The wood was 10mm boards declared as 6mm veneer to clear customs in the US. Veneer is peeled with minimal waste, boards are sawed with large waste (kerf + parts of the trunks with not enough material for full boards). 6mm veneer of the species in question is legal to import, 10mm boards aren't due to Lacey act.
The export declaration for Indian customs stated that the shipment was finished parts of musical instruments instead of raw material. The finished parts are perfectly legal to ship, the raw material in the form of 10mm boards isn't (anything above 6mm veneer is illegal to export).
Gibson tried to conceal both the destination and the source of the shipment by going through several several middlemen (one AG in Germany, one company in California, one person in Tennessee).
The shipment was caught by customs when entering the US, then released to find out who was the final consignee of the wood.
I didn't say voters; they are not elected and the EU is not democratic
Not confused, clueless about the institutions. The European Parliament members are elected every 5 years by deirect election (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2009). You must mix up Parliament and Commission.
I am in the "I cannot ascertain the existence of god, but it is highly improbable that he exists. I live my life based on the conclusion that he is not there." group. In fact, religion only matters to me when I get woken up in the wee hours of the Sunday morning by people coming to ask me if I have accepted "Jesus as my savior" or some variations thereof. Being one of the only people not going to church in my suburb, I'm tagged as a soul to save for all the denominations.
I do wonder if people will debate the existence or non-existence of Harry Potter in about 60 generations. There are several books, a clear prophecy in the beginning, real places are mixed in the story, in the end the prophecy is fulfilled when Harry dies to save the day, then Harry comes back to life.
There is no such real number x, where x+1=x-1. I think it would be silly to claim we don't know such number yet, but maybe in future, who can really know?
Sure, if you limit the problem to a very specific set of data like real numbers. Now, please prove the non-existence of a magical undetectable pink unicorn floating 10ft above your head.
I am getting more and more firmly behind the theory that one or more persons or organizations is actually trying to render the earth inhabitable by man...
R. Giskard Reventlov and R. Daneel Olivaw would like to have a chat with you.
Hmm no... if in absence of proof of existence a person decides to believe in god(s), then that person is a theist (theist, believer in god[s]). This is the faith based opinion. The lack of proof for the existence of god(s) is actually seen as a benefit for a large segment of that population, for proof is the enemy of faith (hence why the book containing Pascal's wager was put on the Index).
If in the absence of proof of existence the same person doesn't believe in god(s), then that person is an atheist (a - theist, non believer in god[s]). Atheism is a faith based opinion in the same way that not collecting stamps is an enjoyable pastime. There are however different types of atheism, with some camping in the camp of "extraordinary claims require extraordinary proofs, self-reference doesn't count" and some camping in the "I won't believe in god(s), whatever proofs are set in front of my eyes".
If in the absence of proof for the existence that person decides to not decide, then that person is agnostic (a - gnostic, without the knowledge of god)... by definition the agnostic should be undecided on practically anything (the existence of elves, dragons, pink invisible unicorns, undetectable tea pot orbiting Saturn,... or even more day to day things as there is no definite proof that the world isn't a huge hallucination in the dream of a dragon).
Also, can you point out how one is supposed to prove the non-existence of anything? I would be very interested how it can be done without resorting to faith. At best one can posit that, to the best of his current knowledge, no proof of the existence of that thing has been found.
Yes, and the GP position is the atheist version: "There's no data for the existence of God, therefore I hold the opinion that there is no god until such data appears".
They can be sold on the market here, without any issue... there are actually many Gen II Voyagers for sale right now, with very low miles and full trim, literally for peanuts. With the amount of KM I drive a year, a new vehicle makes no sense whatsoever. I'd have clocked 300000KM on it before paying off the credit. I prefer paying cash for a used vehicle I will drive into the ground before changing for another used vehicle paid in cash.
The difference in fuel economy between the Sharan and the Voyager represent 2 months worth of gasoline tanks over the year. If I picked up the 130BHP TDI version of the Sharan or the similar TDI Ford Galaxy instead of the 1.8T Sharan, I would be looking at 6 months of tank-filling difference. For my use, the costs in fuel alone would be: 8000 euro a year (voyager) vs 6000 euro a year (sharan 1.8T) vs 3500 euro a year (sharan/galaxy 1.9TDI). Do the extra 6 BHP negated by the weight increase justify a 2000 euro a year difference? Nope. For that matter, do the extra 26 BHP justify the 4500 euro a year difference? Hell no!
The 2007 Voyager didn't fare much better on the NCAP tests, with the added safety measures firing too late after the impact. The car autonomy was virtually unchanged. The voyager was unchanged between 1999 and 2003, why would you expect the economy or safety features to change between those years?
My current vehicle: 1999 Audi A3 1.8T (178 bhp), tows mad stuff, carries a full sized workbench and a passenger without any issue, while drinking about 8.2 L/100. 4stars NCAP rating (9 points in a frontal impact, 16 points in a side impact), 2400 lbs.
We are now looking for a larger vehicle, so we tested the following:
2003 Chrysler Voyager 3.3 V6 (156 bhp), looks very practical but don't get in an accident with it(*). Drinks about 12 L/100. 2 stars NCAP rating (0 point in a frontal impact, 14 points on side impact [as the driver would be higher than most points of impact]), 4133 lbs.The more recent version actually scores lower on the NCAP test.
(*) except if you enjoy having your legs crushed and receiving the steering column through your face and chest.
The NCAP test is an impact at 64km/h, hardly excessive speed for an accident on the national roads (90-100 km/h) or autobahn (130 km/h recommended, no speed limit).
Obviously... a 3500 pounds car should get a larger engine. Now why is there such an obsession with driving 3500 pounds land boats on your side of the Atlantic? And what is it with US 3.3 liters V6 engines developing less power/torque than the 1.8T 4-cyl in my car while drinking way more?
Check by yourself the effective yield of 10 years bond between 2001 and now, investing in EUR and converting back to the EUR at the end of the exercise. A loss 19.8% is what I calculated this week, which is what you would expect when the USD has lost 41% in the time range.
A 1-liter car doesn't have enough power to drive at highway speeds, and in the USA, going anywhere in a city usually means driving on a highway.
Damn, I should tell that to the driver the next time I pass one on the Autobahn... you do realize that there are plenty of those in Germany, right? Now, to be fair, I think you're talking about a US-built 1-liter engine... the size-to-power ratio of engines is a bit different over here.
My mistake I thought UK driving averages were like Continental ones. You bastards must love driving around your tiny island.
Yeah because it is well known that the entire Continental population lives inside a major city center and thus never commutes to work... 20000 miles is the average in the Luxembourg area, I do commute 31000 miles while some colleagues commute 55000 miles just for work (we tend to live in one country and work in another). We still have "only" 9.8 per 100.000 population... it may look high, but the vast majority of trucks going from one side of Europe to the other side of Europe (North-South or East-West) tend to go across Luxembourg to refuel. The large accidents are usually caused by truck catching fire in a tunnel or people going 120mph+ in low visibility while drunk. So it is actually Darwin at work.
For what it is worth, the driving test there is a bit more difficult. The first driving exam includes city and highway driving. There is a second exam to be taken within the first two years, that covers the funny stuff (icy road, wet road, muddy road, emergency braking,...) and voids the license if failed. You also only have 6 points on your license until those two years have passed, running out of points means you need to start from scratch again.
Not only me as a private investor... the country where I work used to have a cool $100bn of US debt in 2008, $78bn in 2010, $68bn in 2011 and are further divesting from the US debt. They went from the top 5 foreign debt holders to outside the top 10 in the last 5 years. As much as they wanted to hold on your debt for ideological or sentimental reasons, they couldn't fiscally or politically justify the bad investment.
In somewhat related news, today the #1 foreign debt owner downgraded your debt...
I redid the calculation for fun yesterday. The actual loss is only 19.8% if you cash out and convert back to Euro or Yen, thanks to the compound interest.
because there is no other comparably safe interest-earning asset around.
...
That's a simple accounting equation.
Only if you keep the entire transaction in USD. If you invested in 10 years bonds (maturing this year) from JPY, EUR or any other major currency, your "safe interest-earning asset" is a 19.8% loss on your initial investment (circa 30% of compound interest on the principal minus circa 40% of USD devaluation). I have no reason to believe the exchange rate will go the other way around within 10 years, so I would realistically not reinvest the value in US bonds.
Therefore, the US is still the safe place to put your money. You'll either get your income back, or your money will have no value no matter where else you had it. (And, there seem to be people on here that think gold is a safe place -- gold has no more intrinsic value than anything else. The dollar has value if you can use it to get things you need to survive, and gold does, too. But you can't eat gold. Historically gold has only had value because the people who controlled the resources wanted it!)
Actually the US bonds have been a losing proposition for many economies from around 2000 onwards. Due to the falling USDxEUR or USDxJPY exchange rates, 10 years obligations maturing now have actually turned into a ~40% loss instead of a profit for European investors and Japanese investors. I still have a few thousand bucks laying around, I'm just waiting for the currency to rebound before swapping them out to EUR.
Are you working for minimum wages? If not, why are you so greedy? Or even why are you employed instead of volunteering in a 3rd world country? [/sarcasm]
You may want to read the leaked text of ACTA before accusing the AC of being a crackpot conspiracy theorist. Trade sanctions against countries that don't harmonize is one of the points of the treaty.
Slashdot Mirror
Not mentioned on the forums:
For more info: The Affidavit (PDF warning).
At the same time, first past the post has the potential of denying the choice of 49.9% of the voters in a 2 party system...
I didn't say voters; they are not elected and the EU is not democratic
Not confused, clueless about the institutions. The European Parliament members are elected every 5 years by deirect election (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2009). You must mix up Parliament and Commission.
I am in the "I cannot ascertain the existence of god, but it is highly improbable that he exists. I live my life based on the conclusion that he is not there." group. In fact, religion only matters to me when I get woken up in the wee hours of the Sunday morning by people coming to ask me if I have accepted "Jesus as my savior" or some variations thereof. Being one of the only people not going to church in my suburb, I'm tagged as a soul to save for all the denominations.
I do wonder if people will debate the existence or non-existence of Harry Potter in about 60 generations. There are several books, a clear prophecy in the beginning, real places are mixed in the story, in the end the prophecy is fulfilled when Harry dies to save the day, then Harry comes back to life.
There is no such real number x, where x+1=x-1. I think it would be silly to claim we don't know such number yet, but maybe in future, who can really know?
Sure, if you limit the problem to a very specific set of data like real numbers. Now, please prove the non-existence of a magical undetectable pink unicorn floating 10ft above your head.
I am getting more and more firmly behind the theory that one or more persons or organizations is actually trying to render the earth inhabitable by man...
R. Giskard Reventlov and R. Daneel Olivaw would like to have a chat with you.
Hmm no... if in absence of proof of existence a person decides to believe in god(s), then that person is a theist (theist, believer in god[s]). This is the faith based opinion. The lack of proof for the existence of god(s) is actually seen as a benefit for a large segment of that population, for proof is the enemy of faith (hence why the book containing Pascal's wager was put on the Index).
If in the absence of proof of existence the same person doesn't believe in god(s), then that person is an atheist (a - theist, non believer in god[s]). Atheism is a faith based opinion in the same way that not collecting stamps is an enjoyable pastime. There are however different types of atheism, with some camping in the camp of "extraordinary claims require extraordinary proofs, self-reference doesn't count" and some camping in the "I won't believe in god(s), whatever proofs are set in front of my eyes".
If in the absence of proof for the existence that person decides to not decide, then that person is agnostic (a - gnostic, without the knowledge of god)... by definition the agnostic should be undecided on practically anything (the existence of elves, dragons, pink invisible unicorns, undetectable tea pot orbiting Saturn, ... or even more day to day things as there is no definite proof that the world isn't a huge hallucination in the dream of a dragon).
Also, can you point out how one is supposed to prove the non-existence of anything? I would be very interested how it can be done without resorting to faith. At best one can posit that, to the best of his current knowledge, no proof of the existence of that thing has been found.
Including / quoting the pope (so, the formal head of majority of Christians)
Isn't he sort of considered as the antichrist and/or an usurper by the other half of christianity?
Yes, and the GP position is the atheist version: "There's no data for the existence of God, therefore I hold the opinion that there is no god until such data appears".
They can be sold on the market here, without any issue... there are actually many Gen II Voyagers for sale right now, with very low miles and full trim, literally for peanuts. With the amount of KM I drive a year, a new vehicle makes no sense whatsoever. I'd have clocked 300000KM on it before paying off the credit. I prefer paying cash for a used vehicle I will drive into the ground before changing for another used vehicle paid in cash.
The difference in fuel economy between the Sharan and the Voyager represent 2 months worth of gasoline tanks over the year. If I picked up the 130BHP TDI version of the Sharan or the similar TDI Ford Galaxy instead of the 1.8T Sharan, I would be looking at 6 months of tank-filling difference. For my use, the costs in fuel alone would be: 8000 euro a year (voyager) vs 6000 euro a year (sharan 1.8T) vs 3500 euro a year (sharan/galaxy 1.9TDI). Do the extra 6 BHP negated by the weight increase justify a 2000 euro a year difference? Nope. For that matter, do the extra 26 BHP justify the 4500 euro a year difference? Hell no!
The 2007 Voyager didn't fare much better on the NCAP tests, with the added safety measures firing too late after the impact. The car autonomy was virtually unchanged. The voyager was unchanged between 1999 and 2003, why would you expect the economy or safety features to change between those years?
My current vehicle: 1999 Audi A3 1.8T (178 bhp), tows mad stuff, carries a full sized workbench and a passenger without any issue, while drinking about 8.2 L/100. 4stars NCAP rating (9 points in a frontal impact, 16 points in a side impact), 2400 lbs.
We are now looking for a larger vehicle, so we tested the following:
2003 Chrysler Voyager 3.3 V6 (156 bhp), looks very practical but don't get in an accident with it(*). Drinks about 12 L/100. 2 stars NCAP rating (0 point in a frontal impact, 14 points on side impact [as the driver would be higher than most points of impact]), 4133 lbs.The more recent version actually scores lower on the NCAP test.
1999 VW Sharan 1.8T (150 bhp), Drinks about 10 L/100. 3 stars NCAP rating (6 points frontal impact, 15 side impact). 3681lbs
(*) except if you enjoy having your legs crushed and receiving the steering column through your face and chest.
The NCAP test is an impact at 64km/h, hardly excessive speed for an accident on the national roads (90-100 km/h) or autobahn (130 km/h recommended, no speed limit).
Obviously... a 3500 pounds car should get a larger engine. Now why is there such an obsession with driving 3500 pounds land boats on your side of the Atlantic? And what is it with US 3.3 liters V6 engines developing less power/torque than the 1.8T 4-cyl in my car while drinking way more?
Check by yourself the effective yield of 10 years bond between 2001 and now, investing in EUR and converting back to the EUR at the end of the exercise. A loss 19.8% is what I calculated this week, which is what you would expect when the USD has lost 41% in the time range.
How do you call a 40% loss over 10 years? That's what the USD has done against the EUR (41%) and the JPY (39%). It did lose more against the CHF.
A 1-liter car doesn't have enough power to drive at highway speeds, and in the USA, going anywhere in a city usually means driving on a highway.
Damn, I should tell that to the driver the next time I pass one on the Autobahn... you do realize that there are plenty of those in Germany, right? Now, to be fair, I think you're talking about a US-built 1-liter engine... the size-to-power ratio of engines is a bit different over here.
My mistake I thought UK driving averages were like Continental ones. You bastards must love driving around your tiny island.
Yeah because it is well known that the entire Continental population lives inside a major city center and thus never commutes to work... 20000 miles is the average in the Luxembourg area, I do commute 31000 miles while some colleagues commute 55000 miles just for work (we tend to live in one country and work in another). We still have "only" 9.8 per 100.000 population... it may look high, but the vast majority of trucks going from one side of Europe to the other side of Europe (North-South or East-West) tend to go across Luxembourg to refuel. The large accidents are usually caused by truck catching fire in a tunnel or people going 120mph+ in low visibility while drunk. So it is actually Darwin at work.
For what it is worth, the driving test there is a bit more difficult. The first driving exam includes city and highway driving. There is a second exam to be taken within the first two years, that covers the funny stuff (icy road, wet road, muddy road, emergency braking, ...) and voids the license if failed. You also only have 6 points on your license until those two years have passed, running out of points means you need to start from scratch again.
Not only me as a private investor... the country where I work used to have a cool $100bn of US debt in 2008, $78bn in 2010, $68bn in 2011 and are further divesting from the US debt. They went from the top 5 foreign debt holders to outside the top 10 in the last 5 years. As much as they wanted to hold on your debt for ideological or sentimental reasons, they couldn't fiscally or politically justify the bad investment.
In somewhat related news, today the #1 foreign debt owner downgraded your debt...
I redid the calculation for fun yesterday. The actual loss is only 19.8% if you cash out and convert back to Euro or Yen, thanks to the compound interest.
because there is no other comparably safe interest-earning asset around.
...
That's a simple accounting equation.
Only if you keep the entire transaction in USD. If you invested in 10 years bonds (maturing this year) from JPY, EUR or any other major currency, your "safe interest-earning asset" is a 19.8% loss on your initial investment (circa 30% of compound interest on the principal minus circa 40% of USD devaluation). I have no reason to believe the exchange rate will go the other way around within 10 years, so I would realistically not reinvest the value in US bonds.
Therefore, the US is still the safe place to put your money. You'll either get your income back, or your money will have no value no matter where else you had it. (And, there seem to be people on here that think gold is a safe place -- gold has no more intrinsic value than anything else. The dollar has value if you can use it to get things you need to survive, and gold does, too. But you can't eat gold. Historically gold has only had value because the people who controlled the resources wanted it!)
Actually the US bonds have been a losing proposition for many economies from around 2000 onwards. Due to the falling USDxEUR or USDxJPY exchange rates, 10 years obligations maturing now have actually turned into a ~40% loss instead of a profit for European investors and Japanese investors. I still have a few thousand bucks laying around, I'm just waiting for the currency to rebound before swapping them out to EUR.
The Year: 2022. The Place: New York City. The Population: 40,000,000
Are you working for minimum wages? If not, why are you so greedy? Or even why are you employed instead of volunteering in a 3rd world country? [/sarcasm]
Wanna know how I know that you know nothing about risk management?
No need to insert the joke, they actually borrowed some materials from the "sex doll" industry to manufacture said robot.
You may want to read the leaked text of ACTA before accusing the AC of being a crackpot conspiracy theorist. Trade sanctions against countries that don't harmonize is one of the points of the treaty.