Otherwise laws against defamation -- a widely accepted case where somebody can say something illegal despite never having promised another party explicitly that they would not -- would not be allowed.
Defamation is harming another person's reputation by making false statements. It has nothing to do with making "illegal statements".
It is a law, which you are required to follow regardless of what you promise.
You can obliterate someones reputation if what you are saying is the truth, and you are not liable or guilty of anything.
Now in this case there is no moral principle or legal principle upon which Apple has a complaint. This person owes Apple no duty to protect information simply because Apple deems it to be secret. If it were truly a secret it would not have fallen into his hands, since he did nothing fraudulent or unlawful in order to obtain it.
Bottom line: if you say something that you know, or reasonably could have known, would damage another in some way, then you are morally responsible for the consequences.
No you are not. Unless what you are saying is a LIE. If what you are saying brings more good into the world than harm, then saying it is the morally correct thing to do. Otherwise you are usually still within your legal rights to say it provided it isn't a LIE (which damages the reputation), and it doesn't incite hatred or counsel criminal acts. (and inciting hatred is legal in a lot of places)
It could be argued that advance notice of a new product, or the inner workings of a product is good for consumers.
Apple was not damaged. Information about Apple which had already been leaked to the public was simply being furthar disseminated. The public has a right to know this information because of its public nature. Apple has no rights over this information.
Apple did not suffer any damage because of the BLOG.
If Apple lost any money it is because Apple made an incorrect business decision itself by incorrectly assuming that this information would remain secret.
Additionally.. Apple has no right to damage people by denying them their right to discuss Apple amongst one another or to whomever they please.
Only those persons which made some kind of NDA with Apple are required to keep anything a secret.
IT's not called global warming. It's called climate change. Precipitation is an element of climate.
"IT" is called global warming. "Climate change" is the vague spin term republicans and neoliberals use to deny that global warming exists and try to make it sound normal.
The average temperature of the earth is increasing.
That is what WARMING means.
Additionally, added energy to the system has been modeled to increase extreame weather events.
And what is this "added energy"?
The earth isn't spinning any faster. It is TEMPERATURE.
ergo: WARMING
You will call it whatever you want. The extra crap industry is dumping into the atmosphere, the forests, jungles and wetlands that mankind is destroying is harming the global climate making it dangerous to breath the air or go outside during the day without getting skin cancer.
If you don't like "global warming", how about "global crapification"?
The freedom to say nasty things about politicians (and the government) is one of the hallmarks of a functioning democracy.
Any encroachment of the freedom to criticize a politician without any fear of retribution or lawsuit, especially while they are in office seems to be an invitation to totalitarianism.
While it is probably true there is no legitimate reason to simply say bad things which are not true, there are so many instances where it is impossible to prove the government (or a politician) has done something wrong, or is of poor character (or whatever else the insult or defamatory remark is) and the fear of a defamation lawsuit may curtail legitimate criticism.
Legitimate criticism of government is such a vital part of democratic society that I would say it is worth the risk of having a few politicians feelings or reputations hurt by false accusations.
quite frankly... at election time practically everything politicians say if only by innuendo about their opponents is defamatory, and damaging to each others reputation.
There is no real difference between flat out defaming someone directly and defaming by innuendo. Politicians have to expect it. It is part of the job.
In canada, while it is in fact common for companies to request Social Insurance Number (SIN) numbers for credit, you need not provide it. (most credit card applications go so far as to indicate it is optional).
The only time you pretty much need to provide SIN is when you are dealing with someone who will need to issue you income tax forms because you are being paid an income by them. (this includes your employer and possibly your bank)
You do not need a SIN to do a credit check (in Canada).
Of all the redundant and patronizing arguments someone can possibly make!
BTW: there is nothing in the BBC article your sig refers to that in any way suggests that amnesty international is directly or indirectly responsible for causing a single death in nepal.
but it still boils down to your decision to deprive someone of potential earnings.
Thats all it boils down to?
Then you would have no complaint against the poor making copies for their personal use would you?
How about someone making copies of music just for archival purposes to insure that 70 years from now when the copyright expires it WILL be available to the public domain, no matter what whacky DRM schemes are invented by them would would deprive the public of its RIGHTFUL property?
It's one thing to not understand this. It's another thing to take issue with the word "theft" simply because you're not physically depriving anyone of anything.
I take issue with the word "theft" because "Copyright infringement" does not fit within that definition.
It's yet another to understand all of this and still believe that you're not doing anything wrong.
maybe so.. but as YOU know. copyright infringement is not theft and it is not piracy.
you may as well call it rape, murder or terrorism because copyright infringement is ALSO none of those things.
The problem is that passing a law in which a particular intent is illegal means that the terrorists can get off if they can plausibly state that their intent was pointing out stars to someone,
It is a fundamental principle of justice, that you can't be put in prison for commiting an offense which has no mental element. (i.e. no intent)
(or no physical mental element for that matter... it is not illegal to merely INTEND something, you must take at least some positive step towards facilitating your intent)
You must intend to point the laser at an aircraft in order to be imprisoned for pointing a laser at an aircraft.
It would be simple enough to make it a crime to point a laser at an aircraft, (and it probably should be).
As far as the defendant (or terrorist as we call defendants these days) convincing the jury he didn't intend to point the laser at an aircraft, but be intended to point at something else, this is for the jury to be convinced of.
It would be very difficult to convince a jury you accidentally painted the aircraft multiple times with a laser, or that you were pointing to multiple stars which just so happened to be directly behind the aircraft.
You can claim this, but the jury is likely to find the story incredible.
Of course in order to state anything you must agree to testify. And once you are agreeing to testify, you open yourself up to cross examination.
You just took a specific example of a particular WAY that a government can provide a public service (a "municipal") and then provided arguments against the "municipal".
This was all fine until you then tried to expand the scope of your proof all the way back up to the state providing a public service in a general sense. (i.e. in any way which isn't based on a municipal)
Your arguments against a municipal do not have any merit over state participation in the market in general.
All that you could possibly have succeeded in doing, is arguing against the use of municipals as the proper vehicle for the state providing a public service. In fact, all you have done is argue that in SOME or MANY cases a municipal does not reflect the wishes of the people and that it should be abolished in favour of DIRECT state control rather than an independant quasi-governmental entity.
But none of your arguments against municipals suggest that private enterprises would be any more responsive to the needs of the public good, nor do they argue against my claim that the state, as of RIGHT, may morally provide any services the people want the state to provide.
I stand by my claim that the state does not enjoy limited liability. Ultimately any harm caused to society by actions of the state will need to be fixed by actions of the state. The state is truly immortal and it is not permitted to die. (it may change form, and prior leaders may be executed, imprisoned, exiled etc.. as has happened many times in the past).
But the state empowered by authority of the people (i.e. a properly functioning republic or a democracy) can not run away from its mistakes forever.
Suing the state is no more difficult than suing any other party with vast amounts of money beyond your finances. And this is not deemed to be a flaw in Free Enterprise.
It just so happens that the state is far less likely to be liable for wrong doing because the state has LEGAL means to do virtually anything. It need not resort to breaking the law.
But because of freedom of information policies and rules in effect on the state, it is also much less likely that the state is doing someone illegal to justify a lawsuit, in the first place. the wrong doing is more likely to be discovered before harm is caused than in the case of private enterprise.
Moreover, you have another way of forcing the state to comply with your position. WIN AN ELECTION.
As for your general arguments against municipals. In the form that you describe them. Your arguments are very convincing. Keeping in mind the scope of your arguments do not extend to the republic or democratic State, itself, but only to the municipals.
why would a government willingly give away a part of its power?
What power? The government doesn't lose any authority by permiting or not permitting any kind of private enterprise. The governement may lose assets or cash it is holding in PUBLIC TRUST if it recklessly grants private property rights without proper consideration of the PUBLIC good (but it is not its own cash or its own assets to begin with, nor is it free to spend it arbitrarily.)
Everyone still needs to follow the laws of the sovereign power regardless who happens to be operating the Czech telephone lines.
In a republic (Czech Republic?) the government loses its power after a finite number of years anyway. Only an election can restore its power. And the election is likely to put someone else in power if the previous government was behaving in ways which didn't serve the people.
Since a republic only has power by authority of the people, I ask:
why would the people willingly give away any part of their sovereign power?
The state does not have an "unfair" advantage over a business.
The state must answer to the entire electorate and a business must only answer to a few major shareholders.
The state does not enjoy "limited liability", a corporation does.
The state must comply with freedom of information requests etc etc from virtually anybody for any reason (or no reason), a business need only comply with such requests when it is being accused of commiting a criminal act and a court orders it.
the foregoing show that the State has many unfair disadvantages AGAINST IT.
This relates to the current situation in that if a city decides to invest taxpayer money in a fiber network and then give it away for free, or make it part of the tax burden, they would be practicing predatory pricing, unfairly using their position of privledge to take away a market for a company such as Bell South and profiting from that privledge. Much like monopolies do to lesser competitors today.
As far as predatory pricing goes, the state does not do this with the goal of bankrupting anyone, or profiting from it, but with the goal of providing a public service. Private firms which practice predatory pricing, will raise their prices as soon as their competition is driven out, and this is contrary to the public good.
Predatory pricing is not immoral by any capitalist ethic and there is no reason the state should protect businesses from predatory pricing unless it serves the PUBLIC good. It is not for the benefit of the business to limit or ban predatory pricing of monopolies, it is purely for the PUBLIC good.
A republic or democracy does not need to engage in predatory pricing to get rid of the competition. The State is free to simply outlaw that service being offered privately. This is the sovereign right of the people.
If the state wanted to outlaw a private business and provide that service directly (like healthcare in Canada), then a state has the right to do so.
Businesses have NO RIGHT to be free from state competition or even state interferance. And every business knew this prior to investing a single penny.
The argument of limitless funds is invalid.
The state does not have limitless funds. It merely has A LOT of funds. And nothing in capitalist ethic says that you have a right to be protected against a competitor with more capital assets.
This argument is rejected by neoliberals when under-developed countries try to impose protectionist policies because foreign investors have such large capital assets (essentially limitless) that they have an "unfair" advantage over locals that can not compete, but the same neoliberals cry about "unfair" competition when a state tries to provide a service to its own people because the state has essentially limitless capital assets.
Except the situation is not the same. In 1 case the wealthier party is motivated by public good, and in the other the wealthier party doesn't give a shit about the public and will skip town if the public gets too unruly.
How on earth is controlling the flow of goods and services supposed to make the local population's income go up?
You improve the local populations income like this. Permits goods to flow out freely, but you do not allow any foreign ownership of local property, and you impose tarrifs on imports on any goods from countries whose legal codes offend your moral standards of industrial, environmental and human welfare ethics.
Recent economic studies have found that the benefits of increasing prosperity are not limited to the richest stratas of society. but instead tend to be wide spread.
Recent economic studies also have found that increasing prosperity is a MYTH. We are in a period of widespread decreasing prosperity, and increasing concentration of wealth in the hands of a minority.
Any economic study which claims to "study the effect of increasing prosperity" is propaganda.
Indeed, they have found that lower-income people often benefit more than the rich from improved prosperity.
How often is "often"? The vast majority of cases? Do you mean, in about 1/2 of the cases? Or do you mean in thousands of cases, but overall in a tiny percentage of cases?
Because however much "often" is, as cited in these recent economic studies, even MORE OFTEN, the rich get richer and the poor get screwed.
In truth, I am completely at a loss to understand how poverty can be eleviated without free trade. Do you think poor countries are capable of bootstrapping themselves into the 21st century by themselves? They need investment and open markets for their goods, not closed borders.
Did you just claim that "poor" countries are fundamentally incapable of developing without being OWNED by rich foreign investors?
Perhaps before bootstrapping themselves into the 21st century we could permit these countries to bootstrap themselves into the 20th century without us going in there and overthrowing every single democratically elected government which tries to implement protectionist policies.
Allowing multinational corporations to have free trade with undeveloped nations is like allowing grade school teachers to sexually molest their students.
Worse... it is like knowingly hiring convicted sex offenders to be teachers AND THEN allowing them to sexually molest their students.
Just like children are not allowed to consent to sex with adults, governments of under developed nations ought not be permitted to consent to free trade with 1st world nations.
One of the principles of business is the maximization of profit. That's the nature of the animal and that's not going to change. What people call 'greed' is most times 'successful execution of business strategy'.
Why not call it what it is?
It isn't always 'successful', nor does it necessarily maximize profits, but it is always 'greed'.
And the fact that it is in the "nature" of corporations to be greedy, doesn't make it morally justifiable for them to be so. Why do we alway try to excuse the conduct of our sociopathic creations we call corportions?
Since it is in the nature of corporations to be greedy, it is morally justifiable and pragmatic to impose severe public oversight and regulation on corporate conduct to insure they serve the public wellbeing (which allows their existence).
The only relevant question here is whether or not broadband should be a delivered service like 'mail' and 'garbage pickup'.
That question was decided rightfully by the people of Lafayette. As a NON-CITIZEN, what moral standing does Bell have to object?
It isn't enough to simply pay some entry level shmuk to obtain the data. The data must be verified to be correct and basically certified with an affidavit (or something alsmost as good) to be of any use in a court of law. The technician who obtains the data must be properly educated and qualified to make such assertions.
There is liability in the event the wrong data is released and the wrong person gets sued because of an incorrectly processed subpoena.
Without sending the technician to testify in court to back up the data obtained from such subpoena's, the other sides lawyers would have the subpoena results thrown out on the basis that they can not be challenged or verified in any way.
Since the subpoena is against the ISP, the ISP would need to pay the technician to possibly appear in court.
etc.. etc..
(the best bet is to not keep any logs.. saves lots of money. But no one listens)
ALL employees were required to go to bi-annual meetings where they were "asked" to join the lobbying group to call the government and relay the phone company's agenda. You had to either sign-up or sign a waiver.
Welcome to the brave new world of corporate feudalism.
Where employees are nothing more than serfs. The corporation OWNS you. You either submit completely, surrender every last shred of human dignity, your own personal political beliefs (and your right to lobby your government as you truly wish), or lose your job and your family starves to death.
Wouldn't you fight to get it stopped, even if you didn't care?
I would fight only if I didn't care.
If I cared I would realize that I have no sovereign right to impose my commercial services on my customers and either I would compete with the government, find some way to work WITH the government, or get out of town.
If you think it is unfair that the government has more resources then you do, you are right. It is unfair. Too bad.
You have no moral claim against the sovereign entering into "your" market as the sovereign is doing it for the good of the people. You are doing it for your own self aggrandizement.
If a private firm 1000 times your size moved into your territory it would also be unfair, and you would have no complaint. The government has even more rights to compete with you than a private firm. The government has the moral sovereign right to do so FOR THE PEOPLE.
There is nothing in capitalism which makes it wrong for the state to participate in the free market (as directed to do so by the sovereign authority granted it by the PEOPLE).
If they want to raise rates or change service, they have to get permission from the government.
When the general market trend in telecommunications, is for costs to decrease, then the inability to RAISE rates is no impediment. In telecommunications, NO ONE is raising rates!
So now along comes high speed service which is about the only feature they can compete on and now the SAME governments that forced them into these bizarre redtape bureaucratic maneuvers want to build their own fiber lines!
1: So what? you would think the government is there to protect a corporation. It is government by the people FOR THE PEOPLE. Bell is NOT a person. (regardless of what some activist judges ever ruled).
If you read the article you would see that the Bells are NOT building the fibre optic lines they promised to build fast enough. That is the only reason the municipality is stepping up to the plate.
2: No one FORCED any corporation to provide phone service. The corporation agreed to do so, and recieved huge profits FOR YEARS in exchange. (not to mention billions in subsidies)
And if we look at the history of the situtation it was basically the mercy of society in recognizing state granted patent monopolies (which society is under no moral obligation to protect) which lead to this arrangement.
For a political boondoggle! Yeah, if I were a Bell exec, I'd be pulling every trick in the regulatory book I could to keep my business afloat.
When you say afloat you really mean.. afloat in billions of dollars of profits?
And that is why corporations should not be allowed to play with vital resources necessary to the public wellbeing without strict government oversight.
Left to follow their natures, Corporations almost always pull every trick in the regulatory book (and even tricks outside of the book) to maximize profits.
But don't be suprised when the Bells use the tools at their disposal to survive. Instead wonder why it is that the legislatures seem to think they're at the mercy of the Bells and not the other way around!
This is very puzzling. As representatives of the people you would think that legislatures would have more power do impose the will of the people, in a "republic".
I do agree with you that we should never be suprised at the extents corporations go to for profits.
The Laffer Curve theory says a tax rate around 28% gets you the most tax revenue in the USA. Since Clinton had raised the tax rate to a high of 46%, people were discouraged from earning more and encouraged to either cheat on taxes or just plain invest less and earn less.
1: Clinton oversaw that largest EVER federal surplus. (so your theory is proven wrong by example) 2: Your theory also presumes that at a certain level of taxation people will intentionally earn less money just to SPITE the tax collector. Because as long as your take home pay increases by some non-zero amount, there is still incentive to earn more and it is irrational to avoid the raise.
Whatever the "Laffer Curve Threory" is just that, a THEORY. It is not authoritative, because economists have not reached any consensus at all that 28% is the best tax rate, or that there even is a BEST tax rate. For every "Laffer" there is another expert who disagrees.
But most importantly this theory you refer to makes a claim which is contradicted by the vast majority of evidence.
People always try to get better higher paying jobs, and this didn't slow down since the introduction of income tax.
The only economic activity a progressive tax rate may deter is probably working overtime.
A progessive tax rate might deter someone from working 80 hours rather than 40 hours (because they get to keep less on the later 40 hours than the first 40 hours, and time is a finite commodity), it would not discourage someone from seeking a higher paid job at the same level of hours per week.
If Laffer is arguing that a progressive tax rate discourages people from working excessive overtime, then I would agree. It would. And THAT IS A GOOD THING.
As far as simply deterring work and investment in general. This is FUD spread by neoconservatives and neoliberals.
Where is the global slow down of the economy world wide as national income taxes exceeded 28%, that this curve theory predicts?
I think it's intellectually dishonest to pretend away non-discretionary federal spending. 3/4 of federal spending is in Welfare, Medicare, Medicade, Social Security and similar socialist programs. To ignore those and make a graph that appears to show more than half of federal spending is military in nature is outright fraudulent. Sorry but Congress CAN effect non-discretionary spending: by repealing or reforming those programs, duh! Meanwhile, count that spending as spending.
Stop being a sore winner. Republicans control congress. The deficit is not the fault of congress it is the fault of the political party in control at this time and unprecedented tax cuts for which the 10% most wealthy americans are getting 80% of the dollars! There isn't a shortage of money. There is a shortage of honesty.
The creator of that chart you are complaining about specifically explained what the chart shows, and says it excludes medicare or social security and explains why the author believes it should be excluded.
I don't think my income is as heavily taxed as some, so the average figure may be closer to 50%.
Your 41% tax bracket is MUCH HIGHER than what corporations pay in income taxes. And corporations profits are considered part of the Gross Domestic Profit.
I would expect that the the GDP can't be much greater than the sum of everyone's salaries.
I think this may be true only if corporations didn't make profit and the only earnings were salaries. But this is not the case. Corporate profits are considered to be part of the GDP. (probably the lions share of it) The GDP is higher than the sum of everyones salaries.
Companies can't sell more than we can buy and I think we're running a trade deficit so the GDP may even be less than the sum of everyone's salaries.
Companies *can* sell more than you can buy, because 1) companies are loaning you money to buy it, and 2) companies are taking the savings they acrue by not paying their employees enough money and reinvesting it (this capital gains is part of the GDP).
This means, companies are selling things that Americans dont have enough money to buy, and the left over profit goes into capital gains. This inflates the apparent GDP. Since your own liabilies are not tax deductable (unlike corporations liabilites), you dont report your increase in personal liability on your taxes.
As a result, the increase is personal liability that Americans are experiencing also shows up in the GDP as growth (when in fact it ought to be considered neutral).
In effect. The only people who matter (the rich) are experiencing economic growth. The rest of us are still in a recession.
I think you are also making a mistake in presuming that the government's income is 41% of the GDP simply because the government takes 41% of your output. Why not check out the ACTUAL budget of your government instead of extrapolating from your own person income taxes? You are NOT representative of the "average" taxes paid and collected on the GDP.
Given a little room for accounting ledger shenanigns it's reasonable to say that the anyone who defends taxes by citing roads and defense isn't watching their money very closely.
Who exactly would build roads and finance defense if not the state? Lets not forget education and healthcare, police departments, emergency services, forestry and that welfare system which is the only thing keeping the proletariate from rising up and overthrowing the government, and that corporte welfare system which is the only thing keeping corporate american in charge of the world? Lets not forget the non-defense military expenditures intended to deflate to true price of oil.
We suggest we should determine how much environmental damage is caused by extracting/processing/burning fuel and that cost should be applied to the sale of each gallon of fuel at the time of sale in the form of environmental levies. (or at least some reasonable approximation of that cost)
Until we know that cost and start applying it our children and grandchildren are subsidizing the fuel expenditures by consumers and industry (as it is they who will be paying for the environmental clean up job). Isn't it bad enough that we are not going to be leaving future generations with any fuel? We re sticking them with the clean up tab as well.
This should be done for all industries, not merely space travel.
Re:Long interviews aren't new
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Defining Google
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I think some companies abuse interviews. A company I worked for wanted everyone on the development team to participate in interviews which meant about 5-10% of the time we were conducting these group interviews of applicants.
It was very disruptive and I believe it was pretty much agreed that we all hated doing the interviews and they didn't really help in any way. (as they were personality type interviews and the applicants had to already pass a technical interview prior to the group interview)
Being that software developers tend to be slightly introverted, being compelled to meet new applicants every week and pretty much meet them at their worst most uncomfortable moment was discomforting to say the least.
I suspect if a company is only hiring 1% of all applicants it pays off to do extensive interviews. If you are hiring 30-50% of the interviewees, then there is less benefit to an exhaustive interview process.
The industrial world has a vested interest in maintaining itself and not destroying itself or us: If there is no civilization or people to buy goods and services, then money and soon power (as in power of the people, not nuclear power) go bye-bye.
Now I've heard it all. A global industrial-military conspiracy to save the world.
Slashdot Mirror
Otherwise laws against defamation -- a widely accepted case where somebody can say something illegal despite never having promised another party explicitly that they would not -- would not be allowed.
Defamation is harming another person's reputation by making false statements. It has nothing to do with making "illegal statements".
It is a law, which you are required to follow regardless of what you promise.
You can obliterate someones reputation if what you are saying is the truth, and you are not liable or guilty of anything.
Now in this case there is no moral principle or legal principle upon which Apple has a complaint. This person owes Apple no duty to protect information simply because Apple deems it to be secret. If it were truly a secret it would not have fallen into his hands, since he did nothing fraudulent or unlawful in order to obtain it.
Bottom line: if you say something that you know, or reasonably could have known, would damage another in some way, then you are morally responsible for the consequences.
No you are not. Unless what you are saying is a LIE. If what you are saying brings more good into the world than harm, then saying it is the morally correct thing to do. Otherwise you are usually still within your legal rights to say it provided it isn't a LIE (which damages the reputation), and it doesn't incite hatred or counsel criminal acts. (and inciting hatred is legal in a lot of places)
It could be argued that advance notice of a new product, or the inner workings of a product is good for consumers.
Apple was not damaged. Information about Apple which had already been leaked to the public was simply being furthar disseminated. The public has a right to know this information because of its public nature. Apple has no rights over this information.
Apple did not suffer any damage because of the BLOG.
If Apple lost any money it is because Apple made an incorrect business decision itself by incorrectly assuming that this information would remain secret.
Additionally.. Apple has no right to damage people by denying them their right to discuss Apple amongst one another or to whomever they please.
Only those persons which made some kind of NDA with Apple are required to keep anything a secret.
IT's not called global warming. It's called climate change. Precipitation is an element of climate.
"IT" is called global warming. "Climate change" is the vague spin term republicans and neoliberals use to deny that global warming exists and try to make it sound normal.
The average temperature of the earth is increasing.
That is what WARMING means.
Additionally, added energy to the system has been modeled to increase extreame weather events.
And what is this "added energy"?
The earth isn't spinning any faster. It is TEMPERATURE.
ergo: WARMING
You will call it whatever you want. The extra crap industry is dumping into the atmosphere, the forests, jungles and wetlands that mankind is destroying is harming the global climate making it dangerous to breath the air or go outside during the day without getting skin cancer.
If you don't like "global warming", how about "global crapification"?
Even if the posts were defamatory?
Is it illegal to defame politicians?
The freedom to say nasty things about politicians (and the government) is one of the hallmarks of a functioning democracy.
Any encroachment of the freedom to criticize a politician without any fear of retribution or lawsuit, especially while they are in office seems to be an invitation to totalitarianism.
While it is probably true there is no legitimate reason to simply say bad things which are not true, there are so many instances where it is impossible to prove the government (or a politician) has done something wrong, or is of poor character (or whatever else the insult or defamatory remark is) and the fear of a defamation lawsuit may curtail legitimate criticism.
Legitimate criticism of government is such a vital part of democratic society that I would say it is worth the risk of having a few politicians feelings or reputations hurt by false accusations.
quite frankly... at election time practically everything politicians say if only by innuendo about their opponents is defamatory, and damaging to each others reputation.
There is no real difference between flat out defaming someone directly and defaming by innuendo. Politicians have to expect it. It is part of the job.
In canada, while it is in fact common for companies to request Social Insurance Number (SIN) numbers for credit, you need not provide it. (most credit card applications go so far as to indicate it is optional).
The only time you pretty much need to provide SIN is when you are dealing with someone who will need to issue you income tax forms because you are being paid an income by them. (this includes your employer and possibly your bank)
You do not need a SIN to do a credit check (in Canada).
you have to admit, that is you opinion
Of all the redundant and patronizing arguments someone can possibly make!
BTW: there is nothing in the BBC article your sig refers to that in any way suggests that amnesty international is directly or indirectly responsible for causing a single death in nepal.
You must admit that is only your opinion.
Did you take it without permission? Yes.
copying something is not "taking" it.
You can justify your crime all you want,
copying something is not a crime.
but it still boils down to your decision to deprive someone of potential earnings.
Thats all it boils down to?
Then you would have no complaint against the poor making copies for their personal use would you?
How about someone making copies of music just for archival purposes to insure that 70 years from now when the copyright expires it WILL be available to the public domain, no matter what whacky DRM schemes are invented by them would would deprive the public of its RIGHTFUL property?
It's one thing to not understand this. It's another thing to take issue with the word "theft" simply because you're not physically depriving anyone of anything.
I take issue with the word "theft" because "Copyright infringement" does not fit within that definition.
It's yet another to understand all of this and still believe that you're not doing anything wrong.
maybe so.. but as YOU know. copyright infringement is not theft and it is not piracy.
you may as well call it rape, murder or terrorism because copyright infringement is ALSO none of those things.
The problem is that passing a law in which a particular intent is illegal means that the terrorists can get off if they can plausibly state that their intent was pointing out stars to someone,
It is a fundamental principle of justice, that you can't be put in prison for commiting an offense which has no mental element. (i.e. no intent)
(or no physical mental element for that matter... it is not illegal to merely INTEND something, you must take at least some positive step towards facilitating your intent)
You must intend to point the laser at an aircraft in order to be imprisoned for pointing a laser at an aircraft.
It would be simple enough to make it a crime to point a laser at an aircraft, (and it probably should be).
As far as the defendant (or terrorist as we call defendants these days) convincing the jury he didn't intend to point the laser at an aircraft, but be intended to point at something else, this is for the jury to be convinced of.
It would be very difficult to convince a jury you accidentally painted the aircraft multiple times with a laser, or that you were pointing to multiple stars which just so happened to be directly behind the aircraft.
You can claim this, but the jury is likely to find the story incredible.
Of course in order to state anything you must agree to testify. And once you are agreeing to testify, you open yourself up to cross examination.
You just took a specific example of a particular WAY that a government can provide a public service (a "municipal") and then provided arguments against the "municipal".
This was all fine until you then tried to expand the scope of your proof all the way back up to the state providing a public service in a general sense. (i.e. in any way which isn't based on a municipal)
Your arguments against a municipal do not have any merit over state participation in the market in general.
All that you could possibly have succeeded in doing, is arguing against the use of municipals as the proper vehicle for the state providing a public service. In fact, all you have done is argue that in SOME or MANY cases a municipal does not reflect the wishes of the people and that it should be abolished in favour of DIRECT state control rather than an independant quasi-governmental entity.
But none of your arguments against municipals suggest that private enterprises would be any more responsive to the needs of the public good, nor do they argue against my claim that the state, as of RIGHT, may morally provide any services the people want the state to provide.
I stand by my claim that the state does not enjoy limited liability. Ultimately any harm caused to society by actions of the state will need to be fixed by actions of the state. The state is truly immortal and it is not permitted to die. (it may change form, and prior leaders may be executed, imprisoned, exiled etc.. as has happened many times in the past).
But the state empowered by authority of the people (i.e. a properly functioning republic or a democracy) can not run away from its mistakes forever.
Suing the state is no more difficult than suing any other party with vast amounts of money beyond your finances. And this is not deemed to be a flaw in Free Enterprise.
It just so happens that the state is far less likely to be liable for wrong doing because the state has LEGAL means to do virtually anything. It need not resort to breaking the law.
But because of freedom of information policies and rules in effect on the state, it is also much less likely that the state is doing someone illegal to justify a lawsuit, in the first place. the wrong doing is more likely to be discovered before harm is caused than in the case of private enterprise.
Moreover, you have another way of forcing the state to comply with your position. WIN AN ELECTION.
As for your general arguments against municipals. In the form that you describe them. Your arguments are very convincing. Keeping in mind the scope of your arguments do not extend to the republic or democratic State, itself, but only to the municipals.
why would a government willingly give away a part of its power?
What power? The government doesn't lose any authority by permiting or not permitting any kind of private enterprise. The governement may lose assets or cash it is holding in PUBLIC TRUST if it recklessly grants private property rights without proper consideration of the PUBLIC good (but it is not its own cash or its own assets to begin with, nor is it free to spend it arbitrarily.)
Everyone still needs to follow the laws of the sovereign power regardless who happens to be operating the Czech telephone lines.
In a republic (Czech Republic?) the government loses its power after a finite number of years anyway. Only an election can restore its power.
And the election is likely to put someone else in power if the previous government was behaving in ways which didn't serve the people.
Since a republic only has power by authority of the people, I ask:
why would the people willingly give away any part of their sovereign power?
The state does not have an "unfair" advantage over a business.
The state must answer to the entire electorate and a business must only answer to a few major shareholders.
The state does not enjoy "limited liability", a corporation does.
The state must comply with freedom of information requests etc etc from virtually anybody for any reason (or no reason), a business need only comply with such requests when it is being accused of commiting a criminal act and a court orders it.
the foregoing show that the State has many unfair disadvantages AGAINST IT.
This relates to the current situation in that if a city decides to invest taxpayer money in a fiber network and then give it away for free, or make it part of the tax burden, they would be practicing predatory pricing, unfairly using their position of privledge to take away a market for a company such as Bell South and profiting from that privledge. Much like monopolies do to lesser competitors today.
As far as predatory pricing goes, the state does not do this with the goal of bankrupting anyone, or profiting from it, but with the goal of providing a public service. Private firms which practice predatory pricing, will raise their prices as soon as their competition is driven out, and this is contrary to the public good.
Predatory pricing is not immoral by any capitalist ethic and there is no reason the state should protect businesses from predatory pricing unless it serves the PUBLIC good. It is not for the benefit of the business to limit or ban predatory pricing of monopolies, it is purely for the PUBLIC good.
A republic or democracy does not need to engage in predatory pricing to get rid of the competition. The State is free to simply outlaw that service being offered privately. This is the sovereign right of the people.
If the state wanted to outlaw a private business and provide that service directly (like healthcare in Canada), then a state has the right to do so.
Businesses have NO RIGHT to be free from state competition or even state interferance. And every business knew this prior to investing a single penny.
The argument of limitless funds is invalid.
The state does not have limitless funds. It merely has A LOT of funds. And nothing in capitalist ethic says that you have a right to be protected against a competitor with more capital assets.
This argument is rejected by neoliberals when under-developed countries try to impose protectionist policies because foreign investors have such large capital assets (essentially limitless) that they have an "unfair" advantage over locals that can not compete, but the same neoliberals cry about "unfair" competition when a state tries to provide a service to its own people because the state has essentially limitless capital assets.
Except the situation is not the same. In 1 case the wealthier party is motivated by public good, and in the other the wealthier party doesn't give a shit about the public and will skip town if the public gets too unruly.
How on earth is controlling the flow of goods and services supposed to make the local population's income go up?
You improve the local populations income like this. Permits goods to flow out freely, but you do not allow any foreign ownership of local property, and you impose tarrifs on imports on any goods from countries whose legal codes offend your moral standards of industrial, environmental and human welfare ethics.
Recent economic studies have found that the benefits of increasing prosperity are not limited to the richest stratas of society. but instead tend to be wide spread.
Recent economic studies also have found that increasing prosperity is a MYTH. We are in a period of widespread decreasing prosperity, and increasing concentration of wealth in the hands of a minority.
Any economic study which claims to "study the effect of increasing prosperity" is propaganda.
Indeed, they have found that lower-income people often benefit more than the rich from improved prosperity.
How often is "often"? The vast majority of cases? Do you mean, in about 1/2 of the cases? Or do you mean in thousands of cases, but overall in a tiny percentage of cases?
Because however much "often" is, as cited in these recent economic studies, even MORE OFTEN, the rich get richer and the poor get screwed.
In truth, I am completely at a loss to understand how poverty can be eleviated without free trade. Do you think poor countries are capable of bootstrapping themselves into the 21st century by themselves? They need investment and open markets for their goods, not closed borders.
Did you just claim that "poor" countries are fundamentally incapable of developing without being OWNED by rich foreign investors?
Perhaps before bootstrapping themselves into the 21st century we could permit these countries to bootstrap themselves into the 20th century without us going in there and overthrowing every single democratically elected government which tries to implement protectionist policies.
Allowing multinational corporations to have free trade with undeveloped nations is like allowing grade school teachers to sexually molest their students.
Worse... it is like knowingly hiring convicted sex offenders to be teachers AND THEN allowing them to sexually molest their students.
Just like children are not allowed to consent to sex with adults, governments of under developed nations ought not be permitted to consent to free trade with 1st world nations.
Eluding to things I wouldn't have (if not for greed) but not telling me what those things are, is a fallacious argument.
Such a claim can not possibly be refuted.
One of the principles of business is the maximization of profit. That's the nature of the animal and that's not going to change. What people call 'greed' is most times 'successful execution of business strategy'.
Why not call it what it is?
It isn't always 'successful', nor does it necessarily maximize profits, but it is always 'greed'.
And the fact that it is in the "nature" of corporations to be greedy, doesn't make it morally justifiable for them to be so. Why do we alway try to excuse the conduct of our sociopathic creations we call corportions?
Since it is in the nature of corporations to be greedy, it is morally justifiable and pragmatic to impose severe public oversight and regulation on corporate conduct to insure they serve the public wellbeing (which allows their existence).
The only relevant question here is whether or not broadband should be a delivered service like 'mail' and 'garbage pickup'.
That question was decided rightfully by the people of Lafayette. As a NON-CITIZEN, what moral standing does Bell have to object?
$60 is a bargain.
It isn't enough to simply pay some entry level shmuk to obtain the data. The data must be verified to be correct and basically certified with an affidavit (or something alsmost as good) to be of any use in a court of law. The technician who obtains the data must be properly educated and qualified to make such assertions.
There is liability in the event the wrong data is released and the wrong person gets sued because of an incorrectly processed subpoena.
Without sending the technician to testify in court to back up the data obtained from such subpoena's, the other sides lawyers would have the subpoena results thrown out on the basis that they can not be challenged or verified in any way.
Since the subpoena is against the ISP, the ISP would need to pay the technician to possibly appear in court.
etc.. etc..
(the best bet is to not keep any logs.. saves lots of money. But no one listens)
How would anyone be able to know how many chinese immigrants are members of the ACLU or Amnesty International?
ALL employees were required to go to bi-annual meetings where they were "asked" to join the lobbying group to call the government and relay the phone company's agenda. You had to either sign-up or sign a waiver.
Welcome to the brave new world of corporate feudalism.
Where employees are nothing more than serfs. The corporation OWNS you. You either submit completely, surrender every last shred of human dignity, your own personal political beliefs (and your right to lobby your government as you truly wish), or lose your job and your family starves to death.
So much for Freedom of Expression.
Wouldn't you fight to get it stopped, even if you didn't care?
I would fight only if I didn't care.
If I cared I would realize that I have no sovereign right to impose my commercial services on my customers and either I would compete with the government, find some way to work WITH the government, or get out of town.
If you think it is unfair that the government has more resources then you do, you are right. It is unfair. Too bad.
You have no moral claim against the sovereign entering into "your" market as the sovereign is doing it for the good of the people. You are doing it for your own self aggrandizement.
If a private firm 1000 times your size moved into your territory it would also be unfair, and you would have no complaint. The government has even more rights to compete with you than a private firm. The government has the moral sovereign right to do so FOR THE PEOPLE.
There is nothing in capitalism which makes it wrong for the state to participate in the free market (as directed to do so by the sovereign authority granted it by the PEOPLE).
If they want to raise rates or change service, they have to get permission from the government.
When the general market trend in telecommunications, is for costs to decrease, then the inability to RAISE rates is no impediment. In telecommunications, NO ONE is raising rates!
So now along comes high speed service which is about the only feature they can compete on and now the SAME governments that forced them into these bizarre redtape bureaucratic maneuvers want to build their own fiber lines!
1: So what? you would think the government is there to protect a corporation. It is government by the people FOR THE PEOPLE. Bell is NOT a person. (regardless of what some activist judges ever ruled).
If you read the article you would see that the Bells are NOT building the fibre optic lines they promised to build fast enough. That is the only reason the municipality is stepping up to the plate.
2: No one FORCED any corporation to provide phone service. The corporation agreed to do so, and recieved huge profits FOR YEARS in exchange. (not to mention billions in subsidies)
And if we look at the history of the situtation it was basically the mercy of society in recognizing state granted patent monopolies (which society is under no moral obligation to protect) which lead to this arrangement.
For a political boondoggle! Yeah, if I were a Bell exec, I'd be pulling every trick in the regulatory book I could to keep my business afloat.
When you say afloat you really mean.. afloat in billions of dollars of profits?
And that is why corporations should not be allowed to play with vital resources necessary to the public wellbeing without strict government oversight.
Left to follow their natures, Corporations almost always pull every trick in the regulatory book (and even tricks outside of the book) to maximize profits.
But don't be suprised when the Bells use the tools at their disposal to survive. Instead wonder why it is that the legislatures seem to think they're at the mercy of the Bells and not the other way around!
This is very puzzling. As representatives of the people you would think that legislatures would have more power do impose the will of the people, in a "republic".
I do agree with you that we should never be suprised at the extents corporations go to for profits.
A classic example of policies interfering with progress.
Don't you mean corporate greed?
The Laffer Curve theory says a tax rate around 28% gets you the most tax revenue in the USA. Since Clinton had raised the tax rate to a high of 46%, people were discouraged from earning more and encouraged to either cheat on taxes or just plain invest less and earn less.
1: Clinton oversaw that largest EVER federal surplus. (so your theory is proven wrong by example)
2: Your theory also presumes that at a certain level of taxation people will intentionally earn less money just to SPITE the tax collector. Because as long as your take home pay increases by some non-zero amount, there is still incentive to earn more and it is irrational to avoid the raise.
Whatever the "Laffer Curve Threory" is just that, a THEORY. It is not authoritative, because economists have not reached any consensus at all that 28% is the best tax rate, or that there even is a BEST tax rate. For every "Laffer" there is another expert who disagrees.
But most importantly this theory you refer to makes a claim which is contradicted by the vast majority of evidence.
People always try to get better higher paying jobs, and this didn't slow down since the introduction of income tax.
The only economic activity a progressive tax rate may deter is probably working overtime.
A progessive tax rate might deter someone from working 80 hours rather than 40 hours (because
they get to keep less on the later 40 hours than the first 40 hours, and time is a finite commodity), it would
not discourage someone from seeking a higher paid job at the same level of hours per week.
If Laffer is arguing that a progressive tax rate discourages people from working excessive overtime, then I would agree. It would. And THAT IS A GOOD THING.
As far as simply deterring work and investment in general. This is FUD spread by neoconservatives and neoliberals.
Where is the global slow down of the economy world wide as national income taxes exceeded 28%, that this curve theory predicts?
I think it's intellectually dishonest to pretend away non-discretionary federal spending. 3/4 of federal spending is in Welfare, Medicare, Medicade, Social Security and similar socialist programs. To ignore those and make a graph that appears to show more than half of federal spending is military in nature is outright fraudulent. Sorry but Congress CAN effect non-discretionary spending: by repealing or reforming those programs, duh! Meanwhile, count that spending as spending.
Stop being a sore winner. Republicans control congress. The deficit is not the fault of congress it is the fault of the political party in control at this time and unprecedented tax cuts for which the 10% most wealthy americans are getting 80% of the dollars! There isn't a shortage of money. There is a shortage of honesty.
The creator of that chart you are complaining about specifically explained what the chart shows, and says it excludes medicare or social security and explains why the author believes it should be excluded.
I don't think my income is as heavily taxed as some, so the average figure may be closer to 50%.
Your 41% tax bracket is MUCH HIGHER than what corporations pay in income taxes. And corporations profits are considered part of the Gross Domestic Profit.
I would expect that the the GDP can't be much greater than the sum of everyone's salaries.
I think this may be true only if corporations didn't make profit and the only earnings were salaries. But this is not the case. Corporate profits are considered to be part of the GDP. (probably the lions share of it) The GDP is higher than the sum of everyones salaries.
Companies can't sell more than we can buy and I think we're running a trade deficit so the GDP may even be less than the sum of everyone's salaries.
Companies *can* sell more than you can buy, because 1) companies are loaning you money to buy it, and 2) companies are taking the savings they acrue by not paying their employees enough money and reinvesting it (this capital gains is part of the GDP).
This means, companies are selling things that Americans dont have enough money to buy, and the left over profit goes into capital gains. This inflates the apparent GDP. Since your own liabilies are not tax deductable (unlike corporations liabilites), you dont report your increase in personal liability on your taxes.
As a result, the increase is personal liability that Americans are experiencing also shows up in the GDP as growth (when in fact it ought to be considered neutral).
In effect. The only people who matter (the rich) are experiencing economic growth. The rest of us are still in a recession.
I think you are also making a mistake in presuming that the government's income is 41% of the GDP simply because the government takes 41% of your output. Why not check out the ACTUAL budget of your government instead of extrapolating from your own person income taxes? You are NOT representative of the "average" taxes paid and collected on the GDP.
Given a little room for accounting ledger shenanigns it's reasonable to say that the anyone who defends taxes by citing roads and defense isn't watching their money very closely.
Who exactly would build roads and finance defense if not the state? Lets not forget education and healthcare, police departments, emergency services, forestry and that welfare system which is the only thing keeping the proletariate from rising up and overthrowing the government, and that corporte welfare system which is the only thing keeping corporate american in charge of the world? Lets not forget the non-defense military expenditures intended to deflate to true price of oil.
We suggest we should determine how much environmental damage is caused by extracting/processing/burning fuel and that cost should be applied to the sale of each gallon of fuel at the time of sale in the form of environmental levies. (or at least some reasonable approximation of that cost)
Until we know that cost and start applying it our children and grandchildren are subsidizing the fuel expenditures by consumers and industry (as it is they who will be paying for the environmental clean up job). Isn't it bad enough that we are not going to be leaving future generations with any fuel? We re sticking them with the clean up tab as well.
This should be done for all industries, not merely space travel.
I think some companies abuse interviews. A company I worked for wanted everyone on the development team to participate in interviews which meant about 5-10% of the time we were conducting these group interviews of applicants.
It was very disruptive and I believe it was pretty much agreed that we all hated doing the interviews and they didn't really help in any way. (as they were personality type interviews and the applicants had to already pass a technical interview prior to the group interview)
Being that software developers tend to be slightly introverted, being compelled to meet new applicants every week and pretty much meet them at their worst most uncomfortable moment was discomforting to say the least.
I suspect if a company is only hiring 1% of all applicants it pays off to do extensive interviews. If you are hiring 30-50% of the interviewees, then there is less benefit to an exhaustive interview process.
The industrial world has a vested interest in maintaining itself and not destroying itself or us: If there is no civilization or people to buy goods and services, then money and soon power (as in power of the people, not nuclear power) go bye-bye.
Now I've heard it all. A global industrial-military conspiracy to save the world.