In essense, pleading guilty and paying the fines is just good business, in the same way that paying a $35 parking ticket in NYC while on a $2,500 service call is just good business...Sad
Which is why its high time for Uncle Sam to start revoking corporate charters for misbehaving corporations.
That just made me think... if a corporation is a legal person, then revoking a charter is similar to the death penalty. Furthermore, one could make an arguement that price fixing is not a crime that warrants the death penalty. Hmm...
Very true. It is the "western" lifestyle that is not sustainable. Also, we must remember that this lifestyle depends on keeping the 3rd world poor. If those people ever came close to our standards of living, the entire system would collapse.
Those in the Peak Oil community (myself included) always go back to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics that states that energy cannot be created. Right now we are living in an odd time that we can tap into large stocks of sequestered energy (oil) that was created by the sun millions of years ago. Very soon, that extra energy will not be there when we need it. Hopefully we can substitute a new energy provider while we move toward a sustainable model.
I think the main problem is that your average person doesn't understand this relationship. Most westerners are too far removed from the factors of production that make their lives so much more convenient than that of the Bangladeshi farmer.
Again, hopefully everyone will wake up and realize that humans cannot continue to keep living in the way they do.
I live in a suburb of Dayton and go to Wright State University in that suburb.
We do have tons of businesses and students at our career fairs. The problem is that no one is getting hired. I've heard stories about grad students taking undergrad internships because no one is hiring. I've got friends who have great credentials, but can't quite seem to get hired.
For the most part Wright-Patterson AFB is THE employer for my city. Most people end up working there if they can get hired. If you're willing to travel, Lexis-Nexis is on the south side of town.
If you can find jobs in Ohio, more power to you. I know most people can't find them. Outsourcing was a big issue in the elections for us because we were the hardest hit in terms of lost jobs.
Either we lose jobs and US companies to places like China, or we sign on to Kyoto.
Why is it that simple? Probably because China has MFN trade status. The WTO and similar organizations put us between a rock and a hard place.
So long as there are people willing to do the work we do for 1/100 the price, there are going to be problems. Whenever any business can make an extra buck, you can bet they'll do whatever it takes to make it happen. The key is to make it more expensive to outsource jobs. Of course, the best way to do that is to use protective tariffs or require all those companies who import goods into the US comply with our national labor laws. In this respect, I can have my cake and eat it, too.
Yes, I know tariffs are the worst thing ever. It eliminates choice from the almighty consumer. Here's a wake-up call to those of you with your heads in the ground:
The American lifestyle is not sustainable.
Wish all you want. We live on a planet with finite resources. Unless we develop energy-to-matter conversion devices (replicators) we will have to fall in line and ratchet back our standards of living. Sooner or later, you're going to have to scale back all the luxuries you enjoy now.
As far as China and totalitarian states go, there is a certain corollary about free trade with them. You can't. When one side sets prices and the other doesn't, the other is at a disadvantage.
That is true, but I fail to see how much more information they'd need. Perhaps a timestamp and some information to spit out for audits?
Even if they "needed" more memory, I'm sure the citizens of NC would much rather their elections department sprang for the 64 MB model instead of having to pay $3,000,000 to do the election over again.
Even then, these things should be writing to the flash cards after EVERY vote. Marxist Hacker 42 noted there is no need to keep ~3,000 votes in RAM.
Lets assume that there will be 10,000 people voting on your machine for (at most) 100 offices or local issues. A simple bit vector approach would be 100 x 10,000 = 1 Mb. Of course, we need to allow for memory requirements for the GUI and related programs, but having these things "run out" of memory is ridiculous.
The only way I can see that memory is a problem is if they are storing each record in.doc format.
Re:Has anything like this happened before?
on
Colin Powell Resigns
·
· Score: 2, Informative
... Badnarik, Cobb, and Nader are gathering funding for a recount...
IIRC, congress can refuse to accept the electors if they so choose. If you saw "Fahrenheit 9/11" you may note the part of the film when a dozen or so house members challenged the election. Of course they were missing an endorsement from a senator, so the challenge was void.
I agree. The language has changed too much to be able to use "liberal" and "conservative" in a very direct way.
I call myself a libertarian democratic socialist. Its a mouthful but it helps for people who understand what those terms mean. I'm for returning power to states, universal health care, pro-2nd amendment, free education through 2 years of college, a balanced budget amendment, etc. Its hard to say I'm "liberal" and equally hard to say "libertarian" or "conservative" and obviously not a "centrist".
On the graph in question, I am approximately (-7,-7), fyi.
If you check the grandparent, you'll see that he insinuated that Stalin was more conservative than Ashcroft. If you take "conservative" to mean "authoritarian", then I suppose you are right. I don't think anyone would agree that a communist would be more conservative than Ashcroft.
I take "conservative" to mean anyone in the libertarian right (lower right quadrant). As I have said other places in this thread, I tend to use "conservative" to mean "Republican" so that I am in sync with most of the country.
Conseravatism is a very subjective word. I wouldn't consider any neo-con to be a conservative, but I tend to use it in casual conversation to mean someone that tends to vote Republican.
In my opinion, Ashcroft is a fascist... and before I get flamed, fascism is simply authoritarianism on social issues and a corporatist economic policy.
It would have been even more curious if the votes would have gone to either Badnarik or Peroutka.
When people say "hey, it gave extra votes to Bush... it must be a conspiracy" it makes those of us against DRM voting machines look like partisan hacks. To get people to listen up, we need to quit using "it gave extra votes to $REPUBLICAN_CANDIDATE". "It gave extra votes to $RANDOM_CANDIDATE" is better".
Gerrymandering actually *decreases* the safety of seats.
I see what you're getting at, but you're missing the point.
Yes, the idea is to pack your opponents into districts where they will win ~80% of the vote while you draw districts where you will win ~60% of the vote. That way you can get more seats with less votes.
It has been proven you can get 75% of the seats with 25% of the vote (draw districts 100% support of the opposition and 50%+1 support of your party). Of course not everyone is registered partisian, but the basic rules still apply.
The incumbancy effect is also noted. Independents often vote based on name recognition for local offices, so all one has to do is simply draw districts so that the partisan makeup is approximately even; the independents will make the rest.
In a way, gerrymandering makes the seats "less safe" in that the margin of victory will go to 0 over time, but be sure that those who draw the boundries will make sure that the seats will be "safe enough" to ensure re-election of incumbents of their party.
Slashdot Mirror
Regarding a similar post, someone once said something about insurers giving people discounts for this.
A reply was something to this effect:
"Well, it all depends on how you look at it. Is it a discount for getting the system or is it an extra fee for not having it?"
In essense, pleading guilty and paying the fines is just good business, in the same way that paying a $35 parking ticket in NYC while on a $2,500 service call is just good business...Sad
... if a corporation is a legal person, then revoking a charter is similar to the death penalty. Furthermore, one could make an arguement that price fixing is not a crime that warrants the death penalty. Hmm...
Which is why its high time for Uncle Sam to start revoking corporate charters for misbehaving corporations.
That just made me think
Does anyone know what these things might go for in the US?
Very true. It is the "western" lifestyle that is not sustainable. Also, we must remember that this lifestyle depends on keeping the 3rd world poor. If those people ever came close to our standards of living, the entire system would collapse.
Those in the Peak Oil community (myself included) always go back to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics that states that energy cannot be created. Right now we are living in an odd time that we can tap into large stocks of sequestered energy (oil) that was created by the sun millions of years ago. Very soon, that extra energy will not be there when we need it. Hopefully we can substitute a new energy provider while we move toward a sustainable model.
I think the main problem is that your average person doesn't understand this relationship. Most westerners are too far removed from the factors of production that make their lives so much more convenient than that of the Bangladeshi farmer.
Again, hopefully everyone will wake up and realize that humans cannot continue to keep living in the way they do.
;-)
Throughout history alcoholic drinks have been popular, even in the times of the ancient Greeks.
I don't see an alcohol shortage anytime soon as it requires little modern technology to produce.
If you know anyone that is paying less, then they are breaking the law.
Yes, and the law has always stopped corporate America from cheating the system.
I live in a suburb of Dayton and go to Wright State University in that suburb.
We do have tons of businesses and students at our career fairs. The problem is that no one is getting hired. I've heard stories about grad students taking undergrad internships because no one is hiring. I've got friends who have great credentials, but can't quite seem to get hired.
For the most part Wright-Patterson AFB is THE employer for my city. Most people end up working there if they can get hired. If you're willing to travel, Lexis-Nexis is on the south side of town.
If you can find jobs in Ohio, more power to you. I know most people can't find them. Outsourcing was a big issue in the elections for us because we were the hardest hit in terms of lost jobs.
Either we lose jobs and US companies to places like China, or we sign on to Kyoto.
Why is it that simple? Probably because China has MFN trade status. The WTO and similar organizations put us between a rock and a hard place.
So long as there are people willing to do the work we do for 1/100 the price, there are going to be problems. Whenever any business can make an extra buck, you can bet they'll do whatever it takes to make it happen. The key is to make it more expensive to outsource jobs. Of course, the best way to do that is to use protective tariffs or require all those companies who import goods into the US comply with our national labor laws. In this respect, I can have my cake and eat it, too.
Yes, I know tariffs are the worst thing ever. It eliminates choice from the almighty consumer. Here's a wake-up call to those of you with your heads in the ground:
The American lifestyle is not sustainable.
Wish all you want. We live on a planet with finite resources. Unless we develop energy-to-matter conversion devices (replicators) we will have to fall in line and ratchet back our standards of living. Sooner or later, you're going to have to scale back all the luxuries you enjoy now.
As far as China and totalitarian states go, there is a certain corollary about free trade with them. You can't. When one side sets prices and the other doesn't, the other is at a disadvantage.
That is true, but I fail to see how much more information they'd need. Perhaps a timestamp and some information to spit out for audits?
Even if they "needed" more memory, I'm sure the citizens of NC would much rather their elections department sprang for the 64 MB model instead of having to pay $3,000,000 to do the election over again.
Even then, these things should be writing to the flash cards after EVERY vote. Marxist Hacker 42 noted there is no need to keep ~3,000 votes in RAM.
I don't see how memory is an issue.
.doc format.
Lets assume that there will be 10,000 people voting on your machine for (at most) 100 offices or local issues. A simple bit vector approach would be 100 x 10,000 = 1 Mb. Of course, we need to allow for memory requirements for the GUI and related programs, but having these things "run out" of memory is ridiculous.
The only way I can see that memory is a problem is if they are storing each record in
Nader is to cut a $2,000 check to the NH authorities. While Cobb and Badnarik have enough to pay for the Ohio recount.
I'm reminded of something I heard once ...
"Napster is a filesharing program that has a chat feature. IRC is a chat program that has a filesharing feature."
If they go after a GAIM plugin, then they had better go after IRC.
Google is a publicly traded company. The bottom line is all that matters.
Indeed, by law, the CEO of every corporation has to act in the interests of the stockholders.
I'm not so sure. Lieberman didn't stand up and challenge the election, and he was on the ticket with Gore.
IIRC, congress can refuse to accept the electors if they so choose. If you saw "Fahrenheit 9/11" you may note the part of the film when a dozen or so house members challenged the election. Of course they were missing an endorsement from a senator, so the challenge was void.
Anyone else have any more info on this?
I find the plugin by Fnkmaster (89084) quite nice.
It is found here.
What secret police?
I agree. The language has changed too much to be able to use "liberal" and "conservative" in a very direct way.
I call myself a libertarian democratic socialist. Its a mouthful but it helps for people who understand what those terms mean. I'm for returning power to states, universal health care, pro-2nd amendment, free education through 2 years of college, a balanced budget amendment, etc. Its hard to say I'm "liberal" and equally hard to say "libertarian" or "conservative" and obviously not a "centrist".
On the graph in question, I am approximately (-7,-7), fyi.
If you check the grandparent, you'll see that he insinuated that Stalin was more conservative than Ashcroft. If you take "conservative" to mean "authoritarian", then I suppose you are right. I don't think anyone would agree that a communist would be more conservative than Ashcroft.
I take "conservative" to mean anyone in the libertarian right (lower right quadrant). As I have said other places in this thread, I tend to use "conservative" to mean "Republican" so that I am in sync with most of the country.
Conseravatism is a very subjective word. I wouldn't consider any neo-con to be a conservative, but I tend to use it in casual conversation to mean someone that tends to vote Republican.
... and before I get flamed, fascism is simply authoritarianism on social issues and a corporatist economic policy.
In my opinion, Ashcroft is a fascist
Whoa ... Stalin was an authoritarian communist. Probably the complete opposite of what is considered "conservative".
Take a look at http://www.politicalcompass.org
Don't you dare joke about things like that.
when you read the title as "Automated Sexy Robots"
"They know what you wan't and will do it within a tolerance of 1 micron."
How I miss futurama.
It would have been even more curious if the votes would have gone to either Badnarik or Peroutka.
... it must be a conspiracy" it makes those of us against DRM voting machines look like partisan hacks. To get people to listen up, we need to quit using "it gave extra votes to $REPUBLICAN_CANDIDATE". "It gave extra votes to $RANDOM_CANDIDATE" is better".
When people say "hey, it gave extra votes to Bush
Gerrymandering actually *decreases* the safety of seats.
I see what you're getting at, but you're missing the point.
Yes, the idea is to pack your opponents into districts where they will win ~80% of the vote while you draw districts where you will win ~60% of the vote. That way you can get more seats with less votes.
It has been proven you can get 75% of the seats with 25% of the vote (draw districts 100% support of the opposition and 50%+1 support of your party). Of course not everyone is registered partisian, but the basic rules still apply.
The incumbancy effect is also noted. Independents often vote based on name recognition for local offices, so all one has to do is simply draw districts so that the partisan makeup is approximately even; the independents will make the rest.
In a way, gerrymandering makes the seats "less safe" in that the margin of victory will go to 0 over time, but be sure that those who draw the boundries will make sure that the seats will be "safe enough" to ensure re-election of incumbents of their party.