I should note, though, that the USPTO generates a great deal of its own revenue in the form of fees related to the filing and prosecution of patents.
Precisely. And that's wrong.
Actually how it's done is what's wrong. What I'd suggest, and I got this partially from another/.er, is to have a short term for patents say 5 years. Then have a tyme table for the extension of patents. To keep a patent active for another year, to make it 6 years, the patent holder will pay X which could be a percentage of the revenue the patent generates. For each year this would increase until the patent holder puts it in the public domain. For instance say for year 1 X is 10%, year 2 it is 25%, and so on. This would allow businesses to recoup the costs of research yet speed up when a patent enters the public domain.
Having said that there are two things, 3 really, that shouldn't be patentable. One is algorithms, two business methods, and three software which basically are algorithms.
It's also going to massively increase small companies costs because they would have to try to patent everything they are doing. Not because they want to attack other companies, but because larger companies might patent it and try to attack them.
There's one simple and effective way to prevent a bigger company from patenting software. All that needs to be done is to put the code into the public domain. While others will be able to use the code no body else can patent it. Of course if the other company claims they had it first then you'd have to defend yourself.
However software shouldn't be patented period. Neither should algorithms, which basically what software uses, or business methods.
The many ill-thought laws with significant bias for the benefit of industry and commerce is not a result of rigidity and conservatism, but the very contrary political forces which continually take more distance to the core of the Constitution.
Thomas Jefferson warned of this when he said "I hope we shall take warning from the example and crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and to bid defiance to the laws of their country."
Unlike Charter (who probably uses something not all that different from an mbox file)
Actually I'd think Charter would use whatever file format Outlook uses seeing as how Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen has a controlling interest in and is the CEO of Charter.
More money than the electronic voting machines? Also, and don't take this the wrong way, but aren't there volunteers?
Workers cost more I think, though I don't know. If the machines are sturdy they should last for years and years whereas pay would have to be paid year after year. And yes there are some who volunteer. I did myself, I was deputized to register people to vote and took part in registering people in a voters' drive.
That, and hard term limits on Congress and Senate will solve quite a few problems with the American electoral system.
I'm torn on term limits. On the one hand I hate how some become professional politicians and get very little if any experience in the real world. As the same tyme though I want to be able to vote for whomever I want to vote for. Say a person can only serve in office for two terms, if they are good I may want to be able to vote for them for a third term, but term limits would mean I couldn't.
Look, America has ten times the votes to count, maybe it should just employ ten times the vote counters?
More counters costs more money.
Arguable; there are tons of examples I can trot out of this very thing. Can't report the name of a young offender, for example.
That's to protect the young.
I seem to recall, for example, Gore giving his initial concession speech based on a reporter 'calling' the election for Bush; forget waiting for the acutal votes to be counted...
That was Gore's fault. Just as all too many people in the US are impatient so was Gore.
maybe the unconstitutionality of the Press choosing the President, rather than the Electoral Colleges as determined by the Several States
It was in fact the electoral college that picked the president. What the press did was possibly affect the outcome of the election, which in the end the population is responsible for. I'm tempted to blame those who don't use their critical thinking skills, if they have them, for the outcome they voted for. However those who use their skills also have to pay the price. I have to blame myself for this as well, in 2000 instead of voting for whom I wanted to vote, I specifically voted against Bush by selecting Gore. Though I think Gore was bad to me Bush was worse and the election was too close for me. Unfortunately though Bush's Florida campaign manager was also in charge of elections in Florida and she made sure Bush would win the state.
But getting back to exit polls; why report them? I'd say that one shouldn't be reporting them during the election lest it sway undecided voters
If they, the voters, haven't decided by election day then maybe they shouldn't vote. They had months to decide who they wanted to vote for, what's the problem. Of all the candidates I know who are running now I already know who I'd vote for, Ron Paul. However I need to wait to see who else will run.
Of course, this is only a problem in the 'winner takes all' and defacto 'two party' system America has
I hat how presidential elected are setup so a candidate who "wins" a state carries all of the electoral votes for the state. Instead each candidate should get the number of electors they win in a state. This would allow smaller political parties to have a bigger say, but the Democrat and Republicans would fight tooth and nail to keep their power.
institute some sort of preference voting, and the problem goes right away
I'm not sure what you mean but it ma be like what I'd like to see. That would be that voters would rank candidates in order of preference. Say there are 5 candidates, a voter can give candidate A 5 points. And if A doesn't win but the voter would rather have candidate B win over candidate C, the voter could give B 4 points. Or if the voter doesn't want to give any candidate anything they don't have to. After all voting is done, the points for each candidate are added up and the candidate with the most votes wins. And in the case of the presidential elections, the candidate with the second highest count becomes the Vice President. In 2000 I could have given my candidate, Harry Browne, 5 points, Gore 3, and left it like that. Elections can use one of the Condorcet methods such as Ranked Pairs.
You are either a troll, or simply too dense to realise the difference between a paper ballot (unprocessed input) and an audit trail (processed output). Neither possibility is worth wasting any more time on.
Because Virgin Galactic exists to make money - not 'to boldly go'. Assume that the service lifetime of the SS2 family is about a decade. Ask yourself, is there a good chance that they will make a healthy profit on their investment within that lifetime?
So in other words they wouldn't be doing things wrong. Also if I recall right Branson wanted to open a hotel on the moon, if so then Scaled maybe be able to get him there. It appears my memory may be off, it appears Branson wants to open a hotel near the moon not on it.
Scaled knows this. Anyone involved in rocketry does. But they're playing on the public's lack of awareness of the extreme difference between "getting to space" and "getting to orbit" to get themselves publicity.
I admit I know next to nothing about "getting to space" or "getting to orbit" but if Scaled is doing things wrong why is Richard Branson, who's one the world's wealthiest people and can afford to hire experts, and his Virgin Galactic investing so much in Scaled?
My veto stamp would get a good workout though. Then either congress could go home and get real jobs or they can try to override my vetoes.
Faced with that choice, I bet they'd override your vetoes.:-)
I bet they wouldn't. Congress has had plenty of chances to override vetoes by Bush and yet they have overridden exactly zero vetoes. Heck the Democrats came to power on the promise to end the war in Iraq but they are still bickering over it a year after coming to power. And they don't even have to override the president to end the war, all they have to do is not pass any funding bills. Are any of them suggesting they do that? No, they spend their tyme on bickering over funding details, with most if not all of the Democrat candidates for president supporting keeping the troops in Iraq. Barack Obama is the only one who has detailed how he would bring the troops home that I've seen. Clinton and Edwards plan to keep the troops there.
Up here in Canada, where each and every ballot is hand counted, sometimes twice, we still often need to withold east coast results until the west coast's polls have closed.
According to wiki Canada's population is just over 33 million. The USA's population is 10 tymes that. If it were possible to have all votes counted by hand like that town in New Hampshire, which had less than 100 voters, that would be okay. However look at the hand counts in Palm Beach County. Republicans took it all the way to the US Supreme Court to stop the hand counting.
as I'm concerned, it should be flat-out illegal for any sort of 'results' to be advertised before the final, approved counts are in.
While I believe the official tallies should be held until all polling stations are closed, to bar the press from reporting exit poll results would be an abridgment of free speech.
It will save time and paper by not bothering to print out something that contains exactly the same "errors" that the machine has already incorporated in its data.
If the paper has the same err as the machine then the voter didn't check to make sure it recorded the right vote.
I fail to see where anything in my reply mentioned, or was in any way applicable to paper ballots.
Here it is: "printed audit trail". If it's not printed on paper then what is it printed on?
I'm sure his demands will cause Congress to immediately begin to do exactly as he says in every way. Or perhaps not. He can "demand" anything. What he gets is what they want to give him.
That's even true today. The Democrat controlled congress won't send the Republican president bills he wants. Look at the economic stimulus package Bush proposed. Democrats don't accept it as it is now, with "'significant' ideological differences" between what each on wants.
Noone ever explained Customs and Immigration to you? Ships can't enter the USA without first getting approval from the Customs people, and then the IRS gets to talk to them about tariffs. No Federal Government means no Customs, which means merchant shipping stops just like the airlines.
I already addressed this even if you want to ignore it. The president can ask congress for a bill that addresses ports, with provisions that shippers pay the costs.
On the one single important issue, there is no difference - neither Party has any interest in surrendering any Federal power at all. Which means they'll be united against a President who wants to reduce Federal power to the Constitutionally mandated limits.
Look at the economic stimulus plans each wants. They both agree something needs to be done but they disagree with what course of action to take.
Note the Reagan, who was an immensely popular President didn't manage to shrink the Federal government one iota, even though that was one of his nominal goals
"Nominally" may be right but he actually wanted to, and did, increase the size of government. In late 2005 or early 2006 "Reason magazine" had an article detailing just how Reagan increased the size of government, especially the so called "War on Drugs". And he once said "I don't believe in a government that protects us from ourselves."
Note, by the way, that I in no way approve of the Federal power grab over the last three-quarter century. But I know enough to know that we can't turn the clock back on it. And believing that we can is a sign of self-delusion.
Saying it can't be done is self defeating. If all those who want it to happen don't work towards that end it won't happen, but if they try it may happen. Not right away but it can. As one of my favorite singers, Billie Holiday, sung "The difficult I'll do right now, the impossible will take a little while."
I'd rather be optimistic than a defeatist. And I know something about that. If I had been a defeatist instead of an optimist I'd be dead now. Over ten years ago I was hit while riding my bike, after classes in college, and while I was in a coma the docs told my family it would be a miracle if I lived. I spent more than a year in therapy and saw around a dozen therapists, some of whom said after looking at my medical records that I must of been stubborn to have survived.
Scanning increases the speed. However I think I prefer India's system. Indian voting machines make it hard to cook an election. Slate has an article on what the US can learn from India.
I have to disagree on that!! Look at Chicago's METRA and Philadelphia's SEPTA systems--ridership is good because the commuter rail lines reach places most desired by commuters.
But how many of those riders would still ride if they could easily drive? I bet it's easier to travel mass transit in Chicago that it is to drive. Though I haven't used it's mass transit, though I do like the Chicago Transit Authority, I have driven through Chicago and the only city I drove through that was worst was Detroit.
It's commendable that you personally are egalitarian enough to pitch in at co-ops and tutor disabled kids, honestly. But relying on the caprices of charitable fellow-feeling is hardly a viable large-scale social policy.
How will an after-the-fact printed audit trail help if the system "accidentally" either ignores votes for the "wrong candidates" when they're input, or "mistakenly" credits them to the "right candidates"?
How will not having an audit trail help? At least with paper ballots someone can call for a hand count of the ballots.
You missed the word "advanced" (it's in the subject of the OP, too). If you want to say that the US is doing better than much of the (ex-)second and third world, and are somewhere in the lower, uh, half of the first world, then yes, that's perfectly valid. It's a bit of a low standard, though. "Yeah, we're doin' better than the sh1tholes of the world, so we must be good". Way to go.
As with the GP I think you are misunderstanding me. If you had read, or not cherry picked part of what, I said you should be able to tell I want health care to be improved in the US.
Ah, I see this tyme you added two words you didn't use the first tyme, "middle east". The first tyme you said " Democracy and Islam don't mix."
Egypt pretends to be a democracy
Egypt's leaders are elected in democratic elections. The elections may not be clean but they do have them. And sense they elect their government Egypt is a democracy.
anyone who speaks out for democracy (which also means speaking out against religious law) tends to come up with a bad case of dead.
Quick, someone better tell Iranian Shirin Ebadi, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, she'd better keep her mouth shut. While some moderates keep quiet others don't, and not all that speak out end up dead because they spoke out. But I kind of expect you, after saying Algeria isn't in the Middle East, that she doesn't count either because she Persian not Arab.
Now what the US, Bush specifically, should do is to stop all the belligerence, breast beating, and rhetoric and instead assist people improve their lives. If even a fraction of the millions if not billions of dollars Bush gave Pakistan to prop up Musharraf had been used instead to open secular schools those schools could have been used to reduce the number of potential terrorists being trained by the madras schools. Helping the poor or underclass will also strengthen the voices of the moderates. Oh when Musharraf cracked down on demonstrators in November or December, I find it bewildering he cracked down on pro democracy protesters not on religious people who want Islamic law, Sharia, to be the law of the land. And there wasn't a peep from Bush.
If you can imagine that that would be an acceptable excuse to the American public when you told them they wouldn't be getting their SSA checks this month
Yes I can imagine it. Because I am disabled I get SSI. However he can demand congress send him a bill to fund these programs. In it he could say he wanted a way people could opt out of the programs as well.
or that the airlines were all being shutdown (you do know that Air Traffic Control is a Federal thing, right?)
Same thing here, he could demand congress present a bill to pay for air traffic control. He could also demand that the airlines be the ones who pay for it. I'd rather see those who use something to pay for it and not those who don't. Don't get me wrong I love flying, and would like to get a private pilot's license. As such when I flew and used air traffic control I'd be willing to pay a fee to do so. That would be a much lower cost than the plane or fuel, I'd also be willing to pay a fee on for the maintenance of the airport strip.
or that merchant shipping would not be allowed to enter or leave (or move within, for that matter) the USA this year
How so? Shippers could easily pay for the running and maintenance of ports just as with airports.
If Ron Paul were to make that speech as an excuse for shutting down the Government, he'd find his popularity rating hitting 1%.
Congress could just as easily be blamed. Even better, he could say "I told you in the campaign I'd shut down government if congress didn't sent me a bill that was constitutional. Congress didn't send me one so I'm shutting down government."
It would take almost no compromise at all - because BOTH Parties would oppose him completely on this one. The Veto Override would be on his desk within an hour of the Veto. And BOTH Parties would spend the next month or three distancing themselves from the lunatic in the White House.
No compromise? Do you really think there's no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans? They are share similarities, they are both for big government, but they disagree on where to spend the money. Democrats will demand big social and welfare programs whereas Republicans will demand big law enforcement and military spending, as well as corporate welfare. I seriously doubt the parties will compromise with each other. Any such bill they did hammer out would bring a howl of protests from various factions, whether "conservative", "liberal", neo-conservative, neo-liberal, religious right, or socialists, maybe all of them at the same tyme.
Slashdot Mirror
I should note, though, that the USPTO generates a great deal of its own revenue in the form of fees related to the filing and prosecution of patents.
Precisely. And that's wrong.
Actually how it's done is what's wrong. What I'd suggest, and I got this partially from another /.er, is to have a short term for patents say 5 years. Then have a tyme table for the extension of patents. To keep a patent active for another year, to make it 6 years, the patent holder will pay X which could be a percentage of the revenue the patent generates. For each year this would increase until the patent holder puts it in the public domain. For instance say for year 1 X is 10%, year 2 it is 25%, and so on. This would allow businesses to recoup the costs of research yet speed up when a patent enters the public domain.
Having said that there are two things, 3 really, that shouldn't be patentable. One is algorithms, two business methods, and three software which basically are algorithms.
Falconit looks like we're just going to roll over and leave whatever innovation is left in the software field to the Chinese and the Indians.
And Brazil and other countries of South America.
FalconIt's also going to massively increase small companies costs because they would have to try to patent everything they are doing. Not because they want to attack other companies, but because larger companies might patent it and try to attack them.
There's one simple and effective way to prevent a bigger company from patenting software. All that needs to be done is to put the code into the public domain. While others will be able to use the code no body else can patent it. Of course if the other company claims they had it first then you'd have to defend yourself.
However software shouldn't be patented period. Neither should algorithms, which basically what software uses, or business methods.
FalconThe many ill-thought laws with significant bias for the benefit of industry and commerce is not a result of rigidity and conservatism, but the very contrary political forces which continually take more distance to the core of the Constitution.
Thomas Jefferson warned of this when he said "I hope we shall take warning from the example and crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and to bid defiance to the laws of their country."
FalconTrue, if there was a free market you'd be able to buy a sarcasm detector ;)
It's hard to detect sarcasm without visual cues, especially on /. where so many don't understand or know what a free market is.
Falcon"Meanwhile I can't even get cable. Maybe it's time to move to India."
Dude, the free market solves all problems. Didn't you get the memo?
What free market? There isn't one.
FalconI was thinking Brazil myself.
I was thinking of Brazil myself. I'd like to go there for a year as part of a study abroad program.
FalconUnlike Charter (who probably uses something not all that different from an mbox file)
Actually I'd think Charter would use whatever file format Outlook uses seeing as how Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen has a controlling interest in and is the CEO of Charter.
FalconMore money than the electronic voting machines? Also, and don't take this the wrong way, but aren't there volunteers?
Workers cost more I think, though I don't know. If the machines are sturdy they should last for years and years whereas pay would have to be paid year after year. And yes there are some who volunteer. I did myself, I was deputized to register people to vote and took part in registering people in a voters' drive.
That, and hard term limits on Congress and Senate will solve quite a few problems with the American electoral system.
I'm torn on term limits. On the one hand I hate how some become professional politicians and get very little if any experience in the real world. As the same tyme though I want to be able to vote for whomever I want to vote for. Say a person can only serve in office for two terms, if they are good I may want to be able to vote for them for a third term, but term limits would mean I couldn't.
FalconLook, America has ten times the votes to count, maybe it should just employ ten times the vote counters?
More counters costs more money.
Arguable; there are tons of examples I can trot out of this very thing. Can't report the name of a young offender, for example.
That's to protect the young.
I seem to recall, for example, Gore giving his initial concession speech based on a reporter 'calling' the election for Bush; forget waiting for the acutal votes to be counted...
That was Gore's fault. Just as all too many people in the US are impatient so was Gore.
maybe the unconstitutionality of the Press choosing the President, rather than the Electoral Colleges as determined by the Several States
It was in fact the electoral college that picked the president. What the press did was possibly affect the outcome of the election, which in the end the population is responsible for. I'm tempted to blame those who don't use their critical thinking skills, if they have them, for the outcome they voted for. However those who use their skills also have to pay the price. I have to blame myself for this as well, in 2000 instead of voting for whom I wanted to vote, I specifically voted against Bush by selecting Gore. Though I think Gore was bad to me Bush was worse and the election was too close for me. Unfortunately though Bush's Florida campaign manager was also in charge of elections in Florida and she made sure Bush would win the state.
But getting back to exit polls; why report them? I'd say that one shouldn't be reporting them during the election lest it sway undecided voters
If they, the voters, haven't decided by election day then maybe they shouldn't vote. They had months to decide who they wanted to vote for, what's the problem. Of all the candidates I know who are running now I already know who I'd vote for, Ron Paul. However I need to wait to see who else will run.
Of course, this is only a problem in the 'winner takes all' and defacto 'two party' system America has
I hat how presidential elected are setup so a candidate who "wins" a state carries all of the electoral votes for the state. Instead each candidate should get the number of electors they win in a state. This would allow smaller political parties to have a bigger say, but the Democrat and Republicans would fight tooth and nail to keep their power.
institute some sort of preference voting, and the problem goes right away
I'm not sure what you mean but it ma be like what I'd like to see. That would be that voters would rank candidates in order of preference. Say there are 5 candidates, a voter can give candidate A 5 points. And if A doesn't win but the voter would rather have candidate B win over candidate C, the voter could give B 4 points. Or if the voter doesn't want to give any candidate anything they don't have to. After all voting is done, the points for each candidate are added up and the candidate with the most votes wins. And in the case of the presidential elections, the candidate with the second highest count becomes the Vice President. In 2000 I could have given my candidate, Harry Browne, 5 points, Gore 3, and left it like that. Elections can use one of the Condorcet methods such as Ranked Pairs.
FalconYou are either a troll, or simply too dense to realise the difference between a paper ballot (unprocessed input) and an audit trail (processed output). Neither possibility is worth wasting any more time on.
I think you're the troll.
I'm done.
FalconBecause Virgin Galactic exists to make money - not 'to boldly go'. Assume that the service lifetime of the SS2 family is about a decade. Ask yourself, is there a good chance that they will make a healthy profit on their investment within that lifetime?
So in other words they wouldn't be doing things wrong. Also if I recall right Branson wanted to open a hotel on the moon, if so then Scaled maybe be able to get him there. It appears my memory may be off, it appears Branson wants to open a hotel near the moon not on it.
FalconScaled knows this. Anyone involved in rocketry does. But they're playing on the public's lack of awareness of the extreme difference between "getting to space" and "getting to orbit" to get themselves publicity.
I admit I know next to nothing about "getting to space" or "getting to orbit" but if Scaled is doing things wrong why is Richard Branson, who's one the world's wealthiest people and can afford to hire experts, and his Virgin Galactic investing so much in Scaled?
FalconMy veto stamp would get a good workout though. Then either congress could go home and get real jobs or they can try to override my vetoes.
Faced with that choice, I bet they'd override your vetoes. :-)
I bet they wouldn't. Congress has had plenty of chances to override vetoes by Bush and yet they have overridden exactly zero vetoes. Heck the Democrats came to power on the promise to end the war in Iraq but they are still bickering over it a year after coming to power. And they don't even have to override the president to end the war, all they have to do is not pass any funding bills. Are any of them suggesting they do that? No, they spend their tyme on bickering over funding details, with most if not all of the Democrat candidates for president supporting keeping the troops in Iraq. Barack Obama is the only one who has detailed how he would bring the troops home that I've seen. Clinton and Edwards plan to keep the troops there.
FalconIt's not how many people who sign up in advance that matters - it's how many actually show up at the counter and plunk down cold hard cash,
Ah but people are "plunking down cold hard cash". The cost of a ride is $200,000 and half of that has to be put down as a down payment.
FalconUp here in Canada, where each and every ballot is hand counted, sometimes twice, we still often need to withold east coast results until the west coast's polls have closed.
According to wiki Canada's population is just over 33 million. The USA's population is 10 tymes that. If it were possible to have all votes counted by hand like that town in New Hampshire, which had less than 100 voters, that would be okay. However look at the hand counts in Palm Beach County. Republicans took it all the way to the US Supreme Court to stop the hand counting.
as I'm concerned, it should be flat-out illegal for any sort of 'results' to be advertised before the final, approved counts are in.
While I believe the official tallies should be held until all polling stations are closed, to bar the press from reporting exit poll results would be an abridgment of free speech.
FalconIt will save time and paper by not bothering to print out something that contains exactly the same "errors" that the machine has already incorporated in its data.
If the paper has the same err as the machine then the voter didn't check to make sure it recorded the right vote.
I fail to see where anything in my reply mentioned, or was in any way applicable to paper ballots.
Here it is: "printed audit trail". If it's not printed on paper then what is it printed on?
FalconI'm sure his demands will cause Congress to immediately begin to do exactly as he says in every way. Or perhaps not. He can "demand" anything. What he gets is what they want to give him.
That's even true today. The Democrat controlled congress won't send the Republican president bills he wants. Look at the economic stimulus package Bush proposed. Democrats don't accept it as it is now, with "'significant' ideological differences" between what each on wants.
Noone ever explained Customs and Immigration to you? Ships can't enter the USA without first getting approval from the Customs people, and then the IRS gets to talk to them about tariffs. No Federal Government means no Customs, which means merchant shipping stops just like the airlines.
I already addressed this even if you want to ignore it. The president can ask congress for a bill that addresses ports, with provisions that shippers pay the costs.
On the one single important issue, there is no difference - neither Party has any interest in surrendering any Federal power at all. Which means they'll be united against a President who wants to reduce Federal power to the Constitutionally mandated limits.
Look at the economic stimulus plans each wants. They both agree something needs to be done but they disagree with what course of action to take.
Note the Reagan, who was an immensely popular President didn't manage to shrink the Federal government one iota, even though that was one of his nominal goals
"Nominally" may be right but he actually wanted to, and did, increase the size of government. In late 2005 or early 2006 "Reason magazine" had an article detailing just how Reagan increased the size of government, especially the so called "War on Drugs". And he once said "I don't believe in a government that protects us from ourselves."
Note, by the way, that I in no way approve of the Federal power grab over the last three-quarter century. But I know enough to know that we can't turn the clock back on it. And believing that we can is a sign of self-delusion.
Saying it can't be done is self defeating. If all those who want it to happen don't work towards that end it won't happen, but if they try it may happen. Not right away but it can. As one of my favorite singers, Billie Holiday, sung "The difficult I'll do right now, the impossible will take a little while."
I'd rather be optimistic than a defeatist. And I know something about that. If I had been a defeatist instead of an optimist I'd be dead now. Over ten years ago I was hit while riding my bike, after classes in college, and while I was in a coma the docs told my family it would be a miracle if I lived. I spent more than a year in therapy and saw around a dozen therapists, some of whom said after looking at my medical records that I must of been stubborn to have survived.
FalconScanning increases the speed. However I think I prefer India's system. Indian voting machines make it hard to cook an election. Slate has an article on what the US can learn from India.
FalconI have to disagree on that!! Look at Chicago's METRA and Philadelphia's SEPTA systems--ridership is good because the commuter rail lines reach places most desired by commuters.
But how many of those riders would still ride if they could easily drive? I bet it's easier to travel mass transit in Chicago that it is to drive. Though I haven't used it's mass transit, though I do like the Chicago Transit Authority, I have driven through Chicago and the only city I drove through that was worst was Detroit.
FalconIt's commendable that you personally are egalitarian enough to pitch in at co-ops and tutor disabled kids, honestly. But relying on the caprices of charitable fellow-feeling is hardly a viable large-scale social policy.
Ah, another cherry picker.
FalconHow will an after-the-fact printed audit trail help if the system "accidentally" either ignores votes for the "wrong candidates" when they're input, or "mistakenly" credits them to the "right candidates"?
How will not having an audit trail help? At least with paper ballots someone can call for a hand count of the ballots.
FalconYou missed the word "advanced" (it's in the subject of the OP, too). If you want to say that the US is doing better than much of the (ex-)second and third world, and are somewhere in the lower, uh, half of the first world, then yes, that's perfectly valid. It's a bit of a low standard, though. "Yeah, we're doin' better than the sh1tholes of the world, so we must be good". Way to go.
As with the GP I think you are misunderstanding me. If you had read, or not cherry picked part of what, I said you should be able to tell I want health care to be improved in the US.
FalconAlgeria isn't in the middle east
Ah, I see this tyme you added two words you didn't use the first tyme, "middle east". The first tyme you said " Democracy and Islam don't mix."
Egypt pretends to be a democracy
Egypt's leaders are elected in democratic elections. The elections may not be clean but they do have them. And sense they elect their government Egypt is a democracy.
anyone who speaks out for democracy (which also means speaking out against religious law) tends to come up with a bad case of dead.
Quick, someone better tell Iranian Shirin Ebadi, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, she'd better keep her mouth shut. While some moderates keep quiet others don't, and not all that speak out end up dead because they spoke out. But I kind of expect you, after saying Algeria isn't in the Middle East, that she doesn't count either because she Persian not Arab.
Now what the US, Bush specifically, should do is to stop all the belligerence, breast beating, and rhetoric and instead assist people improve their lives. If even a fraction of the millions if not billions of dollars Bush gave Pakistan to prop up Musharraf had been used instead to open secular schools those schools could have been used to reduce the number of potential terrorists being trained by the madras schools. Helping the poor or underclass will also strengthen the voices of the moderates. Oh when Musharraf cracked down on demonstrators in November or December, I find it bewildering he cracked down on pro democracy protesters not on religious people who want Islamic law, Sharia, to be the law of the land. And there wasn't a peep from Bush.
FalconIf you can imagine that that would be an acceptable excuse to the American public when you told them they wouldn't be getting their SSA checks this month
Yes I can imagine it. Because I am disabled I get SSI. However he can demand congress send him a bill to fund these programs. In it he could say he wanted a way people could opt out of the programs as well.
or that the airlines were all being shutdown (you do know that Air Traffic Control is a Federal thing, right?)
Same thing here, he could demand congress present a bill to pay for air traffic control. He could also demand that the airlines be the ones who pay for it. I'd rather see those who use something to pay for it and not those who don't. Don't get me wrong I love flying, and would like to get a private pilot's license. As such when I flew and used air traffic control I'd be willing to pay a fee to do so. That would be a much lower cost than the plane or fuel, I'd also be willing to pay a fee on for the maintenance of the airport strip.
or that merchant shipping would not be allowed to enter or leave (or move within, for that matter) the USA this year
How so? Shippers could easily pay for the running and maintenance of ports just as with airports.
If Ron Paul were to make that speech as an excuse for shutting down the Government, he'd find his popularity rating hitting 1%.
Congress could just as easily be blamed. Even better, he could say "I told you in the campaign I'd shut down government if congress didn't sent me a bill that was constitutional. Congress didn't send me one so I'm shutting down government."
It would take almost no compromise at all - because BOTH Parties would oppose him completely on this one. The Veto Override would be on his desk within an hour of the Veto. And BOTH Parties would spend the next month or three distancing themselves from the lunatic in the White House.
No compromise? Do you really think there's no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans? They are share similarities, they are both for big government, but they disagree on where to spend the money. Democrats will demand big social and welfare programs whereas Republicans will demand big law enforcement and military spending, as well as corporate welfare. I seriously doubt the parties will compromise with each other. Any such bill they did hammer out would bring a howl of protests from various factions, whether "conservative", "liberal", neo-conservative, neo-liberal, religious right, or socialists, maybe all of them at the same tyme.
Falcon