's no money left to pay an American Payroll.
Where would the dividends come from?
From the pockets of the working class, whose blood, sweat, and time was used to create the profit. Since Americans, by and large, require more of that profit than elsewhere, private industry is turning elsewhere for workers.
What would the trust fund be making money from?
From the slavery of workers in third world nations, or where they're forced to have laborers here in customer service, from shorting the wages of illegal immigrants.
Or are you talking at a state level, wherein anachronistic labor/business laws cause some states to have third-world economies and rely on govt handouts while others have more sane labor/business laws and thus are forced to indirectly subsidise the third-world states?
That's funny- it's the ones that don't have sane labor/business laws that are currently getting the business- because slavery is always cheaper than paying a living wage.
So the rich in third-world states own stocks in companies that are headquarted in non-third-world states? Perhaps the people in the third-world states should maybe get their govt's to, you know, join the 21st century, or at least the 20th?
It's the other way around- the rich in the first world own businesses that are headquartered here, but do all their business in countries that we are at war with (whether that be the hot, violent kind of war, or the cold, economic kind of war that President Reagan was so good at). Leaving NOTHING for lower-skilled Americans to do. And then when those lower skilled Americans get skills, and demand a wage that includes a dividend on what it cost to get those skills, they just bring in H-1bs, L-1s, and TN visa holders to replace the Americans anyway.
For any child born in America- I say study politics and bureaucracy, because it's the only way you're ever going to be able to hold down a job in the 21st century where human beings are just another commodity- to be used & abused.
Youre kidding...someone asks you where the govt gets the money and your answer is, in effect, that they print it?
That's what a fiat currency is. You claim that the government has no money- I disagree, and my proof is in the signature on the dollar bill in your pocket. It isn't your name- it therefore isn't yours. It was lent to you for a specific purpose- creating a stable economy- and misusing it by saving it instead of spending it is a dereliction of duty on your part.
Well, you seem to take it as a given that people should invest for the purpose of benfiting others rather than themselves...are you saying pork spending should be based on your personal religous beliefs?
Yes. I see no other way that leads to life, liberty, and a pursuit of happiness.
Are the voters not mere mortals as well? If an individual would only invest their money on something that benefits themselves (i.e they are rational), what makes you think that individuals behavior is going to be any different when standing in a voting booth?
The 2000 and 2004 elections proved that- when Red States voted invariably against politicians (not just President) who supported agendas against their economic interest. The reason- lobbyist money spent finding a hole that voters cared more about than economics.
It's just paper, printed up by the FED, who is given the right by Congress to sell it at face value even though it only cost $.04 to print. It's all a lie and a myth in the wide view- but one that is supposed to CREATE JOBS, not end up in savings accounts and 401ks.
No, because I realize that useless pork is like a plague unto our nation.
Anything that provides an American with a job is not useless.
Because those reasons are spurious and insufficient.
Insufficent to whom? Spurious to whom? Certainly not to your fellow citizen who got the job. What's the purpose in having money and a federal government at all?
Oh please. I'm fully aware that we're looking at some serious economic nastiness coming down the pipe (all the more reason to not spend $220M on useless bullshit), but to equate it with the Great Depression just makes you look silly.
It'll be worse. The downturn of 2007 is just the begining: When service industries realize that robots can now replace workers, where will those workers who lose their jobs in house building go?. And if you think it's just science fiction- go take a look at a RECENT McDonald's sometime, and ask yourself where the Dingfries guy is doing now that there's a robot to take his place, or just who is taking your order in the Drive through lane. How long will it be before even that is taken over by a voice recognition system? Most people already order meals by number. This country is heading into a perfect storm that will destroy private industry- and it started 5 years ago.
Of course, since the mandate by that web page is 25% to: conducting the nation's monetary policy by influencing money and credit conditions in the economy in pursuit of full employment and stable prices, I would charge that they've failed in thier mission EVERY YEAR SINCE THEIR INCEPTION, and thus should simply be brought back under the direct control of Congress, who should simply print enough money each year to cover the federal budget. The rest of the economy will get by just fine with no taxes and on the money spent by the federal government- cutting out any need for most of the federal bureaucracy in collecting taxes and fees.
yeah, a handful of contractors and construction workers. I know some out-of-work construction workers. Can I get a couple hundred million federal dollars too?
Talk to your congresscritters- Peter Defazio in my state, in conjunction with my state senator from Beaverton, got us the federal matching funds for the Oregon Transportation Investment Act III, which put construction companies across Oregon which had been sitting idle since the Silicon Forest boom of the 1990s back to work- and financed an upgrade of information technology that got me back to work after the depression of 2001.
You can give 220 million to anyone and come up with some reasons it might benefit me.
Yes, so why would you object to the Alaskans in particular?
But I'm not moving to Alaska when I retire,
Millions of your fellow Californicators do- driving those of us who like the rural Pacific Northwest lifestyle crazy.
and if 220 million is the only thing keeping Alaska from crumbling and sending their teeming thousands to California to take all our jobs away with their superior Alaskan hardiness and bear wrestling skills, I contend that we've already lost that particular battle.
We're damned close to losing that battle- and it's not just Alaska either. Now that the housing bubble is bursting, we'll be damned lucky not to have a repeat of 1931 on our hands.
Call me back when we've got a depression like we did in the 30s. We can talk about pointless public works projects then.
Not at all, I think there is a LOT of leeway on certain things such as military bases and airports and whatnot (as an example) where choosing one district over another can make zero difference to the country, but impacts locals significantly.
Then that isn't "zero difference to the country". If more locals benefit in one place than another, that can affect all sorts of other things in interstate trade as the workers in that district spend money. Anyplace that the federal government spends money, creates consumers for other businesses.
The problem, and why it is called pork, is that there are ridiculously local issues/constraints attached to significant, real bills.
At times, yes- if you take only a short term/local/single subject view. But the point is while such a view is tempting, it's blinding you to the forest fire for examining a single tree. The real problem with pork ain't in the local people who benefit- because they simply become consumers for the rest of the nation. It's the people who take federal money who don't become consumers that are the problem.
I think Obama should sponser a bill to change the name from the Ted Stevens Bridge to Troll Bridge.
Might be good- it would certainly point out another obvious way to fund it!
Why should I, Joe California Taxpayer, have to pay some Alaskan ironworker to build a bridge no one wants or needs?
Actually, certain people do need and want it- but here's the 2 ways it benefits you, personally: 1. Gives you a place to retire to when they build those McMansions on the island, conviently located within easy travel of an airport. 2. Prevents Alaska's economy from going so far down in the deep end that the Alaskans head south to take your job away.
I have no problem with many public works projects, but I draw the line at simply building useless crap to keep people busy.
Read the full description of the bridge- it wasn't just to keep people busy, it was to provide a link between several acres of developable land and the airport. The other bridge in the same bill had the same purpose- giving Anchorage a place to expand into. You're from California, you should be familiar with suburban sprawl.
Well, then let the state print it's own money and spend it. That would be the easy way to cut the feds out of the loop. You could even pass a law that says your money will not be honored in other states, keeping it all at home. The money belongs to the feds, that's why such large investments must come from the people who own the money.
Well, shit, let's just all get higher-paying jobs with the government then.
It seems to be the only opportunity left, unless you were born with a trust fund in a family where stocks make up a significant portion of family income. Certainly private industry is no longer an opportunity for the majority of Americans.
Taking your ideas to their logical conclusion, we should give all of our money to the federal government, as it will invest it more wisely than any of us mere mortals can. Pretty ingenious idea; I wonder why it's never been tried before.
Mere mortals only invest in what benefits them. Unfortuneately, so do congresscritters- to do this right the voice of the voters has to be stronger than the voice of the lobbyist. Until that happens- well, no economic system works very well.
Which is the problem with pork: it does something for the local people and businesses.
What's wrong with actually doing something for US Citizens, as opposed to the traitors known as international corporations?
The money ought to come from Alaska's state budget. I hope that's obvious. But it's a lot harder to find $223 million in a state's budget than in the fed's. Pretty much the only way Alaska could come up with that money is to increase taxes. There's no way that Alaskan taxpayers would approve a tax increase for such a stupid cause. So instead the politicians try to get the money from the fed's budget, where $223 mil is a drop in the bucket. It's essentially "free money" for a state like Alaska: of that entire sum, I'd be surprised if more than $1 mil came from Alaska due to its low population and relatively small economy.
An economy that won't get any bigger without investment. By the time they're done with that deal, the taxes on the McMansions alone will provide far more than the $223 mil. Which is why I say people against pork are rather shortsighted.
Remember also that if all pork were eliminated, the feds could lower the income tax rate and not "lose money" (i.e. the deficit wouldn't increase).
Income would decrease greatly though, lowering the reciepts from income tax still further.
States could then institute or increase local income taxes without affecting the overall tax burden at all. The added revenues could be directed to improving schools, paying cops better wages, fixing the roads, etc. And because it's local politicians making those decisions and not Congressmen who've never even been to Alaska, the politicians can be more easily held accountable. (If a Senator from Massachusetts votes to reduce federal funding to the state of Alaska, there's absolutely nothing that Alaskan voters can do about it.)
Well, there is that- the antifederalist stance. But couldn't a state do that anyway by printing their own money?
I do get the impression that your tongue was at least partly in your cheek, but I wanted to make sure folks know why pork is bad. If you look at the list of pork projects, none of the seem bad... until you start to wonder why a taxpayer in Minnesota should have to pay to maintain local roads in Pennsylvania.
Well, we're either all in this together- and should hang together as Americans- or we're all separate states- in which case we're better off disbanding the federal government altogether. In the first case pork is good- it provides local jobs, which keeps the people from Pennsylvania from attacking Minnesota and stealing their land, just to find a place to raise food and survive. In the second case pork is bad- because it gives the federal government a reason for existing.
All elected officials should act in the best interests of their constituents- and that IS the best interests of the country as a whole. To do any less incites rebellion and civil war.
The problem comes in when the pork doesn't go to the consituents- but instead to a K-Street contractor- which is why we need this database, to see who gets the contract. The Pork itself isn't that bad. It's who gets the contract that can turn it bad.
The problem with pork is that it is wealth redistribution with the sole purpose of benefiting those in power.
If the benefit is to gain votes, that's fine with me. If the benefit is to build a bigger campaign chest through bribery from corporations, that's less OK with me. But that's a matter of campaign finance reform, not pork reform.
Federal funds are collected from the taxes of citizens of every state (and via printing money as you point out).
Actually, the way it's currently set up, the FED is separate and pays no taxes, which to me is a problem as well, but once again a separate one from Pork.
However, federal funds are not distributed equally to every state, and pork is by definition a frivolous expense.
To me, nothing that provides an American with a job in the current economic war we're embroiled in thanks to the WTO is a frivolous expense. It's the federal government's duty to provide for the common welfare- all the better if we get infrastructure improvements in return. NOT to do projects like this is derelection of duty on the part of the government.
Quick note: in theory that might be true, but then in theory if this happened on a regular basis, everyone would concentrate EVEN MORE on getting elected, and do EVEN LESS for the people once they got in, because they'd know that re-election was unlikely if not impossible -- even if they did a good job.
The funny thing about that is that what most people term Pork Spending, IS doing something for the local people and businesses. You can't tell me that a $223 million project like Ted Steven's "Bridge to Nowhere" didn't mean a hell of a lot of local jobs for an area of only 8050 people- not to mention the jobs it would have created on that little tiny island building vacation McMansions for people from the lower 48 once the island was joined to the airport.
Pork is just jobs for Americans, and is no problem at all. The real problem is that taxes are taken out of property and income instead of directly from the FED for the crime of printing money.
Rarely results in the solution we want, only the solution we can describe. This mother's witch hunt to blame her daughter's death on the internet instead of on the idiot who strangled her is creating far more than she hoped for.
Sure, it's likely that in a fully DRM-free Internet age that musicians won't be mega-millionaires, but I consider that a good thing.
It will likely even lead to better music- art is always better when there is suffering involved for the artist. That's why modern RAP music has lost so much of it's edge- you can't sing about poverty if you have enough gold around your neck to feed a small third world nation.
Having said that- it's within the realm of possibility that an economic system based on scarcity (which is what the original article is really talking about) will become outdated within our lifetimes. The answer is that we need a new economic system- one that isn't based on scarcity. http://www.freecycle.org/ has the right idea- but we need to expand it.
Anybody using these with X10 wall switches? For multi-socket fixtures, a single incandescant and the rest CF bulbs work, but I'd like to go all CF if at all possible.
The problem is that if copyright is not "transferrable", who gets credit for collaborative efforts? Who shall retain the copyright to say the "Lord of the Rings" movies that were made? Tolkein's heirs? Jackson? The script writers? Set designers? Actors? All these people helped make it, so unless you plan on equally splitting the copyright between every one of them (hence making it impossible to do ANYTHING with it unless everyone aggrees), then copyright has to either go to the person that paid for creation of a work, or be transferable.
No, that's what royalties are for- another artist can make use of the first artist's work for a negotiated royalty. Actual copyright ownership of the original work, would stay with Tolkien, and evaporate upon his death OR at 25 years, whichever came first. Heirs get nothing. Corporations get nothing. Actors, set designers, and the like for colaborative situations get their own "partial copyrights" on their work alone- and get royalty payments for 25 years or their lifetime, whichever comes first.
This is not a jab against your stance BTW. I'm actually against copyright (or at a minimum I'd like to see the current system stay in place but terms reduced to a non-renewable 10 years). I'm just saying that the "non-transferrable" idea won't really work for modern creations.
I'm fine with 25- but we have computers now and can figure out percentage contributions to the finished work, which would dictate royalties owed to copyright holders of certain portions of the final work. And before anybody asks- I would have prefered this method to the worthless stock options I got when I was in private industry.
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Sloppy handwritting is the result of lazy instructors allowing lazier students to get by with sloppy handwritting.
Not always. Around 15 kids out of a thousand in America have a form of autism that includes dysgraphia, which is a form of nerve damage that doesn't allow them to hold their hand steady, let alone a pencil. That's why the US Military now teaches their snipers to fire with the gun on something solid, like a tripod. Same issue.
For kids with dysgraphia, penmenship *has* to be an optional course- but a good school will replace it with high-speed typing, and require at least 30 WPM to get the same credit. And no amount of teaching will change it- the problem is in the network connection between the brain and the fingers. Usually around 12% packet loss for me.
Get a *really* competent network administrator and some modern media-savvy teachers, and the textbook issue will take care of itself. Heck, you could probably even reduce the poundage in kids backpacks by replacing the laptops with modern 3G cell phones, reducing repetitive strain injuries to young, growing spinal columns the way the current textbook system works.
If private industry were not viable, then what stocks could people own that would be paying out dividends?
Private industry is not viable for American-born workers; we're too expensive and have priced ourselves out of the market. Or to put it another way- C-level executives and stockholders have become so greedy, there's no money left to pay an American Payroll.
Where would the dividends come from?
From the pockets of the working class, whose blood, sweat, and time was used to create the profit. Since Americans, by and large, require more of that profit than elsewhere, private industry is turning elsewhere for workers.
What would the trust fund be making money from?
From the slavery of workers in third world nations, or where they're forced to have laborers here in customer service, from shorting the wages of illegal immigrants.
Or are you talking at a state level, wherein anachronistic labor/business laws cause some states to have third-world economies and rely on govt handouts while others have more sane labor/business laws and thus are forced to indirectly subsidise the third-world states?
That's funny- it's the ones that don't have sane labor/business laws that are currently getting the business- because slavery is always cheaper than paying a living wage.
So the rich in third-world states own stocks in companies that are headquarted in non-third-world states? Perhaps the people in the third-world states should maybe get their govt's to, you know, join the 21st century, or at least the 20th?
It's the other way around- the rich in the first world own businesses that are headquartered here, but do all their business in countries that we are at war with (whether that be the hot, violent kind of war, or the cold, economic kind of war that President Reagan was so good at). Leaving NOTHING for lower-skilled Americans to do. And then when those lower skilled Americans get skills, and demand a wage that includes a dividend on what it cost to get those skills, they just bring in H-1bs, L-1s, and TN visa holders to replace the Americans anyway.
For any child born in America- I say study politics and bureaucracy, because it's the only way you're ever going to be able to hold down a job in the 21st century where human beings are just another commodity- to be used & abused.
Youre kidding...someone asks you where the govt gets the money and your answer is, in effect, that they print it?
That's what a fiat currency is. You claim that the government has no money- I disagree, and my proof is in the signature on the dollar bill in your pocket. It isn't your name- it therefore isn't yours. It was lent to you for a specific purpose- creating a stable economy- and misusing it by saving it instead of spending it is a dereliction of duty on your part.
Well, you seem to take it as a given that people should invest for the purpose of benfiting others rather than themselves...are you saying pork spending should be based on your personal religous beliefs?
Yes. I see no other way that leads to life, liberty, and a pursuit of happiness.
Are the voters not mere mortals as well? If an individual would only invest their money on something that benefits themselves (i.e they are rational), what makes you think that individuals behavior is going to be any different when standing in a voting booth?
The 2000 and 2004 elections proved that- when Red States voted invariably against politicians (not just President) who supported agendas against their economic interest. The reason- lobbyist money spent finding a hole that voters cared more about than economics.
Where do you think federal money comes from?
It's just paper, printed up by the FED, who is given the right by Congress to sell it at face value even though it only cost $.04 to print. It's all a lie and a myth in the wide view- but one that is supposed to CREATE JOBS, not end up in savings accounts and 401ks.
No, because I realize that useless pork is like a plague unto our nation.
Anything that provides an American with a job is not useless.
Because those reasons are spurious and insufficient.
Insufficent to whom? Spurious to whom? Certainly not to your fellow citizen who got the job. What's the purpose in having money and a federal government at all?
Oh please. I'm fully aware that we're looking at some serious economic nastiness coming down the pipe (all the more reason to not spend $220M on useless bullshit), but to equate it with the Great Depression just makes you look silly.
It'll be worse. The downturn of 2007 is just the begining: When service industries realize that robots can now replace workers, where will those workers who lose their jobs in house building go?. And if you think it's just science fiction- go take a look at a RECENT McDonald's sometime, and ask yourself where the Dingfries guy is doing now that there's a robot to take his place, or just who is taking your order in the Drive through lane. How long will it be before even that is taken over by a voice recognition system? Most people already order meals by number. This country is heading into a perfect storm that will destroy private industry- and it started 5 years ago.
Of course, since the mandate by that web page is 25% to: conducting the nation's monetary policy by influencing money and credit conditions in the economy in pursuit of full employment and stable prices, I would charge that they've failed in thier mission EVERY YEAR SINCE THEIR INCEPTION, and thus should simply be brought back under the direct control of Congress, who should simply print enough money each year to cover the federal budget. The rest of the economy will get by just fine with no taxes and on the money spent by the federal government- cutting out any need for most of the federal bureaucracy in collecting taxes and fees.
yeah, a handful of contractors and construction workers. I know some out-of-work construction workers. Can I get a couple hundred million federal dollars too?
Talk to your congresscritters- Peter Defazio in my state, in conjunction with my state senator from Beaverton, got us the federal matching funds for the Oregon Transportation Investment Act III, which put construction companies across Oregon which had been sitting idle since the Silicon Forest boom of the 1990s back to work- and financed an upgrade of information technology that got me back to work after the depression of 2001.
You can give 220 million to anyone and come up with some reasons it might benefit me.
Yes, so why would you object to the Alaskans in particular?
But I'm not moving to Alaska when I retire,
Millions of your fellow Californicators do- driving those of us who like the rural Pacific Northwest lifestyle crazy.
and if 220 million is the only thing keeping Alaska from crumbling and sending their teeming thousands to California to take all our jobs away with their superior Alaskan hardiness and bear wrestling skills, I contend that we've already lost that particular battle.
We're damned close to losing that battle- and it's not just Alaska either. Now that the housing bubble is bursting, we'll be damned lucky not to have a repeat of 1931 on our hands.
Call me back when we've got a depression like we did in the 30s. We can talk about pointless public works projects then.
Aparently you've missed the recent news.
Not at all, I think there is a LOT of leeway on certain things such as military bases and airports and whatnot (as an example) where choosing one district over another can make zero difference to the country, but impacts locals significantly.
Then that isn't "zero difference to the country". If more locals benefit in one place than another, that can affect all sorts of other things in interstate trade as the workers in that district spend money. Anyplace that the federal government spends money, creates consumers for other businesses.
The problem, and why it is called pork, is that there are ridiculously local issues/constraints attached to significant, real bills.
At times, yes- if you take only a short term/local/single subject view. But the point is while such a view is tempting, it's blinding you to the forest fire for examining a single tree. The real problem with pork ain't in the local people who benefit- because they simply become consumers for the rest of the nation. It's the people who take federal money who don't become consumers that are the problem.
I think Obama should sponser a bill to change the name from the Ted Stevens Bridge to Troll Bridge.
Might be good- it would certainly point out another obvious way to fund it!
Why should I, Joe California Taxpayer, have to pay some Alaskan ironworker to build a bridge no one wants or needs?
Actually, certain people do need and want it- but here's the 2 ways it benefits you, personally:
1. Gives you a place to retire to when they build those McMansions on the island, conviently located within easy travel of an airport.
2. Prevents Alaska's economy from going so far down in the deep end that the Alaskans head south to take your job away.
I have no problem with many public works projects, but I draw the line at simply building useless crap to keep people busy.
Read the full description of the bridge- it wasn't just to keep people busy, it was to provide a link between several acres of developable land and the airport. The other bridge in the same bill had the same purpose- giving Anchorage a place to expand into. You're from California, you should be familiar with suburban sprawl.
Well, then let the state print it's own money and spend it. That would be the easy way to cut the feds out of the loop. You could even pass a law that says your money will not be honored in other states, keeping it all at home. The money belongs to the feds, that's why such large investments must come from the people who own the money.
Well, shit, let's just all get higher-paying jobs with the government then.
It seems to be the only opportunity left, unless you were born with a trust fund in a family where stocks make up a significant portion of family income. Certainly private industry is no longer an opportunity for the majority of Americans.
Taking your ideas to their logical conclusion, we should give all of our money to the federal government, as it will invest it more wisely than any of us mere mortals can. Pretty ingenious idea; I wonder why it's never been tried before.
Mere mortals only invest in what benefits them. Unfortuneately, so do congresscritters- to do this right the voice of the voters has to be stronger than the voice of the lobbyist. Until that happens- well, no economic system works very well.
Hey, that makes my strategy of quickly responding to business e-mail (and putting personal e-mail on a lower, 24-hour cycle) correct!
A growing economy is good for everybody- no matter who originally benefits- and is well worth the inflation that it costs.
Which is the problem with pork: it does something for the local people and businesses.
What's wrong with actually doing something for US Citizens, as opposed to the traitors known as international corporations?
The money ought to come from Alaska's state budget. I hope that's obvious. But it's a lot harder to find $223 million in a state's budget than in the fed's. Pretty much the only way Alaska could come up with that money is to increase taxes. There's no way that Alaskan taxpayers would approve a tax increase for such a stupid cause. So instead the politicians try to get the money from the fed's budget, where $223 mil is a drop in the bucket. It's essentially "free money" for a state like Alaska: of that entire sum, I'd be surprised if more than $1 mil came from Alaska due to its low population and relatively small economy.
An economy that won't get any bigger without investment. By the time they're done with that deal, the taxes on the McMansions alone will provide far more than the $223 mil. Which is why I say people against pork are rather shortsighted.
Remember also that if all pork were eliminated, the feds could lower the income tax rate and not "lose money" (i.e. the deficit wouldn't increase).
Income would decrease greatly though, lowering the reciepts from income tax still further.
States could then institute or increase local income taxes without affecting the overall tax burden at all. The added revenues could be directed to improving schools, paying cops better wages, fixing the roads, etc. And because it's local politicians making those decisions and not Congressmen who've never even been to Alaska, the politicians can be more easily held accountable. (If a Senator from Massachusetts votes to reduce federal funding to the state of Alaska, there's absolutely nothing that Alaskan voters can do about it.)
Well, there is that- the antifederalist stance. But couldn't a state do that anyway by printing their own money?
I do get the impression that your tongue was at least partly in your cheek, but I wanted to make sure folks know why pork is bad. If you look at the list of pork projects, none of the seem bad... until you start to wonder why a taxpayer in Minnesota should have to pay to maintain local roads in Pennsylvania.
Well, we're either all in this together- and should hang together as Americans- or we're all separate states- in which case we're better off disbanding the federal government altogether. In the first case pork is good- it provides local jobs, which keeps the people from Pennsylvania from attacking Minnesota and stealing their land, just to find a place to raise food and survive. In the second case pork is bad- because it gives the federal government a reason for existing.
All elected officials should act in the best interests of their constituents- and that IS the best interests of the country as a whole. To do any less incites rebellion and civil war.
The problem comes in when the pork doesn't go to the consituents- but instead to a K-Street contractor- which is why we need this database, to see who gets the contract. The Pork itself isn't that bad. It's who gets the contract that can turn it bad.
The problem with pork is that it is wealth redistribution with the sole purpose of benefiting those in power.
If the benefit is to gain votes, that's fine with me. If the benefit is to build a bigger campaign chest through bribery from corporations, that's less OK with me. But that's a matter of campaign finance reform, not pork reform.
Federal funds are collected from the taxes of citizens of every state (and via printing money as you point out).
Actually, the way it's currently set up, the FED is separate and pays no taxes, which to me is a problem as well, but once again a separate one from Pork.
However, federal funds are not distributed equally to every state, and pork is by definition a frivolous expense.
To me, nothing that provides an American with a job in the current economic war we're embroiled in thanks to the WTO is a frivolous expense. It's the federal government's duty to provide for the common welfare- all the better if we get infrastructure improvements in return. NOT to do projects like this is derelection of duty on the part of the government.
Quick note: in theory that might be true, but then in theory if this happened on a regular basis, everyone would concentrate EVEN MORE on getting elected, and do EVEN LESS for the people once they got in, because they'd know that re-election was unlikely if not impossible -- even if they did a good job.
The funny thing about that is that what most people term Pork Spending, IS doing something for the local people and businesses. You can't tell me that a $223 million project like Ted Steven's "Bridge to Nowhere" didn't mean a hell of a lot of local jobs for an area of only 8050 people- not to mention the jobs it would have created on that little tiny island building vacation McMansions for people from the lower 48 once the island was joined to the airport.
Pork is just jobs for Americans, and is no problem at all. The real problem is that taxes are taken out of property and income instead of directly from the FED for the crime of printing money.
Rarely results in the solution we want, only the solution we can describe. This mother's witch hunt to blame her daughter's death on the internet instead of on the idiot who strangled her is creating far more than she hoped for.
Sure, it's likely that in a fully DRM-free Internet age that musicians won't be mega-millionaires, but I consider that a good thing.
It will likely even lead to better music- art is always better when there is suffering involved for the artist. That's why modern RAP music has lost so much of it's edge- you can't sing about poverty if you have enough gold around your neck to feed a small third world nation.
Having said that- it's within the realm of possibility that an economic system based on scarcity (which is what the original article is really talking about) will become outdated within our lifetimes. The answer is that we need a new economic system- one that isn't based on scarcity. http://www.freecycle.org/ has the right idea- but we need to expand it.
Anybody using these with X10 wall switches? For multi-socket fixtures, a single incandescant and the rest CF bulbs work, but I'd like to go all CF if at all possible.
The problem is that if copyright is not "transferrable", who gets credit for collaborative efforts? Who shall retain the copyright to say the "Lord of the Rings" movies that were made? Tolkein's heirs? Jackson? The script writers? Set designers? Actors? All these people helped make it, so unless you plan on equally splitting the copyright between every one of them (hence making it impossible to do ANYTHING with it unless everyone aggrees), then copyright has to either go to the person that paid for creation of a work, or be transferable.
No, that's what royalties are for- another artist can make use of the first artist's work for a negotiated royalty. Actual copyright ownership of the original work, would stay with Tolkien, and evaporate upon his death OR at 25 years, whichever came first. Heirs get nothing. Corporations get nothing. Actors, set designers, and the like for colaborative situations get their own "partial copyrights" on their work alone- and get royalty payments for 25 years or their lifetime, whichever comes first.
This is not a jab against your stance BTW. I'm actually against copyright (or at a minimum I'd like to see the current system stay in place but terms reduced to a non-renewable 10 years). I'm just saying that the "non-transferrable" idea won't really work for modern creations.
I'm fine with 25- but we have computers now and can figure out percentage contributions to the finished work, which would dictate royalties owed to copyright holders of certain portions of the final work. And before anybody asks- I would have prefered this method to the worthless stock options I got when I was in private industry.