I'm certainly no expert (yet) on Ruby on Rails, but, one of the things that got me very interested in it was this QuickTime video (47MB) in which a simple blog webapp is created from scratch in a very short time.
Some of it might not make much sense to you if you aren't already familiar with Ruby but at least it will give you a little taste of it.
There's a lot of good information at http://www.rubyonrails.com/, particulary in the Rails Academy section (http://www.rubyonrails.com/show/RailsAcademy. And, if you decide you want to learn more, I can recommend the book being reviewed, as I pre-ordered it a couple of weeks ago and have found the beta book very helpful.
I don't know all of the details, but, according to a Reuters story:
CBS news has reported that a U.S. satellite had filmed the shooting and that it had been established the car carrying Calipari was travelling at more than 60 miles (96 km) per hour as it approached the U.S. checkpoint in Baghdad. http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L30104709.htm
I skimmed through TFA and I think the driver estimated his speed at around 50mph, too. And when he heard the warning shots, he panicked and stomped the accelerator in an attempt to get to the airport faster.
It'd be nice if they would release the actual satellite imagery for verification, though. Regardless, Sgrena has too much of a credibility problem for me to take her word alone over the word of several U.S. troops and photographic evidence.
Ummm, actually, "127/8" would be shorthand for 127.0.0.0 - 127.255.255.255. The "/8" explicity means that the first eight bits will be constant, in this case constantly 127.
In the case of 192.168.0.0/24, the first three octets represent the network and will always be 192.168.0.
And I thought the "FairTax" proposal imposed a tax on services, as well as goods. So wouldn't the contractors have to pay a tax on the services being provided by the construction workers? Or is that just a big loophole?
Yes, services would be taxed, but "Business-to-business purchases for the production of goods and services are not taxed."
And then, what about the building materials? If I buy a brick, do I have to pay taxes on it? Or is there an exemption for building materials, or something? The whole thing seems like a bunch of hand-waving to me.
If you bought the brick for yourself, yes, you pay sales tax. If you bought the brick to build something you are going to sell, no sales tax (you would collect the tax from the consumer).
Oh yeah, what if I am my own general contractor? What if I buy the building materials and hire the workers and build the house myself. Then there is no sale, so am I exempt from sales tax? Would I have to then pay sales tax at the point that I resell the house?
Since you would be the consumer, you would have to pay sales tax for the materials, but I'm not sure how the workers would be handled. In theory I'm guessing they would be providing you with a service and therefore should collect the sales tax from you. But, obviously, if you paid them their daily wage plus the sales tax, they would pocket the sales tax and never report it. There would be no tax on the resale of the home.
Capital gains taxes on the sale of a property you live in were already pretty much eliminated years ago anyway (a married couple gets a $500,000 gain tax free every 5 years).
Oops, oh yeah, I forgot about that:)
The biggest problem I have with the FairTax is that it there are too many "what if"s and it seems like it would be too easy to bypass. And I despise the idea of sending everyone a monthly check to cover the taxes that would be collected on the necessities. Way to clumsy and problem prone. I would much prefer a flat tax on income that exempts the first x number of dollars and applies to both individuals and corporations equally.
You're right, cutting spending should be top priority. We need to find some way to force that....
Right. And the income tax will go away after we finish paying for that war...
Yeah, the government really screwed us with that one. The good news is that passing H.R. 25 also involves repealing the 16th Amendment (the one that legalized the federal income tax) to ensure that we don't end up with both a consumption tax and an income tax.
I agree with you, since the words "everyone", "always", "never", etc. have very specific meanings and are commonly misused.
I would guess it would not be difficult to find someone that doesn't think our current tax system is broken. Everyone (yes, literally, as defined) I know would agree that it's broken, but that's hardly everyone. The FairTax people are just speaking in casual generalities, even if it may be a poor choice of words. While I might not like everything about the FairTax, at least they are trying to fix the problem.
Personally, I've always favored a flat tax, say, maybe 15%, with an exemption up to a certain income level. It just seems simpler and I'm a simple kinda guy.
Speaking of which, what if someone bought a new home, for, say, $200,000 (and the sales tax rate was 30%)? Would they owe $60,000 in sales taxes?
That's correct. I think the rate they're talking about is 23%, maybe a little less. But, yes, there would be sales tax on the new home. From what I understand, though, the price of the home would drop quite a bit, because there wouldn't be any income taxes (or tax compliance costs) embedded in the cost of building the home. The companies involved, including contractors, in the building of the home would lower their prices since they don't have to pay income taxes. Why wouldn't they just pocket the money? Because their competitors will eat them alive by reducing their own prices. And don't forget that your net income will be signicantly higher with the removal of the federal income tax, Social Security, and Medicare.
Also, there is no tax on used goods. If you buy a used home, there is no sales tax collected. And, when you sell a home there is no capital gains tax. The FairTax also replaces personal, estate, gift, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes as well.
Keep in mind that I am not an economist or an expert on the FairTax plan and, for all I know, it could be a terrible idea. The current tax system MUST be overhauled, though, and I don't have a better plan.
The tax system now is (mostly) fair. Everyone pays a % of their earnings.
Hardly. Not everyone pays a percentage. Almost half the workers in the U.S. pay no income tax at all. And, in fact, they get quite a sweetheart deal -- many of those people get a "refund" which is far larger than the amount that was witheld in the first place (refundable credits).
The problem with a national sales tax is that middle to low income earners spend a larger percentage of their earnings. Upper class earners spend a much smaller percentage of their wages. A national sales tax would hurt low wage earners the most as they would be using the majority of their wages on food & basic necessities. The little $ they might have left after their purchases and their tax burden won't be enough for an adequate savings.
It's been my experience that most upper class earners spend virtually everything they earn. They might spend a slightly smaller amount as a percentage of their income, but, 85% of $200,000 is a lot more real dollars than 95% of $25,000. Admittedly, I pulled those numbers out of my ass, they're just for illustration purposes;)
As structured in H.R. 25, everyone gets a monthly check to prevent exactly what you describe. It's actually a pretty well thought-out plan. You can read more about it at http://fairtax.org/.
The national sales tax has nothing to do with third party tax preperation services.
Actually, it does. As put forth in HR 25, the national sales tax would replace the income tax.
Republicans do it far more often then democrats, but that is only because most democrats are dirt poor.
What makes you say that? Last I heard there are more millionaire democrats than republicans in Congress. It seems to me that the more wealth someone has, the more likely they are to be a democrat (entertainers, lawyers, CEOs, etc.). But, you are right about both sides doing anything they can to avoid paying taxes.
I wish I had some mod points, I'd mod up Spud Stud's comment. Fetal tissue research has not been blocked. Why is it so hard for the public at large to understand that not funding something is not the same as blocking, banning, or outlawing something.
Oracle doesn't have to be mentioned in the article. The original poster stated that the Agility Alliance "includes IT heavyweights EDS, Oracle, Cisco, Microsoft, Sun, Dell and EMC."
If you check the Alliance's web site (http://www.eds.com/services/alliances/agility/) you will see that Oracle is indeed a member of that group. As is SAP and Siebel, but, they aren't mentioned in the article either.
One thing that really bothers me is that White House security has become so slack that people can wander around there with fake names
It might not be as bad as it sounds. I think I read something earlier that his press pass was given on a day-by-day basis, and was obtained using his real name. Only when it came time to publish did he use his pseudonym.
Hopefully we would agree that any reporter should avoid using their opportunity to ask a question as a platform for their own agenda, regardless of their own political leanings.
I know, that's being a little idealistic, perhaps a bit naive, but, my world's a better place.
With the exception of the last question, it sounds to me like he brought up some good points.
In that last question he seems to be taking none to subtle shots a Kerry, rather asking a legitimate question.
I don't subscribe to the school of thought that the sole job a reporter is to dig up dirt. If it happens, that's fine, but, to me, it seems like their role should be to gather accurate information and report on it.
No, I agree, my first post was a total pipe-dream, and the criticism was not just directed at Bush but all of 'em. I was exaggerating to allude to an ethos that I don't see us having.
I kinda got that feeling, and the word "Utopia" did come to mind when I read your post. You're right, in that Utopia things would be as you described. And would be very cool.
It definetly wouldn't be as haute coture, but I'd rather see a ragtag heartfelt inagural ceremony than a spitnpolish blacktie theatrical event, just like i'd rather a maccaroni xmas card from someone who can't afford much than something glitzy from someone who can afford anything...i understand that's me being a typical youngperson, and accept that old ppl like their black suits, so they can go ahead and enjoy it..
I agree, whole-heartedly. If I were President (God help us all if that were true), I would probably do something like a lottery. People who wanted to attend could put in request, and then I would randomly draw five or ten thousand, whatever the number would be, and that would be my guest list.
Come on, think it through. The artists, caterers, and many others are precisely the ones that can't afford to give stuff away. Their suppliers won't just say "Oh, it's for a party, don't worry about paying us back. It's on us!"
These millions that are being spent on the inaugeration are being pumped right into the economy. Since when did we become a nation whiners that are always trying to dictate how other people spend their money. If it was public money, yeah, I'd have an issue with it, since it's partly my money.
And, not that I really care, but Clinton's second-term inaugeration cost more than Bushes and I don't remember a big deal being made out that one.
And, finally, for those that are saying things like "Think of how many HumVees and sets of body armor for our troops that money could have purchased," I say, "Easy: zero," because it wasn't taxpayer dollars. The private sector donate money to the military (beyond taxation).
So it seems like you need to access (click on a link to) your trusted site via an untrusted site to get hijacked?
That is correct. The malicious site must know the name of the target window. By clicking on their link to open Citibank's page, they get to name the new window.
Meanwhile, back in the malicious site's window, a script stays running waiting for the popup window to open. When it does, it quickly redirects the window to a page on their own site.
Since the popup is launched without an address bar, you don't notice the new address you're at.
Actually, it IS a vaccine
on
HIV Vaccine
·
· Score: 1
While I don't disagree with your comments in general, I must disagree with you're statement "It is NOT a vaccine."
"A preparation of a weakened or killed pathogen, such as a bacterium or virus, or of a portion of the pathogen's structure that upon administration stimulates antibody production or cellular immunity against the pathogen but is incapable of causing severe infection."
Which is exactly what they created. It's a therapeutic vaccine, rather than the more common preventative vaccine that people are accustomed to.
Hmm, actually, he inherited an economy that was already in decline, and then, despite of what happened on 9/11 and a subsequent war, turned the economy around which has reduced the unemployment rate to a low 5.4%. Not to shabby.
he fucked Iraq
Really? If by "fucked" you mean "improved," alright, I'll give ya that one.
he fucked our international relations
I would argue that our own media fucked our international relations. They're the ones that constantly criticized, insulted, and generally belittled him. And the main reason France and Germany didn't join us in Iraq is because they were in bed with Saddam, with multi-billion dollar oil deals. Not to mention they were both involved in the corruption of the Oil For Food program.
he fucked our intelligence services
The Clinton administration is, in part, responsible for that. Specifically, it was Jamie Gorelick that wrote the memo that helped block communication between the intelligence agencies.
Bush has been busy improving inter-agency communication and collaboration. I admit they may have gone a little too far with some components of the Patriot Act.
he fucked our civil liberties
How?
and he fucked our electoral system.
Again, how? As far as I am aware, he hasn't done anything to our electoral system. Did he change some laws? Extend his term? I must have missed that story.
Kinda puts a blowjob from an intern into perspective, doesn't it?
Nothing wrong with a blowjob. Purgery, on the other hand, is a bigger deal. That's why he was impeached and temporarily disbarred by the U.S. Supreme Court and had his Arkansas law license suspended for five years (plus a $25,000 fine) for providing "misleading testimony" in order to deny Paula Jones her day in court.
Slashdot Mirror
Some of it might not make much sense to you if you aren't already familiar with Ruby but at least it will give you a little taste of it.
There's a lot of good information at http://www.rubyonrails.com/, particulary in the Rails Academy section (http://www.rubyonrails.com/show/RailsAcademy. And, if you decide you want to learn more, I can recommend the book being reviewed, as I pre-ordered it a couple of weeks ago and have found the beta book very helpful.
If so, please send it to "jacked at fastisos dot com".
Thanks!
http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/03/ 1859245&tid=179&tid=142&tid=3&tid=106
Apparently it wasn't so obvious to the author of the message I replied to, since he was wrong (127/8 is not shorthand for 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0).
What the hell do you think a netmask is? '/8' means the netmask, when written down in binary form, starts with 8 1's.
Right, who said otherwise? Great, we're all in agreement. Thanks for playing.
I skimmed through TFA and I think the driver estimated his speed at around 50mph, too. And when he heard the warning shots, he panicked and stomped the accelerator in an attempt to get to the airport faster.
It'd be nice if they would release the actual satellite imagery for verification, though. Regardless, Sgrena has too much of a credibility problem for me to take her word alone over the word of several U.S. troops and photographic evidence.
Ummm, actually, "127/8" would be shorthand for 127.0.0.0 - 127.255.255.255. The "/8" explicity means that the first eight bits will be constant, in this case constantly 127.
In the case of 192.168.0.0/24, the first three octets represent the network and will always be 192.168.0.
Yes, services would be taxed, but "Business-to-business purchases for the production of goods and services are not taxed."
And then, what about the building materials? If I buy a brick, do I have to pay taxes on it? Or is there an exemption for building materials, or something? The whole thing seems like a bunch of hand-waving to me.
If you bought the brick for yourself, yes, you pay sales tax. If you bought the brick to build something you are going to sell, no sales tax (you would collect the tax from the consumer).
Oh yeah, what if I am my own general contractor? What if I buy the building materials and hire the workers and build the house myself. Then there is no sale, so am I exempt from sales tax? Would I have to then pay sales tax at the point that I resell the house?
Since you would be the consumer, you would have to pay sales tax for the materials, but I'm not sure how the workers would be handled. In theory I'm guessing they would be providing you with a service and therefore should collect the sales tax from you. But, obviously, if you paid them their daily wage plus the sales tax, they would pocket the sales tax and never report it. There would be no tax on the resale of the home.
Capital gains taxes on the sale of a property you live in were already pretty much eliminated years ago anyway (a married couple gets a $500,000 gain tax free every 5 years).
Oops, oh yeah, I forgot about that :)
The biggest problem I have with the FairTax is that it there are too many "what if"s and it seems like it would be too easy to bypass. And I despise the idea of sending everyone a monthly check to cover the taxes that would be collected on the necessities. Way to clumsy and problem prone. I would much prefer a flat tax on income that exempts the first x number of dollars and applies to both individuals and corporations equally.
You're right, cutting spending should be top priority. We need to find some way to force that....
Yeah, the government really screwed us with that one. The good news is that passing H.R. 25 also involves repealing the 16th Amendment (the one that legalized the federal income tax) to ensure that we don't end up with both a consumption tax and an income tax.
I would guess it would not be difficult to find someone that doesn't think our current tax system is broken. Everyone (yes, literally, as defined) I know would agree that it's broken, but that's hardly everyone. The FairTax people are just speaking in casual generalities, even if it may be a poor choice of words. While I might not like everything about the FairTax, at least they are trying to fix the problem.
Personally, I've always favored a flat tax, say, maybe 15%, with an exemption up to a certain income level. It just seems simpler and I'm a simple kinda guy.
That's correct. I think the rate they're talking about is 23%, maybe a little less. But, yes, there would be sales tax on the new home. From what I understand, though, the price of the home would drop quite a bit, because there wouldn't be any income taxes (or tax compliance costs) embedded in the cost of building the home. The companies involved, including contractors, in the building of the home would lower their prices since they don't have to pay income taxes. Why wouldn't they just pocket the money? Because their competitors will eat them alive by reducing their own prices. And don't forget that your net income will be signicantly higher with the removal of the federal income tax, Social Security, and Medicare.
Also, there is no tax on used goods. If you buy a used home, there is no sales tax collected. And, when you sell a home there is no capital gains tax. The FairTax also replaces personal, estate, gift, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes as well.
Here's a pdf that describes it much better than I can: http://www.fairtaxvolunteer.org/pdf/homebuilder.pd f
Keep in mind that I am not an economist or an expert on the FairTax plan and, for all I know, it could be a terrible idea. The current tax system MUST be overhauled, though, and I don't have a better plan.
Hardly. Not everyone pays a percentage. Almost half the workers in the U.S. pay no income tax at all. And, in fact, they get quite a sweetheart deal -- many of those people get a "refund" which is far larger than the amount that was witheld in the first place (refundable credits).
The problem with a national sales tax is that middle to low income earners spend a larger percentage of their earnings. Upper class earners spend a much smaller percentage of their wages. A national sales tax would hurt low wage earners the most as they would be using the majority of their wages on food & basic necessities. The little $ they might have left after their purchases and their tax burden won't be enough for an adequate savings.
It's been my experience that most upper class earners spend virtually everything they earn. They might spend a slightly smaller amount as a percentage of their income, but, 85% of $200,000 is a lot more real dollars than 95% of $25,000. Admittedly, I pulled those numbers out of my ass, they're just for illustration purposes ;)
As structured in H.R. 25, everyone gets a monthly check to prevent exactly what you describe. It's actually a pretty well thought-out plan. You can read more about it at http://fairtax.org/.
Actually, it does. As put forth in HR 25, the national sales tax would replace the income tax.
Republicans do it far more often then democrats, but that is only because most democrats are dirt poor.
What makes you say that? Last I heard there are more millionaire democrats than republicans in Congress. It seems to me that the more wealth someone has, the more likely they are to be a democrat (entertainers, lawyers, CEOs, etc.). But, you are right about both sides doing anything they can to avoid paying taxes.
Otherwise, interesting post...
If you check the Alliance's web site (http://www.eds.com/services/alliances/agility/) you will see that Oracle is indeed a member of that group. As is SAP and Siebel, but, they aren't mentioned in the article either.
The poster is correct.
It's really no different than book publishers paying a couple of bucks for a fact correction or a few dimes for spotting a typo.
One thing that really bothers me is that White House security has become so slack that people can wander around there with fake names
It might not be as bad as it sounds. I think I read something earlier that his press pass was given on a day-by-day basis, and was obtained using his real name. Only when it came time to publish did he use his pseudonym.
Hopefully we would agree that any reporter should avoid using their opportunity to ask a question as a platform for their own agenda, regardless of their own political leanings.
I know, that's being a little idealistic, perhaps a bit naive, but, my world's a better place.
In that last question he seems to be taking none to subtle shots a Kerry, rather asking a legitimate question.
I don't subscribe to the school of thought that the sole job a reporter is to dig up dirt. If it happens, that's fine, but, to me, it seems like their role should be to gather accurate information and report on it.
Such as bzip?
I kinda got that feeling, and the word "Utopia" did come to mind when I read your post. You're right, in that Utopia things would be as you described. And would be very cool.
It definetly wouldn't be as haute coture, but I'd rather see a ragtag heartfelt inagural ceremony than a spitnpolish blacktie theatrical event, just like i'd rather a maccaroni xmas card from someone who can't afford much than something glitzy from someone who can afford anything. ..i understand that's me being a typical youngperson, and accept that old ppl like their black suits, so they can go ahead and enjoy it..
I agree, whole-heartedly. If I were President (God help us all if that were true), I would probably do something like a lottery. People who wanted to attend could put in request, and then I would randomly draw five or ten thousand, whatever the number would be, and that would be my guest list.
These millions that are being spent on the inaugeration are being pumped right into the economy. Since when did we become a nation whiners that are always trying to dictate how other people spend their money. If it was public money, yeah, I'd have an issue with it, since it's partly my money.
And, not that I really care, but Clinton's second-term inaugeration cost more than Bushes and I don't remember a big deal being made out that one.
And, finally, for those that are saying things like "Think of how many HumVees and sets of body armor for our troops that money could have purchased," I say, "Easy: zero," because it wasn't taxpayer dollars. The private sector donate money to the military (beyond taxation).
That is correct. The malicious site must know the name of the target window. By clicking on their link to open Citibank's page, they get to name the new window.
Meanwhile, back in the malicious site's window, a script stays running waiting for the popup window to open. When it does, it quickly redirects the window to a page on their own site.
Since the popup is launched without an address bar, you don't notice the new address you're at.
While I don't disagree with your comments in general, I must disagree with you're statement "It is NOT a vaccine."
A vaccine is defined as:
Which is exactly what they created. It's a therapeutic vaccine, rather than the more common preventative vaccine that people are accustomed to.
Not necessarily relevant, but, I find it interesting that Progeny was founded by the creator of Debian: Ian Murdock.
Their web site: http://www.progeny.com/
Hmm, actually, he inherited an economy that was already in decline, and then, despite of what happened on 9/11 and a subsequent war, turned the economy around which has reduced the unemployment rate to a low 5.4%. Not to shabby.
he fucked Iraq
Really? If by "fucked" you mean "improved," alright, I'll give ya that one.
he fucked our international relations
I would argue that our own media fucked our international relations. They're the ones that constantly criticized, insulted, and generally belittled him. And the main reason France and Germany didn't join us in Iraq is because they were in bed with Saddam, with multi-billion dollar oil deals. Not to mention they were both involved in the corruption of the Oil For Food program.
he fucked our intelligence services
The Clinton administration is, in part, responsible for that. Specifically, it was Jamie Gorelick that wrote the memo that helped block communication between the intelligence agencies.
Bush has been busy improving inter-agency communication and collaboration. I admit they may have gone a little too far with some components of the Patriot Act.
he fucked our civil liberties
How?
and he fucked our electoral system.
Again, how? As far as I am aware, he hasn't done anything to our electoral system. Did he change some laws? Extend his term? I must have missed that story.
Kinda puts a blowjob from an intern into perspective, doesn't it?
Nothing wrong with a blowjob. Purgery, on the other hand, is a bigger deal. That's why he was impeached and temporarily disbarred by the U.S. Supreme Court and had his Arkansas law license suspended for five years (plus a $25,000 fine) for providing "misleading testimony" in order to deny Paula Jones her day in court.