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User: plague3106

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  1. Re:Defeat the purpose? on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    So Mom can drive her Escalade to pick up groceries.

    Ok, i'll bite. How exactly do you get food to feed a family of four for two weeks home while its just you on the bus or train?

    Part of the reason people like cars is because it does give them more freedom. I think alot of the problem is that public transportation mostly sucks. I would love nothing more then to take the train to work everyday, but i simply can't. There aren't any buses where i live. If i needed to get to the city right away on the weekend, without my car i couldn't. The trains run to the city hourly. If i have to get to a family memebers house...it'd be impossible.

    So i wouldn't place all the blame on cars being status symbols. There are simply too many remote areas and too few public transportation options to live without one.

  2. Re:Govt is horrible at social engineering on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    At least in the case of HOV lanes, Govt trying to change social behavior has been a failure. The money would have been better spent building a train system, which is less costly than adding a lane of traffic but harder to justify politically.

    At least with a train I could come and go as I pleased, plus I could save a tremendous amount of money by not driving my car as much, risking accidents, etc.


    I hear you. I'd LOVE to be able to take the train to work. Unfortunatly the trains here are built in a spoke system, to the center of the city. I live in one suburb, and work in another. I'd have to go further south on the train, then jump to another line. Even that i'd be willing to do...but no way to get from the station to my office, since its about 4 miles away, and there are no buses.

  3. Re:Makes me sick. on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    Where I come from, we also call it "hitch hiking" Generally smiled upon, given the chance to help out a guy who needs a ride, without being paralyzed by paranoia. The frequency of "psychos" is grossly overestimated...

    Where i come from, we also call it "hitch hiking" Whether its frowned upon or smiled upon, i don't know, but i do know that hitch hiking is illegal, as well as picking up a hitch hiker.

  4. Re:I deserve it if my tax dollars built that lane on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    Once it was in place, the powers-that-be decided to make it HOV-only during rush hour periods.

    Ok, there aren't any carpool lanes that i know of where i live....what does HOV stand for?

  5. Re:Makes me sick. on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    Impressive? WTF? The whole point of the carpool lane is to get people to CARPOOL.

    Some people can't. For others, its too impractical. What if two or more of you need to go to seperate meetings at seperate locations out of the office? Or what if you're the only one that lives in your area? Personally i'd rather the gov't build up a good rail system where i live. Septa unfortunaly thinks people ONLY want to get to center city.

  6. Re:I drive in Seattle on Bid On eBay To Speed Up Your Commute · · Score: 1

    Another problem with Seattle traffic is that a major north south route not only for the area but for the entire west coast (I5) runs through the middle of downtown and cannot be expanded (what do we do with the convention center).

    Sounds like a bypass for I5 would be a good idea (unless they're using it to get to downtown Seattle). Bulldoze the convention center and rebuild it elsewhere.

  7. Re:thr0d ps1t on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    I'm not going to argue what a law could be corrupted into or whatever.. but.. In a honest loser-pays system.. If the accused is truly innocent, they often could either FIND ways of paying for their lawyer in the mean time knowing they'll win eventually (might be rough, but..)

    Again, this is total bullshit. You talk as if you can magically increase your income to match the expense of paying for a lawyer. This simply isn't the case. If it was easily done, I imagine alot less innocent people would be in prison.

    You figure, if I'm a good lawyer trying to break out and make a name for myself

    More likely then not, if you are a good lawyer, you already have a name for yourself, and thus aren't inclined to do pro bono work. The ones willing to do pro bono work usually are the ones that are just starting, and thus, probably not very good. Not trying to bash them, its simply a lack of experience.

    Also, if they lawyer is good, why would he make a deal that if he loses they'll 'work something else out'? Wouldn't he probably just take a case where he knows he's going to get paid because the client can afford it?

  8. Re:double offences on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    He was never tried, so i don't think that would apply.

  9. Re:I love America on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    He's actually a member of skull and bones. Seriously.

  10. Re:The search engine is NOT back up on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    We need tort reform now!

    Tort reform would be more harmful to the small guy then it would be helpful. We do need to fix some things, but tort reform isn't the proper solution.

  11. Re:thr0d ps1t on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    I would place no limits on pain and suffering awards where someone's life was ended or made forever miserable as a result of the defendent's actions. But I like the idea of loser pays in the event that the lawsuit is deemed frivolous by the court.

    I believe lawsuits are declare frivolous before they even go to trial. Correct me if i'm wrong, but a judge typically reviews that case and decides if there is merit to it before beginning a trial.

    If when you hear frivolous lawsuit you think of the woman that burned herself with McDonalds coffee, i think you need to dig deeper into that case, and the final outcome.

  12. Re:thr0d ps1t on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    and it makes the unjustly accused stick to their guns.

    Bullshit. People can't stick to thier guns if they cannot continue to pay a lawyer. As soon as that happens, the unjustly accused is defenseless, loses the case, and then has even more legal bills to pay. Which i'm willing to bet is most americans. Such tort reform would only encourage big corporations to file more lawsuits, and discourage someone who is actualy hurt by them from filing, for fear of losing. I'm really suprised you can't see that.

    Winning the case does not prove someone right or wrong. Have you been keeping track of the number of people being freed from prison after being wrongfully found guilty? I believe there was about 10-15 just this past week..freed because new DNA evidence appeared that proved innocence, or because it was discovered that cop was corrupt and racist.

    If the courts never made a mistake, and rulings were always fair and just, your tort reform might work. Unfortunatly, our system is far from that fantasy.

  13. Re:...Teach him! on RIAA Not Done With Jesse Jordan · · Score: 1

    I dunno, kinda sounds like black mail to me.

    If a manager demanded sex from a subordinate to keep thier job...well its not fair, but the subordinate chose to do it to keep her job.

  14. Re:Nothing on USB 1.1 Renumbered To USB 2? · · Score: 1

    I've caught CNN doing this quite a number of times too. I'm willing to bet its pretty common.

    You ever see your local news spewing 'Could your neighbor be a terrorist???'

  15. Re:mac vs linux vs windows vs etc. on Platform Evangelism · · Score: 1

    Write the drivers you need

    Do you honestly believe this? Computers are tools to get things done. Would you advocate that I buy a car but be expected to build my own break system?

  16. Re:Permanent eyesores & small impact on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    Now they are about the worst of a city's common eyesores.

    I don't pay them a second thought personally.

    The article said they would handle 75% of local power needs but that was only 1.8% of New England. And the damaged view would be permanent.

    Thats still alot of homes. Andi wouldn't say 2% of New England is a small part of the big picture. Thats actually fairly impressive for 130 windmills.

    The only downside to Nukes is a Chernobyl-like operating mess. But that has proved extremely rare (one such event in the history of Nuclear Power, 50+ years) and probably even less likely by an order of magnitude given the plant designs and operating policies in Europe, Japan, and the US vs. the former Soviet Union. I'd rather live with that risk than the risk presented by thousands of trolling supertankers in the world's oceans.

    That's quite the downside though, wouldn't you say? Its possible that downside could affect us here in the US, should the structure containing the disaster collaspe. The other downside you forget is what to do with the spent fuel rods. I'd just as soon not have that stuff around anywhere.

    Say what you want about the French, these folks know Nuclear power. Imagine if the US were 70% emission free power like they are. Electric cars would suddenly make sense, hydrogen economy would make sense... because the ultimate source of the juice was emission free.


    Again, you're not counting the spent fuel rods. I think that electric cars don't make sense for other reasons...one being that they don't seem to have the power of gasoline powered cars. Before you say its unimportant, remember that some of the country has alot of hills to drive up and down.

  17. Re:NIMBY FACTOR on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    So on top of the costs of maintaining the farm, the only people around to really see a benifit from the turbines would be the few who acutaly live on isalnd.

    So don't spend that much on property. People act like its thier right for property value to stay the same or go up. Its not...you even seem to know this b/c you call it an investment. Investments don't always work out.

    There a similar people near where i live that oppose the Woodhaven project. Thier aguments? Noise, pollution, the fact that some people would be forced to move, and lower propety value.

    So the people near the road that is heavily traveled can deal with the noise, but they can't. I'm sure the pollution is much better a few blocks away, with cars sitting idle because the roads are backed up beyond belief then the pollution caused by cars that are actually moving. I guess they'd rather be trapped where they are instead of being somewhere less congested in an emergecy. And i guess they also feel we should let our infrastructure collapse because the they'd lose some money on it.

    But putting them somewhere where they would conflict with the total point of living in elite settings is kinda an odd idea.

    Ya, i feel real bad for those guys that can afford million dollar housing, while we have people without homes at all, or are forced to live in crackdon.

    Also there are plenty of other places to put it, in NO ONES backyard. America has lots of open spaces, why not stick it in one of those?

    Off the top of my head, no one will be around to run the damn facility, or repair them if they should require maintence.

  18. Re:NIMBY on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    The last thing you want is to be reading a book and be disturbed by one of these turbines

    Yes, good thing thre aren't any winds or waves crashing to disturb that either.

    Not only that but natural wild life will also be effected by this.

    The two birds that lose thier life annually is a tragic cost.

    Where they were proposing, we were within 200 yards of the turbine which if it got moving, would have been pretty loud.

    I'll grant you 200 yards is pretty close. I'm curious though how much noise one turbine would create.

    rather large and seemingly ineffecent power storage system.

    Storage? I'm not a national power expert or anything, but i was under the impression that whatever is generated gets put right onto the grid, no storage. Indeed, too much power caused a huge blackout in the NE in the 70s i think.

    With the cape cod area the winds don't blow strong all the time.

    From the article, it seems the turbines don't need strong winds to blow...just average, 10mph or so.

    Normally the winds blow durring the winter and off peak times, making them extreamly large decorations durring the summer when they are really needed.

    I doubt there is no wind whatsoever during the day or over the summer. Indeed, daytime is probably one of the more windy times of day, with the earth being heated and such.

    So on top of the costs of maintaining the farm, the only people around to really see a benifit from the turbines would be the few who acutaly live on isalnd.

    Well, who do you think the turbines are supposed to benefit? Can't comment on the cost of maintence though...however i'd guess its fairly low. I'm sure coal power plants require maintence too.

  19. Re:NIMBY on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    Sure you weren't taken by some people that already decided they didn't like the idea?

    Sound volume (i belives) halves as the distance doubles. So how far would you be?

  20. Re:NIMBY on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    As to overpopulation. I don't really think the world is overpopulated. I once read that you could put all 6 billion people in a an area the size of Jacksonville, FL's city limits, and each person would still have 9 sq ft (3ft x 3ft) to themselves.

    Overpopulation has little to do with physical space available, and more to do with feeding, clothing, and providing shelter for everyone.

  21. Re:NIMBY on A Mighty Wind · · Score: 1

    I also like airplane noise.

    I don't like airplane noise, but i think i'd be ok with a wind turbine. I mind the airplane noise b/c it comes from no where suddenly, is very loud for a bit, then disappears. A constant background noise though doesn't seem to bother me.

  22. Re:Fossil Fuels on Widespread Use of Hydrogen May Hurt Ozone Layer · · Score: 1

    The only thing hydrogen would do in our current situation would be to move pollution from your car to a power plant.

    Were it could probably be dealt with much more effectively. Maybe LA would have much less smog if said powerplant is far enough away.

  23. Re:overblown on Widespread Use of Hydrogen May Hurt Ozone Layer · · Score: 1

    I have gas heating and stove in my apartment..in the winter, my bill is about $50..int he summer, $15. Seems pretty cheap to me.

  24. Re:Eh? Do you really TRUST them with your money:? on U.S. E-Commerce Sites To Collect EU VAT · · Score: 1

    Why would you want to give your hard earned money to a government?

    I dunno, i kinda like having roads, a postal system (which doesn't get paid for by taxes..), national and local parks, etc.

  25. Re:Printed signatures on Why Johnny Can't Handwrite · · Score: 1

    I believe the reason your sig. must be in cursive because its much easier for someone to duplicate your printed signature. The cursive one is the one that's more distinctive.