This is how Crony Capitalism works. As long as you pay either to candidate campaigns or in fines, there are favors to be had at the Washington D.C. Bazaar. Government only goes after the little people and companies because they don't pay up.
Would the savings you anticipate by remaining paper based remain when:
1. The document has to be retrieved from the "warehouse" and a file cataloging system must be maintained to ensure its whereabouts remain known?
2. What are compliance costs/fines or other undesirable consequences if the document can't be retrieved?
3. The "warehouse" is destroyed by fire and the sole original goes up in smoke?
4. You have to maintain duplicates of paper originals in digital or analog form in geographically disparate locations to avoid scenarios 2 & 3?
5. What happens to the paper documents when their business usefulness or legal retention requirements are met? Are there costs for destruction/removal?
I'm pretty sure the overwhelming majority of our American prison population would not go around executing police after being released from prison.
I know you were going for funny, but the foundation of your joke is not only false, but bolsters the notion that keeping 1 in 25 Americans in prison is a *good* thing.
I didn't propose your straw man, you did.
Shooting police is a bad career move if you reside in a nation of laws. No doubt they'd stick to easier prey and send the crime rates back up to the days when the criminal justice system didn't understand recidivism and that career criminals commit most crime. In Mexico, they send the Army to quell violence.
I concur that having that rate of incarceration is not optimal. Any sane person desires less criminal activity. What's your suggestion for lowering it without having them commit new crimes?
No way! That would require bringing our prison population levels down from 4% to something negligible. This is the USA. We can't have those levels of freedom here! What do you think this is, some kind of democracy?
No doubt Mexico achieves this admirable statistic by ensuring they house their criminals *outside* of prisons. These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety.
What a country!
> I argue, however, against your, in my eyes, simplistic view of political economics.
Straw man. I am painting in broad strokes geared to the majority audience, not those schooled in the minutiae of the "dismal science".:-) Slashdot is not the proper forum for an in depth treatise on the topic. It is, however, the optimal forum for sharpshooting.
Per your example of Newtonian physics, there are exceptions and I'm not ignoring them.
The crux of your argument is that tariffs are beneficial if correctly applied. It's a nice theory but the entities that apply them, governments, are historically poor predictors of economic behaviors, which makes "correct" application improbable.
I note that you do not believe that the EU, with a combined economic output that exceeds the USA, is in need of protective tariffs.
A snap cost/benefit analysis precludes further investment of resources in this thread. Thanks for your responses.
I fail to note how the passage of time has made Adam Smith's observations less relevant. Trade and the absence of government interference builds wealth. The rise and continued dominance of mercantilism is instructive. The validity of why competition and market forces work within a national economy do not stop at political borders.
The EU doesn't build digital cameras. The tariff won't build them either. The net effect is tax revenue for government and more expensive cameras for EU consumers. No one benefits except bureaucratic mandarins who pretend to control economies.
The same arguments were made regarding Japan in the '80s, i.e. Japan Inc. and how it was going to overtake the USA as the #1 economy. It's assumes that the East is dynamic and the West is static. The Chinese supply inexpensive labor, period. Are they investing in advanced robotics for manufacturing so they can learn and overtake the West? They are not as they have a large labor pool in the agrarian sector of their economy to exploit.
Oh. And Japan Inc.? What happened is the US economy grew from 25% to 30% of the global GNP. It was Japan that had to largely abandon protectionism.
With protectionism, Europe still doesn't build cameras, the rich man pays $15 plus higher taxes for the unemployed working man who can't afford the camera.
Without protectionism, Germany sells the precision instruments to produce the optics, Japan designs the semiconductors, Taiwan fabs the chips and the Chinese assemble them with equipment bought from the West. Everyone benefits, is employed and makes enough money to buy a $10 camera.
That's reality. Anything else is fiction and ignores how the global economy works.
I own one of these drives (640 Gb) and it is pre-formatted Mac OS X Extended Journaled. That alone says volumes about Computerworld's test engineers.
It's very fast and quiet. I'd buy another.
The authoritarian states have long cultivated anti-Western sentiment to maintain control over their populations. Al-Quada is a political organization that utilizes terrorism and religious intolerance as weapons to achieve political aims, i.e. a global authoritarian caliphate that will not operate with the consent of the governed.
Turkey doesn't care for the EU, NATO and the West in general? Kuwait and Bahrain aren't U.S. allies? The inhabitants of Kosovo aren't glad the U.S. stepped in? Muslims aren't a monolithic bloc, my simplistic correspondent.
Points 1 & 2:
1. the U.S. supports an independent Palestinian state and so do I. It just can't be via the destruction of Israel. Next?
2. Germany didn't attack the U.S. directly. But it did attack our vital interests and allies. And you're engaging in revisionism about Kuwait. That was a global coalition, including Muslim dominant countries that operated under a U.N. mandate to liberate Kuwait. And as you are likely aware, Afghanistan was host to a regime, the Taliban, that terrorized the populace, destroyed national treasures because of their radical intolerance and harbored terrorists that launched a direct attack on U.S. soil.
Going forward, I'm not going to debate your "points" because they are based on emotion, not reason. And that's not a useful exercise.
So, as an Anonymous Coward, your 4 points would represent the al-Qaeda propaganda position?
At the end of WWII, the victors did not withdraw and the fascist, totalitarian regimes were replaced by democracies that endure to this day. And those peoples were freed, not tortured. To date, what form of government is advancing and which is in decline?
Actually, Canada and Mexico would be more upset than Saudi Arabia. Canada is the largest USA supplier of crude oil and petroleum products. Venezuela and Nigeria are large exporters as well.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/rankings/totimportsby_ country.htm
Gee, I hope you didn't burst an artery kicking down the straw man* you set up. I never postulated "tinkering" was useless. Obviously, progress is made by "tinkering" or experimentation in the electronic and physical world. My context was the likely end user population referenced in the article for a $100 portable device.
In the future, I suggest you read the article and thread before you get in a high dungeon or make assumptions about who you're responding to. The fantasy allegories were fun though. Read and/or experience a lot of it?
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
AC, let's set up a straw man to your logic as well. You're postulating we should never plan for an event that has never occurred?
Do you think terrorists are seeking nuclear and bio weapons?
http://www.state.gov/t/us/rm/14848.htm
Slashdot Mirror
Shouldn't the study explain to /. readers what sex is rather than confusing them?
This is how Crony Capitalism works. As long as you pay either to candidate campaigns or in fines, there are favors to be had at the Washington D.C. Bazaar. Government only goes after the little people and companies because they don't pay up.
Nicely done on multiple counts. Welcome to /., home of the anecdote extrapolated globally.
Would the savings you anticipate by remaining paper based remain when: 1. The document has to be retrieved from the "warehouse" and a file cataloging system must be maintained to ensure its whereabouts remain known? 2. What are compliance costs/fines or other undesirable consequences if the document can't be retrieved? 3. The "warehouse" is destroyed by fire and the sole original goes up in smoke? 4. You have to maintain duplicates of paper originals in digital or analog form in geographically disparate locations to avoid scenarios 2 & 3? 5. What happens to the paper documents when their business usefulness or legal retention requirements are met? Are there costs for destruction/removal?
When do you plan to stop beating your wife/significant other/anime collection?
Heh, nice on topic nick. So you were the idiot weaving on the highway last night? Reductio ad absurdum
I'm pretty sure the overwhelming majority of our American prison population would not go around executing police after being released from prison.
I know you were going for funny, but the foundation of your joke is not only false, but bolsters the notion that keeping 1 in 25 Americans in prison is a *good* thing.
I didn't propose your straw man, you did.
Shooting police is a bad career move if you reside in a nation of laws. No doubt they'd stick to easier prey and send the crime rates back up to the days when the criminal justice system didn't understand recidivism and that career criminals commit most crime. In Mexico, they send the Army to quell violence.
I concur that having that rate of incarceration is not optimal. Any sane person desires less criminal activity. What's your suggestion for lowering it without having them commit new crimes?
No way! That would require bringing our prison population levels down from 4% to something negligible. This is the USA. We can't have those levels of freedom here! What do you think this is, some kind of democracy?
No doubt Mexico achieves this admirable statistic by ensuring they house their criminals *outside* of prisons. These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety. What a country!
Indeed. Why can't we be more like Mexico in every way?
> I argue, however, against your, in my eyes, simplistic view of political economics. Straw man. I am painting in broad strokes geared to the majority audience, not those schooled in the minutiae of the "dismal science". :-) Slashdot is not the proper forum for an in depth treatise on the topic. It is, however, the optimal forum for sharpshooting.
Per your example of Newtonian physics, there are exceptions and I'm not ignoring them.
The crux of your argument is that tariffs are beneficial if correctly applied. It's a nice theory but the entities that apply them, governments, are historically poor predictors of economic behaviors, which makes "correct" application improbable.
I note that you do not believe that the EU, with a combined economic output that exceeds the USA, is in need of protective tariffs.
A snap cost/benefit analysis precludes further investment of resources in this thread. Thanks for your responses.
I fail to note how the passage of time has made Adam Smith's observations less relevant. Trade and the absence of government interference builds wealth. The rise and continued dominance of mercantilism is instructive. The validity of why competition and market forces work within a national economy do not stop at political borders. The EU doesn't build digital cameras. The tariff won't build them either. The net effect is tax revenue for government and more expensive cameras for EU consumers. No one benefits except bureaucratic mandarins who pretend to control economies.
The same arguments were made regarding Japan in the '80s, i.e. Japan Inc. and how it was going to overtake the USA as the #1 economy. It's assumes that the East is dynamic and the West is static. The Chinese supply inexpensive labor, period. Are they investing in advanced robotics for manufacturing so they can learn and overtake the West? They are not as they have a large labor pool in the agrarian sector of their economy to exploit. Oh. And Japan Inc.? What happened is the US economy grew from 25% to 30% of the global GNP. It was Japan that had to largely abandon protectionism.
With protectionism, Europe still doesn't build cameras, the rich man pays $15 plus higher taxes for the unemployed working man who can't afford the camera. Without protectionism, Germany sells the precision instruments to produce the optics, Japan designs the semiconductors, Taiwan fabs the chips and the Chinese assemble them with equipment bought from the West. Everyone benefits, is employed and makes enough money to buy a $10 camera. That's reality. Anything else is fiction and ignores how the global economy works.
Or use can always use: http://www.bugmenot.com/
I own one of these drives (640 Gb) and it is pre-formatted Mac OS X Extended Journaled. That alone says volumes about Computerworld's test engineers. It's very fast and quiet. I'd buy another.
And would the Skype Mac OS X client recognize Core Duo CPUs in the iMac and MacBook Pro?
The authoritarian states have long cultivated anti-Western sentiment to maintain control over their populations. Al-Quada is a political organization that utilizes terrorism and religious intolerance as weapons to achieve political aims, i.e. a global authoritarian caliphate that will not operate with the consent of the governed. Turkey doesn't care for the EU, NATO and the West in general? Kuwait and Bahrain aren't U.S. allies? The inhabitants of Kosovo aren't glad the U.S. stepped in? Muslims aren't a monolithic bloc, my simplistic correspondent. Points 1 & 2: 1. the U.S. supports an independent Palestinian state and so do I. It just can't be via the destruction of Israel. Next? 2. Germany didn't attack the U.S. directly. But it did attack our vital interests and allies. And you're engaging in revisionism about Kuwait. That was a global coalition, including Muslim dominant countries that operated under a U.N. mandate to liberate Kuwait. And as you are likely aware, Afghanistan was host to a regime, the Taliban, that terrorized the populace, destroyed national treasures because of their radical intolerance and harbored terrorists that launched a direct attack on U.S. soil. Going forward, I'm not going to debate your "points" because they are based on emotion, not reason. And that's not a useful exercise.
From a historical perspective, since WWII electoral democracy is on the rise. http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=5
So, as an Anonymous Coward, your 4 points would represent the al-Qaeda propaganda position? At the end of WWII, the victors did not withdraw and the fascist, totalitarian regimes were replaced by democracies that endure to this day. And those peoples were freed, not tortured. To date, what form of government is advancing and which is in decline?
Actually, Canada and Mexico would be more upset than Saudi Arabia. Canada is the largest USA supplier of crude oil and petroleum products. Venezuela and Nigeria are large exporters as well. http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/rankings/totimportsby_ country.htm
Gee, I hope you didn't burst an artery kicking down the straw man* you set up. I never postulated "tinkering" was useless. Obviously, progress is made by "tinkering" or experimentation in the electronic and physical world. My context was the likely end user population referenced in the article for a $100 portable device. In the future, I suggest you read the article and thread before you get in a high dungeon or make assumptions about who you're responding to. The fantasy allegories were fun though. Read and/or experience a lot of it? *http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
It's an equally common mistake that all end users wish to "tinker" with their computers as opposed to accomplishing something useful with a tool.
AC, let's set up a straw man to your logic as well. You're postulating we should never plan for an event that has never occurred? Do you think terrorists are seeking nuclear and bio weapons? http://www.state.gov/t/us/rm/14848.htm
A nuclear or biological weapon attack in a major U.S. population center would alter those statistics, eh?