Yow. A "Hackers" quote. Another great example of why Hollywood can rarely be praised for making movies about technical subjects. Then again, we will always have Blade Runner.
Frankly, what really makes typing easier is an hour spent with a hot brunette relieving both of your tensions. Lingerie makes it even better, and the skilled employment of toys will make sure that you'll be welcome to do it again later and in the days to follow. Touch typing requires significant manual dexterity; so do hot brunettes. 'nuff said.
There is no constitutional requirement that amendments be written as you suggest.
Yes, of course there is. That's why the 21st amendment had to repeal the 18th in order to mean anything. Having contradictory, non-repealed content is nonsensical. The 16th is invalid. Period. Not that the government follows the constitution anyway.
I follow Christ, but don't dismiss all Atheism as "the lack of a belief."
All atheism is lack of belief. That's what it literally means: a = without, theism = belief in a god or gods. Furthermore, if you "believe" there is no god, underlying that must be a lack of belief there is a god.
It isn't complicated, and it isn't religion. It is just the same common sense that fails to engender belief in the Easter Bunny or Santa. No evidence for an extraordinary proposition is a worthless position to argue from.
However, it takes a major leap of faith to say, "I believe there is No God."
Certainly no more than it takes to say "I believe there is no Santa Claus"; if that's tough for you, then I can imagine it'd be tough to disbelieve in a god or gods as well. Personally, I look at the size and complexity of the universe as implied by the Hubble deep space images, and I laugh comfortably at the idea of gods. Religion is too small an idea to face reality.
I've never found any reason to engender belief in anything that has produced no objective evidence over a reasonable time frame (which I would certainly characterize all religion as having had.) Likewise, I've never had any trouble discarding ideas that seem quite likely to never produce any such evidence in the future. Religion appeals to the fearful, the gullible, the needy, the controlling. None of that describes me.
But they don't because the bureaucrats rarely actually do what anyone wants.. and why should they? Nothing will happen to them if they don't.
Well... yes, but remember: the concept of any two uninformed voters being able to outvote any single uninformed voter applies to our elected representatives just as much as it does to the rank and file voter. "The Internet is a series of tubes", anyone? So assuming you could get past the legislators voting based on PACs and lobbies and payola (which you can't) you'd still have to face the whole problem with the raw democratic process being flawed at its very core. If you don't pre-qualify your voters, you are simply handing power to the village idiots.
The bureaucrats - by which I mean the unelected powerbase, such as the FCC - are an entirely different kind of problem. They cannot be controlled by any measure traceable to the voters - there is simply no mechanism provided to do so.
I recognize it just fine. It is that document that our government largely ignores, the more so in recent years. I don't even have that much of a problem with the constitution, other than the 13th amendment, which gives the government the right to enslave anyone convicted of any crime, the 16th amendment, which is contradictory to section 8 and the 10th amendment both, and that portion of the 5th amendment that allows government to take private property against the owner's will under any circumstances. I'm just pointing out that I had nothing to do with it, and claiming that I did is a blatant lie.
The constitution, by the way, isn't directed at "me." It is a document that specifies how the government may be constituted. In that role, it has two indirect ways it can affect me; one, in that it should (but has been unable to) set the limits of the federal government; and two, in that it should (but also has been unable to) set the limits of state government, as per amendment 14 (which applies amendments 1...10 to the states.) So the question isn't even whether "I" recognize it, though I do. The question is if the state and federal governments will comply with it, which they obviously will not. From that arises the question of what to do about it.
You dont recognize any law passed by people who you did not vote for.
Again, you're wrong. I recognize those laws just fine. I even obey them, even the ones I object to vehemently. I am simply pointing out, without mincing any words, that I didn't have anything to do with creating, formulating, or passing them, and that consequently, the laws are a matter of dictatorial infliction, and enforcement via coercion. Since I was nowhere in the chain of authority for these laws, you cannot blame the manner and form of them upon me. These are facts; none of them in any way says I don't recognize the letter of the law, or the armored fist of coercion that drives them home. I certainly do.
Further you discount the foundation of Democracy, one man one vote.
Discount it? Hardly. I simply pointed out how it actually works. If you are uninformed, and your sister is uninformed, you are enabled to outvote your mom, who is informed. That is how it works. Most people are woefully uninformed; this tells you that the specific description I give here applies broadly. It isn't rocket science. It isn't even basic earth science.
And you entertain violent(sic) about gravely hurting people who disagree with you.
I would rather employ violence against people who dictate the laws to the rest of us, without any input from us, than talk to them. Yes indeed. No taxation or legislation without representation. The fact is, I don't have any representation. Just like the heroes who founded our country. Got anything to say about that?
The stock market is the direct proof staring at you that shows that "Large number of people, acting independantly on their own self interest will make more intelligent and wise decisions"
Is that what it shows? Or does it simply show that well funded corporations with more than minimal share value (the only ones allowed on the stock exchange) generally make profits, and investing in them such that you get a cut of that profit is in your self interest, assuming, of course, that you haven't been taxed out of your ability to do so? Doesn't it also show, specifically in the case of 1929, that large numbers or people, acting in their own self-interest but not knowing what the heck they are doing, will do the absolute wrong thing and force a bad situation to become an intolerable situation? Of course it does. Ditto democracy. There are no democracies that have survived very long. They become immensely corrupt, as ours is becoming as I write this. And then they fall. Film at 11.
The Govt is you. It is the politicians you voted for who is taxing you.
There are no politicians that I have voted for who have ever had the opportunity to contribute to making law. Every law that has been made was made by people I explicitly did not vote for, largely never had an opportunity to vote for, and where the votes that put those politicians in office were entirely from people who I in no way have ever agreed were qualified to make law, or select people to make law, on my behalf.
Furthermore, the constitution itself was crafted by people whom I had nothing to do with, did not authorize, have not sworn an oath to nor signed an agreement binding me to their machinations, and did not even know, who crafted the document long before I would have ever had any opportunity to have any input on any level whatsoever (and that goes for most laws, too.) So get off your high horse. The government and the laws are no different than decree from a monarch in fact - I have had, and will have, exactly ZERO input to them. And that goes for every other normal citizen too, they're just too bewildered to realize it.
Furthermore, to the extent that anyone - perhaps a legislator - has input to the system, any two uninformed people directly have the ability to outvote any one informed person, to which we can add the dead certainty that the vast majority are woefully uninformed, a situation that bodes poorly in theory, and has turned out even worse in reality.
So the government and its laws are not "me." If the government and its laws are "you" to any realistic extent (which I highly doubt, despite your piteous cries of representative malarky), then let me take this opportunity to appraise you of the fact that I would as soon drown you in the nearest adequate puddle as speak to you. You represent the worst of the very absolute worst. Are we clear?
The 16th amendment is an invalid amendment, because it contradicts, without accounting for, both section 8 and the 10th amendment. Unless those are changed, there is no legitimate authority for the fed to do anything, taxwise or otherwise (like drug laws and speed limit laws) about intrastate commerce. No change to the constitution that makes it contradict itself can be valid. What they have is the ability to coerce and the ability to bribe. Because they are criminals operating outside the constituting authority that is the only leg they have to stand on that justifies their existance. And they use both liberally. That's not the same thing at all as "authority." The fed behaves considerably more like the Sopranos than does as a legitimate representation of the form of government the constitution actually enables.
Secondly, it has always been questionable on how much authority the IRS and the Feds really have on non-interstate commerce.
No, actually, it isn't. They have none. What they have is the ability to coerce; aside from that (and the fact that they broadly use that ability to coerce), they are operating entirely outside the constitution:
Sec 8: [The Congress shall have Power] To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
10th Amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Given that the constitution has not been amended to change either of these rules for the fed, no other conclusion can be drawn but that they have no such authority.
Charging sales tax again is double-dipping --like they do to you when you buy/sell a car, boat, etc.
The entire system is based on multiple dipping, and the lower you are, socioeconomically speaking, the more dips you pay.
Say a corporation pays an employee $20000, and he pays $500 in taxes of which, 100% comes from its customers. So the customers are paying the salary and the taxes for the corporation's employee. In the meantime, the customer is paying those costs with what is left over from his income, after tax. So the customer in every case pays his own taxes, and then those in the economic pyramid above him from what remains after his taxation.
Here's another one. Some company - say the gas company - decrees, for whatever reason, to have medical coverage for its employees. Where does that money come from? Why, from the gas company's customers, of course. So as a customer, you pay for the gas company's employee's medical coverage out of your income before you can pay for your own. Same for the bank employee and so forth.
You don't get to say, for instance, that you spent all of your income ($20000) and of that, 27% went into paying other people's taxes, so you shouldn't be taxed on that part of what you spent. Oh no. You pay your taxes, the taxes of the guy who hauls fuel for your car, the taxes of the guy who sucks the oil out of the ground, the taxes of the guy in the convenience store where you get your fuel, and the taxes of everyone else from whom you purchase a good or service, and you pay this out of your taxable income. Nice, eh?
So the fact is, the people at the bottom of the pyramid have everyone else's costs built into their incomes.
But it is actually worse than that. Unlike taxes, the progression is reversed, percentage wise. Got a lot of phone business to do with the phone company? Then they'll reduce your rates, special deals, good customer, yadda yadda. Percentage wise, you're now paying less for the medical care and taxes of the phone company employee than is some single mother who has a phone on the basis of the services of the phone company you actually receive. That leaves more for you to pay your own costs both on a percentage basis, and on a real basis.
Our economy literally sits heaviest on the shoulders of those at the bottom. It is designed to do so, or at the most optimistic, has evolved to do so.
As for your gratuitous statement about who will and won't pay the taxes, you do know that 79% of the tax burden is carried by the top 20% of income earners, right?
You do know that 54% of all income is earned by the top 20% of income earners, right? And that at these incomes, it is trivially easy for these people to live? And that while you complain for them, the tax rate they pay has no possible reasonable effect on how they live whatsoever? And that the tax rate that the lowest two - or even three - brackets pay not only has an effect, but in many cases means the difference between medical treatment or not, college for the kids or not, and a host of other basic choices? So that your statement, even if 100% accurate, is basically a sop to people who have no need of your empathy whatsoever?
There's nothing annoys me as much as the presumption that a 1/3-million dollar or higher income is 10% different (that's the difference in tax rates) from a 50,000 or 20,000 dollar income and that those in the 35% bracket deserve sympathy, empathy, tax breaks, or thanks. Under any general circumstances, but certainly in our current economic mess, where both the fed and the states have expanded to take on many unconstitutional roles. Since those people can live the same life as a middle income earner without any stress, perhaps they should be paying all of the tax burden. Seriously.
I'm a lot more inclined to account for how stress-free you can rationally maintain your family than I am for the total dollars earned as a metric for how much tax one should pay. Once I've got enough funds to reach a certain standard of living, my tax rate should climb quite steeply as far as I'm concerned. Perhaps there should be no incentive at all to earn more than a million dollars or so a year - anything anyone would earn over that goes into taxes by a flat rate until the national debt is paid and all tax resources required are met. I'd be perfectly fine with that. You'd see the government get out of a lot of places it shouldn't be, too, because rich people have a lot of clout. If you can't live comfortably on a million bucks a year in the current US economic environment, you should probably be taken out and shot.
I know a lot of families here in Montana who still wouldn't be able to live what most of the readers here would consider a reasonable lifestyle (small house, health insurance, one car) if you removed the entire state and federal and use taxes tax burden from them. Comparing them on any kind of equal field with some wag who makes 349,000 (the 35% bracket for singles) or more per year is the act of a lunatic, no matter how reasonable it sounds to declare that they pay 79% of the tax burden.
If they were redoing the internet from scratch, what is wrong with it that ought to be fixed? Can we hear some new-internet wishlists?
The first thing I'd want is a guarantee that idiots wouldn't try to take down an operating infrastructure that everyone has grown to depend upon. That's the only thing we're missing, as far as I can tell.
And by the way, if you want to "fix" SMTP, start a new mail protocol that uses a different port. Leave the rest of us alone.
Wikipedia contains errors. But so does most every dictionary (try looking up atheist and you'll find the Christian definition, which is about as definitive of an atheist as an atheist's definition of a Christian is of a Christian. Atheism is the lack of a belief, or to quote someone sharp, "If atheism is a belief system, then bald is a hair color.") Standard printed encyclopedias and textbooks contain errors. The news media contains errors. Political speech contains errors. Court pronouncements and laws contain errors. Parental and teacher mandates and teachings contain errors. tests contain errors. School boards make errors (and how!) Newspapers contain errors. Even the editors of Slashdot make mistakes (cough.)
Wikipedia, however, is one of the few sources that continually tries to approach accuracy, and where you can find an error repaired literally seconds after you detect it - or you can fix it yourself, if you understand the problem.
So why, again, is it that wikipedia must be banned?
It better have a job so it can buy her dinner and pay her bills . . .
So, in your world, women simply have no marketable skills? I always thought they were the same as us fellows, only a whole lot cuter, plus they can cook up a baby. For every incompetent human being I've met who was female, there's been a male of similar lack of competence to keep the scales balanced. Me, I like the smart ones.
Well, good luck with your bill-paying, anyway. Everyone likes something different.
When the demand becomes saturated by computerized dolls, women will go to extraordinary lengths to get laid by a real dude.
Oh, I don't know. When she can have a doll that has size-as-you-please parts, is 100% attentive, never gets tired, soft, rude, disinterested, or puts her aside for beer, football, or poker, never pines for or asks for sex acts she doesn't prefer, doesn't put her at risk for disease, pregnancy, heartbreak, political argument, never looks at other women... she may not be all that interested in a dude at all. What guys imagine would be fun for them will have some kind of direct corollary for the ladies, you can count on it.
There's a pretty amazing market for BOBs (Battery Operated Boyfriends) right now. That's your red flag. Chicks don't mind technology at all. Assuming they do is your first step towards the curb. Best thing you can do for your relationship is go buy a Hitachi Magic Wand. You'll go from goat to hero in about 60 seconds. Now just imagine one of these that will bring her breakfast in bed... and you're beginning to get the idea.
You really need to get some therapy. Not to mention learn more about the range of normal sexual activities, figure out where your prostate is, and stop worrying about what other people are doing with consenting partners. Just because you're neurotic, repressed and sexually naive doesn't mean that everyone else is, you know. Here are some tips: Plenty of heterosexual men and women engage in all manner of anal play in both directions - it isn't an activity limited to "homosexuals" by any means. Furthermore, not all homosexuals engage in anal play. Some are perfectly content with manual stimulation and or oral stimulation. You're just fixated on anal for some reason. Again, I suggest you seek therapy. You are one busted puppy.
Just so we're clear - the only time "Democrats" appears in my post is in the subject line, as a "re", meaning, the post the *previous* writer titled so-and-so. I wasn't saying anything about democrats or republicans as parties, I was responding to the "I want my country back."
I consider the political system 100% broken; it is my strong impression that you could elect Ghandi himself as president and it would not deflect the course of the country one whit. The courts are 100% broken (that's where almost all of these twisted, strained interpretations come from - judges and lawyers who are unwilling to comply with the constitution's authority.) Both the house and senate are completely, utterly compromised by the vast majority of members who will sign or vote for literally anything if it has the proper ratio of pork / favors for them, and are willing to bribe to force the states to fall into line (think speed limits, drug laws, etc) and worse. I sympathize with the idea of getting a conservative (or simply sensible) head of state, but I don't actually believe it would have any effect. No doubt I'll vote for Paul when the time comes, unless someone with a better platform comes along, but that doesn't mean I expect him to be able to change anything. Once something falls off a cliff, no amount of good will can stop the process.
I like Ron Paul a great deal, and mostly agree with his stances. However, I find much to regret in his position on immigration. I would agree that he is, by far, the candidate with the least problems in terms of the field at hand.
No one, including you, has successfully presented any specifics that show my post contained any errors. If you want to specifically characterize any of it as errors - or lies - by all means, the floor is yours. I'm right here, and I've got a reply with your (cowardly lack of a) name on it ready to fill in. So fire away from under your broad, thick, and yellow stripe, M. AC.
I wonder the same thing. My guess is, it will fall into some middle range, but again, we'll have to wait for actual commercial products and on the road experience before we will really know. On the one hand, if the main power supply can be restricted to full charge cycles, that would be optimal - but on the other, "they" want to sell stuff to us, and making something like this last what amounts to forever isn't exactly a great business strategy. But there are other uses, and they may suffice to support such an industry quite well. We'll just have to wait and see.
I pointed to the research that indicated the capabilities I quoted. It will, as always, take some time for research like that to reach consumer's hands. Examples of current UCs available to consumers can be found here. These, however, are not the same technology as the nano-materials based ones, and represent only the beginning of the useful parts in terms of UCs in general. Don't attempt to put words into my mouth that I didn't say myself; I started the thread with probably, and that's what I meant, and what I was talking about, all along. We will all have to wait.
When I can do the same thing with electric automobiles, that will have eliminated the need to use a petroleum-based vehicle completely.
You mentioned three things. (1) Range, 600 miles. This is more often quoted at 300 miles for a passenger vehicle. UCs are not there yet, but they are within reasonable distance of catching it. I again predict 3-5 years.
(2) Refueling time of ten minutes. UCs can do this at home or on the road. Not a problem. You keep mentioning this and I suspect you don't understand the logistics of managing energy with ultracaps. Let me toss a few facts at you, perhaps that will help. You have a recharging station in your home. What it does, first of all, is constantly pulls from the mains into its own ultracaps until it reaches sufficient charge to suit your needs (charging one or two cars, probably.) When you actually plug the car into it, the car takes what it needs (probably not a full charge, either) and this is done by a (relatively) slow ramp-up of current (to avoid sparks, fires, etc) that turns into a torrent of charge once the charging connection has ben verified as solid by expected limited current flow. So the charge time is minutes. Maybe just one minute. Ultracaps take - and supply - charge at astonishing rates. They are not like batteries in this regard. On the road, the "gas station" works just the same way. It doesn't try to fuel you from the mains; it fuels you from its own local storage, which it is constantly replenishing as required. So you see, there is no reason at all to assume that (a) extremely high current service is required for a home, (b) charging would be slow, (c) charging would be inconvenient, (d) charging ever has to let the car fall below 100% when it is plugged in (or charged, then placed in sunlight.)
(3) Driveway storage for three months. Again, UCs can sit just like any other capacitor. However, unlike a gas/diesel fuel vehicle, a UC-powered vehicle can remain attached to the mains, and/or be trickle charged by solar, and make that driveway storage lifetime extend to decades, long after your conventional battery would have died, your fuel turned to varnish, and your car turned into no more than an invitation for a towing service.
That list is not a list of "non-US people", it is a list of names, and people (buyers and sellers) are being screwed by it right and left for sales made in the US, by US citizens, to other US citizens, without indictment, warrant, representation or trial. This is not about "sales to Hitler" and to any extent that you believe it is, you are blind. All manner of controls exist for sales that go outside the country, and this list in no way adds any needed teeth to those mechanisms. This list can (and has, and will continue to) prevent US citizens from buying or selling goods and services to other US citizens - if you key a trigger that lands a reference to this list on your credit report, you're done, pal. No loans, no mortgage, no new car, no nothing.
Pay attention.
Slashdot Mirror
Yow. A "Hackers" quote. Another great example of why Hollywood can rarely be praised for making movies about technical subjects. Then again, we will always have Blade Runner.
Frankly, what really makes typing easier is an hour spent with a hot brunette relieving both of your tensions. Lingerie makes it even better, and the skilled employment of toys will make sure that you'll be welcome to do it again later and in the days to follow. Touch typing requires significant manual dexterity; so do hot brunettes. 'nuff said.
Yes, of course there is. That's why the 21st amendment had to repeal the 18th in order to mean anything. Having contradictory, non-repealed content is nonsensical. The 16th is invalid. Period. Not that the government follows the constitution anyway.
All atheism is lack of belief. That's what it literally means: a = without, theism = belief in a god or gods. Furthermore, if you "believe" there is no god, underlying that must be a lack of belief there is a god.
It isn't complicated, and it isn't religion. It is just the same common sense that fails to engender belief in the Easter Bunny or Santa. No evidence for an extraordinary proposition is a worthless position to argue from.
Certainly no more than it takes to say "I believe there is no Santa Claus"; if that's tough for you, then I can imagine it'd be tough to disbelieve in a god or gods as well. Personally, I look at the size and complexity of the universe as implied by the Hubble deep space images, and I laugh comfortably at the idea of gods. Religion is too small an idea to face reality.
I've never found any reason to engender belief in anything that has produced no objective evidence over a reasonable time frame (which I would certainly characterize all religion as having had.) Likewise, I've never had any trouble discarding ideas that seem quite likely to never produce any such evidence in the future. Religion appeals to the fearful, the gullible, the needy, the controlling. None of that describes me.
Well... yes, but remember: the concept of any two uninformed voters being able to outvote any single uninformed voter applies to our elected representatives just as much as it does to the rank and file voter. "The Internet is a series of tubes", anyone? So assuming you could get past the legislators voting based on PACs and lobbies and payola (which you can't) you'd still have to face the whole problem with the raw democratic process being flawed at its very core. If you don't pre-qualify your voters, you are simply handing power to the village idiots.
The bureaucrats - by which I mean the unelected powerbase, such as the FCC - are an entirely different kind of problem. They cannot be controlled by any measure traceable to the voters - there is simply no mechanism provided to do so.
I recognize it just fine. It is that document that our government largely ignores, the more so in recent years. I don't even have that much of a problem with the constitution, other than the 13th amendment, which gives the government the right to enslave anyone convicted of any crime, the 16th amendment, which is contradictory to section 8 and the 10th amendment both, and that portion of the 5th amendment that allows government to take private property against the owner's will under any circumstances. I'm just pointing out that I had nothing to do with it, and claiming that I did is a blatant lie.
The constitution, by the way, isn't directed at "me." It is a document that specifies how the government may be constituted. In that role, it has two indirect ways it can affect me; one, in that it should (but has been unable to) set the limits of the federal government; and two, in that it should (but also has been unable to) set the limits of state government, as per amendment 14 (which applies amendments 1...10 to the states.) So the question isn't even whether "I" recognize it, though I do. The question is if the state and federal governments will comply with it, which they obviously will not. From that arises the question of what to do about it.
Again, you're wrong. I recognize those laws just fine. I even obey them, even the ones I object to vehemently. I am simply pointing out, without mincing any words, that I didn't have anything to do with creating, formulating, or passing them, and that consequently, the laws are a matter of dictatorial infliction, and enforcement via coercion. Since I was nowhere in the chain of authority for these laws, you cannot blame the manner and form of them upon me. These are facts; none of them in any way says I don't recognize the letter of the law, or the armored fist of coercion that drives them home. I certainly do.
Discount it? Hardly. I simply pointed out how it actually works. If you are uninformed, and your sister is uninformed, you are enabled to outvote your mom, who is informed. That is how it works. Most people are woefully uninformed; this tells you that the specific description I give here applies broadly. It isn't rocket science. It isn't even basic earth science.
I would rather employ violence against people who dictate the laws to the rest of us, without any input from us, than talk to them. Yes indeed. No taxation or legislation without representation. The fact is, I don't have any representation. Just like the heroes who founded our country. Got anything to say about that?
Is that what it shows? Or does it simply show that well funded corporations with more than minimal share value (the only ones allowed on the stock exchange) generally make profits, and investing in them such that you get a cut of that profit is in your self interest, assuming, of course, that you haven't been taxed out of your ability to do so? Doesn't it also show, specifically in the case of 1929, that large numbers or people, acting in their own self-interest but not knowing what the heck they are doing, will do the absolute wrong thing and force a bad situation to become an intolerable situation? Of course it does. Ditto democracy. There are no democracies that have survived very long. They become immensely corrupt, as ours is becoming as I write this. And then they fall. Film at 11.
There are no politicians that I have voted for who have ever had the opportunity to contribute to making law. Every law that has been made was made by people I explicitly did not vote for, largely never had an opportunity to vote for, and where the votes that put those politicians in office were entirely from people who I in no way have ever agreed were qualified to make law, or select people to make law, on my behalf.
Furthermore, the constitution itself was crafted by people whom I had nothing to do with, did not authorize, have not sworn an oath to nor signed an agreement binding me to their machinations, and did not even know, who crafted the document long before I would have ever had any opportunity to have any input on any level whatsoever (and that goes for most laws, too.) So get off your high horse. The government and the laws are no different than decree from a monarch in fact - I have had, and will have, exactly ZERO input to them. And that goes for every other normal citizen too, they're just too bewildered to realize it.
Furthermore, to the extent that anyone - perhaps a legislator - has input to the system, any two uninformed people directly have the ability to outvote any one informed person, to which we can add the dead certainty that the vast majority are woefully uninformed, a situation that bodes poorly in theory, and has turned out even worse in reality.
So the government and its laws are not "me." If the government and its laws are "you" to any realistic extent (which I highly doubt, despite your piteous cries of representative malarky), then let me take this opportunity to appraise you of the fact that I would as soon drown you in the nearest adequate puddle as speak to you. You represent the worst of the very absolute worst. Are we clear?
The 16th amendment is an invalid amendment, because it contradicts, without accounting for, both section 8 and the 10th amendment. Unless those are changed, there is no legitimate authority for the fed to do anything, taxwise or otherwise (like drug laws and speed limit laws) about intrastate commerce. No change to the constitution that makes it contradict itself can be valid. What they have is the ability to coerce and the ability to bribe. Because they are criminals operating outside the constituting authority that is the only leg they have to stand on that justifies their existance. And they use both liberally. That's not the same thing at all as "authority." The fed behaves considerably more like the Sopranos than does as a legitimate representation of the form of government the constitution actually enables.
No, actually, it isn't. They have none. What they have is the ability to coerce; aside from that (and the fact that they broadly use that ability to coerce), they are operating entirely outside the constitution:
Given that the constitution has not been amended to change either of these rules for the fed, no other conclusion can be drawn but that they have no such authority.
The entire system is based on multiple dipping, and the lower you are, socioeconomically speaking, the more dips you pay.
Say a corporation pays an employee $20000, and he pays $500 in taxes of which, 100% comes from its customers. So the customers are paying the salary and the taxes for the corporation's employee. In the meantime, the customer is paying those costs with what is left over from his income, after tax. So the customer in every case pays his own taxes, and then those in the economic pyramid above him from what remains after his taxation.
Here's another one. Some company - say the gas company - decrees, for whatever reason, to have medical coverage for its employees. Where does that money come from? Why, from the gas company's customers, of course. So as a customer, you pay for the gas company's employee's medical coverage out of your income before you can pay for your own. Same for the bank employee and so forth.
You don't get to say, for instance, that you spent all of your income ($20000) and of that, 27% went into paying other people's taxes, so you shouldn't be taxed on that part of what you spent. Oh no. You pay your taxes, the taxes of the guy who hauls fuel for your car, the taxes of the guy who sucks the oil out of the ground, the taxes of the guy in the convenience store where you get your fuel, and the taxes of everyone else from whom you purchase a good or service, and you pay this out of your taxable income. Nice, eh?
So the fact is, the people at the bottom of the pyramid have everyone else's costs built into their incomes.
But it is actually worse than that. Unlike taxes, the progression is reversed, percentage wise. Got a lot of phone business to do with the phone company? Then they'll reduce your rates, special deals, good customer, yadda yadda. Percentage wise, you're now paying less for the medical care and taxes of the phone company employee than is some single mother who has a phone on the basis of the services of the phone company you actually receive. That leaves more for you to pay your own costs both on a percentage basis, and on a real basis.
Our economy literally sits heaviest on the shoulders of those at the bottom. It is designed to do so, or at the most optimistic, has evolved to do so.
You do know that 54% of all income is earned by the top 20% of income earners, right? And that at these incomes, it is trivially easy for these people to live? And that while you complain for them, the tax rate they pay has no possible reasonable effect on how they live whatsoever? And that the tax rate that the lowest two - or even three - brackets pay not only has an effect, but in many cases means the difference between medical treatment or not, college for the kids or not, and a host of other basic choices? So that your statement, even if 100% accurate, is basically a sop to people who have no need of your empathy whatsoever?
There's nothing annoys me as much as the presumption that a 1/3-million dollar or higher income is 10% different (that's the difference in tax rates) from a 50,000 or 20,000 dollar income and that those in the 35% bracket deserve sympathy, empathy, tax breaks, or thanks. Under any general circumstances, but certainly in our current economic mess, where both the fed and the states have expanded to take on many unconstitutional roles. Since those people can live the same life as a middle income earner without any stress, perhaps they should be paying all of the tax burden. Seriously.
I'm a lot more inclined to account for how stress-free you can rationally maintain your family than I am for the total dollars earned as a metric for how much tax one should pay. Once I've got enough funds to reach a certain standard of living, my tax rate should climb quite steeply as far as I'm concerned. Perhaps there should be no incentive at all to earn more than a million dollars or so a year - anything anyone would earn over that goes into taxes by a flat rate until the national debt is paid and all tax resources required are met. I'd be perfectly fine with that. You'd see the government get out of a lot of places it shouldn't be, too, because rich people have a lot of clout. If you can't live comfortably on a million bucks a year in the current US economic environment, you should probably be taken out and shot.
I know a lot of families here in Montana who still wouldn't be able to live what most of the readers here would consider a reasonable lifestyle (small house, health insurance, one car) if you removed the entire state and federal and use taxes tax burden from them. Comparing them on any kind of equal field with some wag who makes 349,000 (the 35% bracket for singles) or more per year is the act of a lunatic, no matter how reasonable it sounds to declare that they pay 79% of the tax burden.
The first thing I'd want is a guarantee that idiots wouldn't try to take down an operating infrastructure that everyone has grown to depend upon. That's the only thing we're missing, as far as I can tell.
And by the way, if you want to "fix" SMTP, start a new mail protocol that uses a different port. Leave the rest of us alone.
Wikipedia contains errors. But so does most every dictionary (try looking up atheist and you'll find the Christian definition, which is about as definitive of an atheist as an atheist's definition of a Christian is of a Christian. Atheism is the lack of a belief, or to quote someone sharp, "If atheism is a belief system, then bald is a hair color.") Standard printed encyclopedias and textbooks contain errors. The news media contains errors. Political speech contains errors. Court pronouncements and laws contain errors. Parental and teacher mandates and teachings contain errors. tests contain errors. School boards make errors (and how!) Newspapers contain errors. Even the editors of Slashdot make mistakes (cough.)
Wikipedia, however, is one of the few sources that continually tries to approach accuracy, and where you can find an error repaired literally seconds after you detect it - or you can fix it yourself, if you understand the problem.
So why, again, is it that wikipedia must be banned?
So, in your world, women simply have no marketable skills? I always thought they were the same as us fellows, only a whole lot cuter, plus they can cook up a baby. For every incompetent human being I've met who was female, there's been a male of similar lack of competence to keep the scales balanced. Me, I like the smart ones.
Well, good luck with your bill-paying, anyway. Everyone likes something different.
Oh, I don't know. When she can have a doll that has size-as-you-please parts, is 100% attentive, never gets tired, soft, rude, disinterested, or puts her aside for beer, football, or poker, never pines for or asks for sex acts she doesn't prefer, doesn't put her at risk for disease, pregnancy, heartbreak, political argument, never looks at other women... she may not be all that interested in a dude at all. What guys imagine would be fun for them will have some kind of direct corollary for the ladies, you can count on it.
There's a pretty amazing market for BOBs (Battery Operated Boyfriends) right now. That's your red flag. Chicks don't mind technology at all. Assuming they do is your first step towards the curb. Best thing you can do for your relationship is go buy a Hitachi Magic Wand. You'll go from goat to hero in about 60 seconds. Now just imagine one of these that will bring her breakfast in bed... and you're beginning to get the idea.
You really need to get some therapy. Not to mention learn more about the range of normal sexual activities, figure out where your prostate is, and stop worrying about what other people are doing with consenting partners. Just because you're neurotic, repressed and sexually naive doesn't mean that everyone else is, you know. Here are some tips: Plenty of heterosexual men and women engage in all manner of anal play in both directions - it isn't an activity limited to "homosexuals" by any means. Furthermore, not all homosexuals engage in anal play. Some are perfectly content with manual stimulation and or oral stimulation. You're just fixated on anal for some reason. Again, I suggest you seek therapy. You are one busted puppy.
Just so we're clear - the only time "Democrats" appears in my post is in the subject line, as a "re", meaning, the post the *previous* writer titled so-and-so. I wasn't saying anything about democrats or republicans as parties, I was responding to the "I want my country back."
I consider the political system 100% broken; it is my strong impression that you could elect Ghandi himself as president and it would not deflect the course of the country one whit. The courts are 100% broken (that's where almost all of these twisted, strained interpretations come from - judges and lawyers who are unwilling to comply with the constitution's authority.) Both the house and senate are completely, utterly compromised by the vast majority of members who will sign or vote for literally anything if it has the proper ratio of pork / favors for them, and are willing to bribe to force the states to fall into line (think speed limits, drug laws, etc) and worse. I sympathize with the idea of getting a conservative (or simply sensible) head of state, but I don't actually believe it would have any effect. No doubt I'll vote for Paul when the time comes, unless someone with a better platform comes along, but that doesn't mean I expect him to be able to change anything. Once something falls off a cliff, no amount of good will can stop the process.
A great show. Funny as can be.
I like Ron Paul a great deal, and mostly agree with his stances. However, I find much to regret in his position on immigration. I would agree that he is, by far, the candidate with the least problems in terms of the field at hand.
No one, including you, has successfully presented any specifics that show my post contained any errors. If you want to specifically characterize any of it as errors - or lies - by all means, the floor is yours. I'm right here, and I've got a reply with your (cowardly lack of a) name on it ready to fill in. So fire away from under your broad, thick, and yellow stripe, M. AC.
I wonder the same thing. My guess is, it will fall into some middle range, but again, we'll have to wait for actual commercial products and on the road experience before we will really know. On the one hand, if the main power supply can be restricted to full charge cycles, that would be optimal - but on the other, "they" want to sell stuff to us, and making something like this last what amounts to forever isn't exactly a great business strategy. But there are other uses, and they may suffice to support such an industry quite well. We'll just have to wait and see.
I pointed to the research that indicated the capabilities I quoted. It will, as always, take some time for research like that to reach consumer's hands. Examples of current UCs available to consumers can be found here. These, however, are not the same technology as the nano-materials based ones, and represent only the beginning of the useful parts in terms of UCs in general. Don't attempt to put words into my mouth that I didn't say myself; I started the thread with probably, and that's what I meant, and what I was talking about, all along. We will all have to wait.
You mentioned three things. (1) Range, 600 miles. This is more often quoted at 300 miles for a passenger vehicle. UCs are not there yet, but they are within reasonable distance of catching it. I again predict 3-5 years.
(2) Refueling time of ten minutes. UCs can do this at home or on the road. Not a problem. You keep mentioning this and I suspect you don't understand the logistics of managing energy with ultracaps. Let me toss a few facts at you, perhaps that will help. You have a recharging station in your home. What it does, first of all, is constantly pulls from the mains into its own ultracaps until it reaches sufficient charge to suit your needs (charging one or two cars, probably.) When you actually plug the car into it, the car takes what it needs (probably not a full charge, either) and this is done by a (relatively) slow ramp-up of current (to avoid sparks, fires, etc) that turns into a torrent of charge once the charging connection has ben verified as solid by expected limited current flow. So the charge time is minutes. Maybe just one minute. Ultracaps take - and supply - charge at astonishing rates. They are not like batteries in this regard. On the road, the "gas station" works just the same way. It doesn't try to fuel you from the mains; it fuels you from its own local storage, which it is constantly replenishing as required. So you see, there is no reason at all to assume that (a) extremely high current service is required for a home, (b) charging would be slow, (c) charging would be inconvenient, (d) charging ever has to let the car fall below 100% when it is plugged in (or charged, then placed in sunlight.)
(3) Driveway storage for three months. Again, UCs can sit just like any other capacitor. However, unlike a gas/diesel fuel vehicle, a UC-powered vehicle can remain attached to the mains, and/or be trickle charged by solar, and make that driveway storage lifetime extend to decades, long after your conventional battery would have died, your fuel turned to varnish, and your car turned into no more than an invitation for a towing service.
All I can say to this is, I hope you're wrong. I have no counter argument to offer.
That list is not a list of "non-US people", it is a list of names, and people (buyers and sellers) are being screwed by it right and left for sales made in the US, by US citizens, to other US citizens, without indictment, warrant, representation or trial. This is not about "sales to Hitler" and to any extent that you believe it is, you are blind. All manner of controls exist for sales that go outside the country, and this list in no way adds any needed teeth to those mechanisms. This list can (and has, and will continue to) prevent US citizens from buying or selling goods and services to other US citizens - if you key a trigger that lands a reference to this list on your credit report, you're done, pal. No loans, no mortgage, no new car, no nothing. Pay attention.