Really? Pray tell, where in the Bible are Christians forbidden to own slaves? Because as far as I can tell, slavery isn't dealt with at length in the New Testament. Indeed, as that page points out, Paul even returns a slave to his master, despite the fact that that's apparently forbidden in the Old Testament. Further, the whole thing is generally relatively positive about the subject of slavery, with Jesus apparently even enjoining slaves to follow their masters the same way they follow God, which is what I meant about "the full support of the Bible and their pastors".
Of course, despite forbidding the return of runaway slaves in one section, another part of the Bible says that it's totally okay to have them (I guess you just can't go after runaways?) as long as they're not Israelites; Leviticus 25:39 - 55 lays this out. Israelis are not allowed to become slaves, but anyone else? They're totally fair game (Lev 25:44). Of course, bringing up Leviticus is kind of cheating, because it's just chock full of bullshit; even Christians only use parts of it to support their arguments, they don't pay attention to the mixed fibers or shellfish provisions.
So let's look at Exodus, shall we? There, God apparently amended the whole "Israelis aren't allowed to be slaves" thing; now, they can be enslaved, but only for seven years. Of course, if your master decides to keep your wife and children hostage, they can force you to become a slave permanently (Exodus 21:2-6) - and female slaves don't have the whole "seven year escape clause" thing going for them (Exodus 21:7). Clearly, this means that slaves are A-OK in the OT, and even (effectively) hostage holding. Did anything change in the NT? Well, I think that's your side of the argument, isn't it?
But that's all Exodus and Leviticus and the Old Testament and shit - none of that matters to Christians, right? It was all just silly Jewish antics; Jesus changed everything, right? So clearly, Christians throughout history have refrained from owning slaves, right? Well no, not really; indeed, in the 14th century, Pope Nicholas V issued a papal bull legitimizing the slave trade in West Africa - he said basically "Okay Portugal (which incidentally was and is a Christian nation), you can go a conquerin' in West Africa, and anyone you defeat is slaves forever".
Would a Christian - and not just any Christian, but the pope himself - have said something like that if you couldn't make a good case for Christians being allowed to own slaves?
But please, feel free to make your case that Christians are forbidden to own slaves - make sure you cite your sources, though. I'm sorry I didn't do that in the first place.
You know what the Christian Bible says about slavery, right? It is in no way prohibited; indeed, moral, God-fearing Christians have been slave owners, with the full support of the Bible and their pastors behind them.
All religions hail from times when that sort of thing was appropriate; don't single out the Muslims simply because they actually follow their holy book's teachings, instead of conveniently forgetting about the nastier bits.
I would say - well, you need specialized equipment to pick up things in the visible electromagnetic spectrum. It's just that most people have them, they're called "eyes".
However, you might argue, most people don't have the specalized equipment required to pick up 2.4 GHz signals, so it's different.
Aha, I would say - nowadays, I wouldn't be surprised if a significant fraction of the population has the equipment necessary to pick up 2.4 GHz signals sitting in their pockets, or in their backpacks.
The problem with saying "you can't look at it without specialized equipment, therefore it should be private" is that in this case, the "specialized equipment" is getting less and less specialized.
But how are gift cards any better, though? They're just cash you can only use at one store. I don't get why cash is not okay but gift cards are.
It amounts to I am compelled to give you a gift but I don't know anything about you at all
How about, "I like you and I want to give you a gift, but unfortunately I don't know you very well"? You're assuming the person giving cash is compelled to give a gift, and thus choose cash out of laziness - instead of wanting to give a gift, and choosing cash for its universal utility.
Teenagers who have a social life that is driven by peer validation, rather than, say, quality of social interaction or deep interest in a certain activity, are more likely to have sex and/or engage in risk taking behaviors in an attempt to impress those peers.
What exactly is wrong with teenagers having sex? I'm entirely unclear as to why this is considered a universally bad thing. Just make sure they know about STDs and how to use condoms, and let them go to town. It won't hurt.
Letting teenagers drive, on the other hand - that is a bad fucking idea. Way, way more teenagers die or get injured because they suck at driving than because they're having sex.
It's so weird how badly weighted our society's sense of danger is.
Yeah, I just don't understand why it's not socially acceptable to just send people cash.
In fact, I'd imagine that starting from first principles (i.e, without all the millions of dollars companies have put into marketing them) it would be far less acceptable to give gift cards than to give cash - because when you give someone a gift card, you're essentially saying "I don't trust you to not go out and buy drugs or get a tattoo or do something else I don't approve of with this cash, so I will instead force you to spend the money at a store that I know does not sell anything I disapprove of".
I mean, really. Gift cards are like cash, except stupider unless you're the company that's issuing them (you give me money now and then spend that credit later? I'd take that offer any day of the week and twice on Sundays; this is, in fact, why Costco sells packs like $100 worth of Starbucks gift cards for $80).
Uh dude, if Aunt Mildred is just ordering me some shit off of Amazon and not picking it out in a physical store and shipping it (or, *gasp*, bringing it over herself), she doesn't expect gratitude and respect for her gift. If it's going to be such a hands-off and clinical transaction as "I ordered this pair of socks for you from Amazon", then hell yeah I want to be able to convert that to cash instead - it's what I would have wanted to do anyway.
And by the way, looking a gift horse in the mouth would have really, really helped the people of Troy.
Yeah, exactly - I'm not allowed to go on to your property to peer in your windows, but if you have a giant blazing electronic marquee on top of your house that displays exactly what's being shown on your monitor at all times, I am allowed to photograph it from the street.
This is exactly what an unencrypted wireless network is, with two exceptions: it's your network traffic, not your monitor, and it's not in the visible spectrum so people don't pay attention to it (out of sight, out of mind after all).
Google did nothing wrong in this case, though what they did may have been ill-considered (for instance, it's trivial to determine if a wireless network is encrypted or not; if it's not encrypted, don't store anything besides the positional stuff and wireless MAC).
Uhm, I hope you realize that the second largest shareholder (not donor, actual owner of the company) of Fox News is a Saudi Arabian prince who, according to Fox News, may have ties with terrorists?
Look, just because people give money to causes they approve of doesn't automatically make those causes suspect. You should also critically examine the material they put out, not just who funds them.
If they believe that they're idiots, I mean one of the first things God said to Adam and Eve was "if you eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge you will surely die".
They didn't die, he's a liar. Christians try to wiggle out of this one by claiming some sort of spiritual "death" happened, but that's bullshit - if you can have kids and become the progenitors of the entire goddamn (literally! hah!) human race, you're just not fucking dead.
(Also they didn't exist in the first place, which makes the whole question of original sin kinda nonsensical - I mean, did Jesus die for a metaphor? - but that's entirely besides the point)
On the other hand, I've disassembled my current laptop all the way down to the motherboard in order to replace the heatsink/heatpipe/fan assembly. It was a $60 part and ~1 hour of my labor to save a $2000 laptop, so it was definitely worthwhile.
Actually, this is very well established - random rewards build habits far more efficiently than consistent rewards. It's how people get addicted to gambling.
Basically, this emergent situation that's been created where sometimes pushing a button has a positive, rewarding effect and sometimes it doesn't is perfect for ensuring that all buttons get pushed.
What, pray tell, is baroque about "set it at the temperature you want"?
It's not like these things are stupid - they're controlling AC for the entire building, for goodness' sakes - so lying to them and saying "I want it to be 60 degrees in the middle of summer when it's 90 degrees outside" isn't going to get you anything.
I mean, what do you think is more reasonable in the following situation: it's 90 degrees outside, and someone sets the thermostat in a large office to 60 degrees.
Do you think:
1) Oh someone really wants 60 degrees in the middle of summer! I'd better waste a shitload of energy making that happen! Or - 2) Someone accidentally bumped the thermostat and turned the temperature way down, or someone's kids got at it, or something - they don't really want 60 degrees, I'll just leave it where it is.
Because every once in a while, an idiot who walks in to an emergency room with a headache actually has a treatable condition that would have otherwise been fatal. Right there, you've just saved someone's life - and gained a lifetime's worth of tax revenues, that now help pay for you.
If the stuff you're pushing worked the way you say it would, the doctor would be recommending it.
However, as it turns out, the research on whether or not magnesium helps with high blood pressure is inconclusive; this article seems to have a reasonable layman's summary of what's going on. Therefore, the doctor cannot in good conscience recommend that the guy take magnesium pills, as they may or may not work (for the same reason why doctors can't prescribe placebos, despite their occasional effectiveness).
Furthermore, look at the "Should I take oral magnesium supplements" and "What are good dietary sources of magnesium" sections - dietary magnesium supplements just don't work, you need to get it as part of your food. What food contains magnesium? Healthy food. What part of the doctor's recommendation are you leaving out? A diet change. No doctor would just prescribe blood pressure pills without also including a dietary intervention, that's only treating the symptoms without treating the underlying problem. This is actually something alt-med people love to accuse doctors of, probably because everyone just hears "pills" but doesn't pay attention to the "and here's how you should improve your diet, and some exercises you can do" bit. Either you or your friend didn't pay attention to the part where the doctor recommended lifestyle changes, because he certainly did (and if he didn't, he is being remiss in his care).
So why recommend blood pressure pills in the first place, if the real treatment is going to be a change in diet and exercise? Because high blood pressure is a danger now, while diet and exercise will cure the problem later (if at all - to be quite honest, few people manage to make permanent healthy lifestyle changes. It's really sad, but that's the way it is). Ideally, your friend would start taking the blood pressure pills immediately, then start in on changing his diet and getting more exercise and eventually wean himself off the pills once his blood pressure gets to a normal level.
As for potassium bicarbonate, the Cigna page on it says that you should tell your doctor if you have high blood pressure and intend to take it, as there may be side effects. The only study on its effects that I could find was this one, which had positive results but was little more than a pilot study (14 people). Further research is needed before a doctor can really recommend supplementation with potassium bicarbonate (especially when just eating more fruits and vegetables already has a significant effect, which is probably why there's been little research in this area - there's no need to recommend expensive supplements when the patient can just eat better).
There is something I don't understand in your post, though: you say that taking these alternative supplements is good, because it deprives the pharmaceutical complex of years of income (despite the fact that ideally you'd stop taking the blood pressure pills at some point) - but as your alternative, you recommend taking magnesium and potassium bicarbonate supplements. Do those poof into existence from thin air? No, they're sold by the "supplemental" complex - and you're recommending giving them years of income for treating high blood pressure, despite (again) the fact that the real treatment lies in a lifestyle change. You're basically saying "don't buy stuff that we know works from those guys, buy stuff that may or may not work from these other guys".
I wonder who is treating the symptoms here, and not addressing the causes?
And what exactly is wrong with that? I thought one of the wonders of capitalism was that although some people might have a smaller slice of the pie, the pie itself is always growing. Well, in your example, the pie has just grown by $12. Isn't that something we should be celebrating, not suing over?
The standard of any kind of journalism is explaining things in a manner in which your audience will understand it. Laypeople--and in the technical community that is Slashdot, I am referring to geeks who don't necessarily know or care about all of the technical intricacies of video codecs--see the headline and think...
"what the fuck is HTML5 and what does it have to do with my iPhone?"
Seriously, you're speaking from a position of knowledge. You know that HTML 5 isn't a video standard, but that it is a standard the iPhone can understand. Most people don't know that, and don't even care. Thus, the reporter writing that this app transcodes video into HTML5 is just more confusing, not less - a better wording would have been to simply leave out the "HTML 5" part, and just put down something like,
...when a user clicks on a Flash video the Skyfire app downloads the Flash video on Skyfire's server where the video is decoded and then delivered to the iOS device...
The journalist put "HTML 5" in there because it sounds technical, not for clarity. The Skyfire rep he talked to could have said "we download the video, reverse the tachyon field and reconfigure the deflector dish, delivering it straight to your iPhone" and the journalist would have written,
...when a user clicks on a Flash video the Skyfire app downloads the Flash video on Skyfire's server where the video's tachyons are reversed, then has its deflector dish reconfigured and is delivered to an iOS device...
Basically, the GP is right to complain; this is indicative of some pretty non-existent journalism standards, be they technical or not.
If your business site requires Flash to view (specifically, the "no Flash==blank page" type), you're not getting my business whether I'm "out and about" with my iPhone...
This is actually a huge problem. My wife and I like going to small, local restaurants; unfortunately about seven times out of ten they have some bullshit webpage that was apparently made by a monkey who only understood Flash, so her iPhone can't look at the menu or hours or location. It is incredibly frustrating. Fortunately my N900 can usually handle the Flash well enough that we can get what we want, but it's still such a retarded choice.
The collapse started before 2008. Just look at Wikipedia's article on the sub-prime mortgage crisis - its root was in easy credit that was available during 2002 to 2004.
It's not like people bought mortgages and then couldn't pay them all in 2008; all that shit had been brewing since 2000.
Slashdot Mirror
You can't put a price on the value of an education. So stop charging for them.
See? My position reduces to a pithy little remark too!
Really? Pray tell, where in the Bible are Christians forbidden to own slaves? Because as far as I can tell, slavery isn't dealt with at length in the New Testament. Indeed, as that page points out, Paul even returns a slave to his master, despite the fact that that's apparently forbidden in the Old Testament. Further, the whole thing is generally relatively positive about the subject of slavery, with Jesus apparently even enjoining slaves to follow their masters the same way they follow God, which is what I meant about "the full support of the Bible and their pastors".
Of course, despite forbidding the return of runaway slaves in one section, another part of the Bible says that it's totally okay to have them (I guess you just can't go after runaways?) as long as they're not Israelites; Leviticus 25:39 - 55 lays this out. Israelis are not allowed to become slaves, but anyone else? They're totally fair game (Lev 25:44). Of course, bringing up Leviticus is kind of cheating, because it's just chock full of bullshit; even Christians only use parts of it to support their arguments, they don't pay attention to the mixed fibers or shellfish provisions.
So let's look at Exodus, shall we? There, God apparently amended the whole "Israelis aren't allowed to be slaves" thing; now, they can be enslaved, but only for seven years. Of course, if your master decides to keep your wife and children hostage, they can force you to become a slave permanently (Exodus 21:2-6) - and female slaves don't have the whole "seven year escape clause" thing going for them (Exodus 21:7). Clearly, this means that slaves are A-OK in the OT, and even (effectively) hostage holding. Did anything change in the NT? Well, I think that's your side of the argument, isn't it?
But that's all Exodus and Leviticus and the Old Testament and shit - none of that matters to Christians, right? It was all just silly Jewish antics; Jesus changed everything, right? So clearly, Christians throughout history have refrained from owning slaves, right? Well no, not really; indeed, in the 14th century, Pope Nicholas V issued a papal bull legitimizing the slave trade in West Africa - he said basically "Okay Portugal (which incidentally was and is a Christian nation), you can go a conquerin' in West Africa, and anyone you defeat is slaves forever".
Would a Christian - and not just any Christian, but the pope himself - have said something like that if you couldn't make a good case for Christians being allowed to own slaves?
But please, feel free to make your case that Christians are forbidden to own slaves - make sure you cite your sources, though. I'm sorry I didn't do that in the first place.
You know what the Christian Bible says about slavery, right? It is in no way prohibited; indeed, moral, God-fearing Christians have been slave owners, with the full support of the Bible and their pastors behind them.
All religions hail from times when that sort of thing was appropriate; don't single out the Muslims simply because they actually follow their holy book's teachings, instead of conveniently forgetting about the nastier bits.
At least they're not hypocritical in their faith.
I would say - well, you need specialized equipment to pick up things in the visible electromagnetic spectrum. It's just that most people have them, they're called "eyes".
However, you might argue, most people don't have the specalized equipment required to pick up 2.4 GHz signals, so it's different.
Aha, I would say - nowadays, I wouldn't be surprised if a significant fraction of the population has the equipment necessary to pick up 2.4 GHz signals sitting in their pockets, or in their backpacks.
The problem with saying "you can't look at it without specialized equipment, therefore it should be private" is that in this case, the "specialized equipment" is getting less and less specialized.
But how are gift cards any better, though? They're just cash you can only use at one store. I don't get why cash is not okay but gift cards are.
How about, "I like you and I want to give you a gift, but unfortunately I don't know you very well"? You're assuming the person giving cash is compelled to give a gift, and thus choose cash out of laziness - instead of wanting to give a gift, and choosing cash for its universal utility.
What exactly is wrong with teenagers having sex? I'm entirely unclear as to why this is considered a universally bad thing. Just make sure they know about STDs and how to use condoms, and let them go to town. It won't hurt.
Letting teenagers drive, on the other hand - that is a bad fucking idea. Way, way more teenagers die or get injured because they suck at driving than because they're having sex.
It's so weird how badly weighted our society's sense of danger is.
Yeah, I just don't understand why it's not socially acceptable to just send people cash.
In fact, I'd imagine that starting from first principles (i.e, without all the millions of dollars companies have put into marketing them) it would be far less acceptable to give gift cards than to give cash - because when you give someone a gift card, you're essentially saying "I don't trust you to not go out and buy drugs or get a tattoo or do something else I don't approve of with this cash, so I will instead force you to spend the money at a store that I know does not sell anything I disapprove of".
I mean, really. Gift cards are like cash, except stupider unless you're the company that's issuing them (you give me money now and then spend that credit later? I'd take that offer any day of the week and twice on Sundays; this is, in fact, why Costco sells packs like $100 worth of Starbucks gift cards for $80).
Uh dude, if Aunt Mildred is just ordering me some shit off of Amazon and not picking it out in a physical store and shipping it (or, *gasp*, bringing it over herself), she doesn't expect gratitude and respect for her gift. If it's going to be such a hands-off and clinical transaction as "I ordered this pair of socks for you from Amazon", then hell yeah I want to be able to convert that to cash instead - it's what I would have wanted to do anyway.
And by the way, looking a gift horse in the mouth would have really, really helped the people of Troy.
Yeah, exactly - I'm not allowed to go on to your property to peer in your windows, but if you have a giant blazing electronic marquee on top of your house that displays exactly what's being shown on your monitor at all times, I am allowed to photograph it from the street.
This is exactly what an unencrypted wireless network is, with two exceptions: it's your network traffic, not your monitor, and it's not in the visible spectrum so people don't pay attention to it (out of sight, out of mind after all).
Google did nothing wrong in this case, though what they did may have been ill-considered (for instance, it's trivial to determine if a wireless network is encrypted or not; if it's not encrypted, don't store anything besides the positional stuff and wireless MAC).
Uhm, I hope you realize that the second largest shareholder (not donor, actual owner of the company) of Fox News is a Saudi Arabian prince who, according to Fox News, may have ties with terrorists?
Look, just because people give money to causes they approve of doesn't automatically make those causes suspect. You should also critically examine the material they put out, not just who funds them.
If they believe that they're idiots, I mean one of the first things God said to Adam and Eve was "if you eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge you will surely die".
They didn't die, he's a liar. Christians try to wiggle out of this one by claiming some sort of spiritual "death" happened, but that's bullshit - if you can have kids and become the progenitors of the entire goddamn (literally! hah!) human race, you're just not fucking dead.
(Also they didn't exist in the first place, which makes the whole question of original sin kinda nonsensical - I mean, did Jesus die for a metaphor? - but that's entirely besides the point)
On the other hand, I've disassembled my current laptop all the way down to the motherboard in order to replace the heatsink/heatpipe/fan assembly. It was a $60 part and ~1 hour of my labor to save a $2000 laptop, so it was definitely worthwhile.
Actually, this is very well established - random rewards build habits far more efficiently than consistent rewards. It's how people get addicted to gambling.
Basically, this emergent situation that's been created where sometimes pushing a button has a positive, rewarding effect and sometimes it doesn't is perfect for ensuring that all buttons get pushed.
What, pray tell, is baroque about "set it at the temperature you want"?
It's not like these things are stupid - they're controlling AC for the entire building, for goodness' sakes - so lying to them and saying "I want it to be 60 degrees in the middle of summer when it's 90 degrees outside" isn't going to get you anything.
I mean, what do you think is more reasonable in the following situation: it's 90 degrees outside, and someone sets the thermostat in a large office to 60 degrees.
Do you think:
1) Oh someone really wants 60 degrees in the middle of summer! I'd better waste a shitload of energy making that happen!
Or -
2) Someone accidentally bumped the thermostat and turned the temperature way down, or someone's kids got at it, or something - they don't really want 60 degrees, I'll just leave it where it is.
Because every once in a while, an idiot who walks in to an emergency room with a headache actually has a treatable condition that would have otherwise been fatal. Right there, you've just saved someone's life - and gained a lifetime's worth of tax revenues, that now help pay for you.
No, that would be "sexing-up the science". It's only "sexing-up the story" if the reporter gets in on it :)
It's okay! This was only a simulation, right?
If the stuff you're pushing worked the way you say it would, the doctor would be recommending it.
However, as it turns out, the research on whether or not magnesium helps with high blood pressure is inconclusive; this article seems to have a reasonable layman's summary of what's going on. Therefore, the doctor cannot in good conscience recommend that the guy take magnesium pills, as they may or may not work (for the same reason why doctors can't prescribe placebos, despite their occasional effectiveness).
Furthermore, look at the "Should I take oral magnesium supplements" and "What are good dietary sources of magnesium" sections - dietary magnesium supplements just don't work, you need to get it as part of your food. What food contains magnesium? Healthy food. What part of the doctor's recommendation are you leaving out? A diet change. No doctor would just prescribe blood pressure pills without also including a dietary intervention, that's only treating the symptoms without treating the underlying problem. This is actually something alt-med people love to accuse doctors of, probably because everyone just hears "pills" but doesn't pay attention to the "and here's how you should improve your diet, and some exercises you can do" bit. Either you or your friend didn't pay attention to the part where the doctor recommended lifestyle changes, because he certainly did (and if he didn't, he is being remiss in his care).
So why recommend blood pressure pills in the first place, if the real treatment is going to be a change in diet and exercise? Because high blood pressure is a danger now, while diet and exercise will cure the problem later (if at all - to be quite honest, few people manage to make permanent healthy lifestyle changes. It's really sad, but that's the way it is). Ideally, your friend would start taking the blood pressure pills immediately, then start in on changing his diet and getting more exercise and eventually wean himself off the pills once his blood pressure gets to a normal level.
As for potassium bicarbonate, the Cigna page on it says that you should tell your doctor if you have high blood pressure and intend to take it, as there may be side effects. The only study on its effects that I could find was this one, which had positive results but was little more than a pilot study (14 people). Further research is needed before a doctor can really recommend supplementation with potassium bicarbonate (especially when just eating more fruits and vegetables already has a significant effect, which is probably why there's been little research in this area - there's no need to recommend expensive supplements when the patient can just eat better).
There is something I don't understand in your post, though: you say that taking these alternative supplements is good, because it deprives the pharmaceutical complex of years of income (despite the fact that ideally you'd stop taking the blood pressure pills at some point) - but as your alternative, you recommend taking magnesium and potassium bicarbonate supplements. Do those poof into existence from thin air? No, they're sold by the "supplemental" complex - and you're recommending giving them years of income for treating high blood pressure, despite (again) the fact that the real treatment lies in a lifestyle change. You're basically saying "don't buy stuff that we know works from those guys, buy stuff that may or may not work from these other guys".
I wonder who is treating the symptoms here, and not addressing the causes?
But where did he get the jelly beans?
And what exactly is wrong with that? I thought one of the wonders of capitalism was that although some people might have a smaller slice of the pie, the pie itself is always growing. Well, in your example, the pie has just grown by $12. Isn't that something we should be celebrating, not suing over?
"what the fuck is HTML5 and what does it have to do with my iPhone?"
Seriously, you're speaking from a position of knowledge. You know that HTML 5 isn't a video standard, but that it is a standard the iPhone can understand. Most people don't know that, and don't even care. Thus, the reporter writing that this app transcodes video into HTML5 is just more confusing, not less - a better wording would have been to simply leave out the "HTML 5" part, and just put down something like,
The journalist put "HTML 5" in there because it sounds technical, not for clarity. The Skyfire rep he talked to could have said "we download the video, reverse the tachyon field and reconfigure the deflector dish, delivering it straight to your iPhone" and the journalist would have written,
Basically, the GP is right to complain; this is indicative of some pretty non-existent journalism standards, be they technical or not.
This is actually a huge problem. My wife and I like going to small, local restaurants; unfortunately about seven times out of ten they have some bullshit webpage that was apparently made by a monkey who only understood Flash, so her iPhone can't look at the menu or hours or location. It is incredibly frustrating. Fortunately my N900 can usually handle the Flash well enough that we can get what we want, but it's still such a retarded choice.
In other words: for every United States, there are a dozen Somalias.
... what.
The collapse started before 2008. Just look at Wikipedia's article on the sub-prime mortgage crisis - its root was in easy credit that was available during 2002 to 2004.
It's not like people bought mortgages and then couldn't pay them all in 2008; all that shit had been brewing since 2000.
You've just described what I call The Fundamental Theorem of Republican Economics.
It goes like this:
The Laffer Curve exists, and its slope is always negative.
Basically, they seem to think that no matter how low taxes are, cutting them will always make things better. Always