Phi for All

I KNEW it!

I think the government is best suited for certain undertakings, especially where private sector profit motives might interfere with the objectives. Healthcare is a great example; I would rather pay money into a government program designed to pay for my medical treatment than to a private insurance company whose profits suffer if I use those funds for my medical treatment. Some things, like roads, libraries and parks, we all benefit from either directly or indirectly, and we should be happy to pay for these things in the form of taxes. We should not be happy to pay for subsidizing private industries and corporations with our tax monies whose products we may not even use. You may be lactose intolerant, but in the US a part of your income taxes subsidize dairy farmers. You may like free market capitalism, but subsidies like this unfairly imbalance trade and drive up costs in addition to what we're taxed. This isn't the fault of our system of government, it's the fault of citizens who aren't using their representatives in that government. The corporations, PACs and lobbyists are using the representatives and we are not. These bills and resolutions on radio performance aren't really taxes, as swansont has tried to point out. They may still be bad for all in the long run since they may affect us all, including those who aren't listening to the radio. I see this as another lobby who wants their government to pass a law that makes them more money.

You already told me about this tomorrow. You got turned down for the scholarships you applied for?! You're right, wtf?! Thanks, Galindo. I feel better.

Faith shouldn't be necessary for an empirical approach to historical data.

If you're explaining EVERYTHING, then won't anything I would like to *see* in it already *be* in it?

In that case, when you stub your toe you should say, "Owweo!"

You'll never *boost* your rep if you can't spell "boost". If you meant "boast", well your current rep is nothing to boast about. I'm starting to see a pattern here.... And in case you were wondering (come on, I know you were), posts in General Discussion don't increase your post count, so that's why it says 0 even though you've made 5 posts.

I'm so glad you asked that question, Rhydrirty. The easiest way for you to earn a quick $500 is to prepare translation services to people who write not wrote so shapely. Charge by the word and you're done in a day!

Because I'm just one person who isn't necessarily representative of my society as a whole. I acknowledge that a representative governing body is needed to ensure that my views are incorporated with other members of my society. My ideal federal government would be one that strives to represent me and my fellow members of society, NOT the private sector business interests that are interested only in profiting from me. When too much governmental control is given to those business concerns, satisfying me begins to lose its importance to profit alone. The bigger a business becomes, the less competition it has and the less concerned with quality and satisfaction it has to be (*cough* Microsoft *cough*).

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago, and our nation was the most prosperous in the world. 100 years ago, we were a nation that didn't have many cars, telephones, schools or restaurants, our wildlife was more abundant and not over-hunted, we had no interstate highways, many fewer state highways, no workman's or unemployment compensation, fewer corporations and fewer citizens, to name a fraction of the differences. 200 years ago we had far fewer taxes than we did 100 years ago, so it's really not a very good argument, despite it's punchy emotional plea. We have many more helpful projects bought with the taxes, that's the other side of the equation. And you have to define "prosperous" for it to have any meaning. Is it strictly economic, or does it include other factors like overall health, military might, resources, etc.? I don't disagree that the problem is spending. In fact, most people would probably agree that spending has always been the problem, they just don't agree on the particulars of where it's spent badly. I agree that a tax on broadcasters probably isn't going to harm much, except an industry that is headed down the tubes anyway. Aside from a bit of nostalgia, and a pang of sympathy for those who can't afford much besides the free airwaves, I'm not going to lose much sleep over it. I'm more concerned with the billions unaccounted for in defense, the billions spent on pork barrel projects, the billions granted in subsidies for well-established industries, the billions spent on corporate welfare, the billions spent on helping those poor health insurance companies....

Not to mention that stepping outside the vehicle for the roadside sobriety test is usually fatal.

This sounds just like Star Trek TNG's synthehol. Shuts the buzz down when it's no longer wanted. Perfect for those who will soon need to pilot a vehicle.

"Actual physicist", as in "professional physicist"? Someone who actually makes their living as a physicist, say, for the US Naval Observatory? That would be swansont.

Personally, I can't think of anybody else on staff (or in the general membership, for that matter) who is more qualified and capable of handling this most sensitive of sub-forums. Pangloss does an admirable job of keeping an even keel on a ship that tends to list to port. If you would like to keep honing your political opinions against opposing views, you're going to need those who hold those views to stay on board long enough to post them, and here at SFN that often takes a steersman who has to shove a little harder to starboard than he would like. I would hate participating on this forum if all I heard was opinions echoing my own. So let's scupper this mutiny right now, ye scabrous dog! Leave it fer the bilges, get that mainsail taut and put yer back into it! Arrrrrrr!

You failed the Turing test, and the spelling test. This makes no sense whatsoever.

I'm not a big fan of the budget system, it's full of flaws, but I can't think of anything that fixes those flaws without causing a bunch of other flaws. So let's look at it this way, if your employer gave you a budget to put together an office at home, would you spend it all or would you buy only the bare necessities? Would you buy the cheapest desk, the least expensive computer, and not replace the 12-year old carpet so you could spend less of your employer's money? You won't get anything bonus for saving him money and you have to work with the stuff you buy, so making your work day more bearable by getting the bigger monitor and the nicer chair might make you perform better too. Maybe that's part of the reason your employer set the budget where he did. And if you have an extra £299 after all else is purchased, and a new flat screen TV was something that would help you do your job by staying informed, it's not a question of what you deserve, or even what you can get your company to pay for, it's about working within the system that has been set up for you to do your job. There are definitely public servants who go overboard and don't work within the rules and abuse their budgets and their power, but I just don't think what Campbell did is corrupt. Self-serving? Maybe, but is it self-serving if it makes you better at what you do for a living, and if so, is that necessarily bad? There are worse ways to be self-serving.

So we have a chance for the government to place effective subsidization that could help build a sustainable infrastructure for wind power, but we're sending the bulk of it overseas, while oil, sugar, corn and many other industries continue to receive government subsidies ad infinitum.

I think it's the reason it becomes ingrained in your thinking. If there was no negative consequences other than the possibility of naturally occurring ones (car accidents from driving too fast, retaliation from someone you stole from, etc), then I don't think many people would survive adolescence. Later in life we know mortality, and the consequences of our actions on others, but not so much when we're young. Experience tempers our actions, good and bad.

This kind of mistake happens too often for it to be coincidence. I'm reminded of the lack of restrictions on the banking bailout. I think economic stimulus legislation in the hands of politicians equals profits for the Big Business Party.

I think the price tag from all remodeling work seems excessive, but most of it is legitimate and justifiable expense. Did the "top designer" have any carpentry, plumbing or electrical work done? That kind of work adds up quickly in any kind of renovation. If the designer used a General contractor to coordinate everyone's efforts so the time involved was minimal, that's usually 20% more in cost, but it's often cheaper than renting another space in the meantime. Were the designer and GC paid on a percentage of the total cost basis? This method does little to make them curb costs, but is preferable to paying them flat rate, in which case they will use the cheapest materials and labor in order to inflate their profits. What it boils down to is that Campbell had an ACA budget approved from his fees office, he stayed within it and got the flat updated. You are taking the objectionable parts, like flat screen TVs, king-sized beds and scatter cushions, and equating them to the total cost of the renovation, even though we know he got the TV for £299. He probably paid twice that for the bed, half that for the cushions, leaving almost £9000 for the rest of what the top designer did for his flat. If you have any objections, it should be with whoever sets the budgets, not those who stay within them.

I can see part of your point here. One of the things that keeps our prison system going is the amount of money made from it. But I don't understand what you mean by the community being willing to pay for vengeance themselves. Could you elaborate? Can we come up with a cheap device that inflicts pain by nerve induction so there's no physical damage, and let's those who have been wronged push the button? If this type of corporal punishment is handed down by a legitimate authority, can be done in public to add to the humiliation factor and provide visible justice, I think it would serve as a better deterrent than incarceration, and at least would be a worthy experiment in some cases. But I worry about it becoming a spectacle. Television coverage would start out like C-Span and end up like Fox Sports. I don't think sponsoring punitive actions is the road we need to go down.

I'm also opposed to the death penalty. For the reasons Pangloss and Sisyphus stated, and also because it precludes (or at least deters) further research into better methodologies. That's the problem with most "ultimate solutions"; once you consider it the best method, you stop trying to find anything better, even when the evidence shows you it's not even very good. There has to be something better than killing people for killing people.

Many things politicians do fall within my personal definition of corrupt, but I'm afraid I'd have to put a TV on a list of legitimate business expenses for someone who needs their finger on the pulse of society.

This was one of my earliest criticisms of Bush II. There were several articles early on about his demand for condensed versions of all briefings because he wasn't big on reading. We saw shortly afterward what happens when presidents don't read their daily briefings. I prefer someone in the highest office who does their own reading and has the smarts to make decisions that aren't based on someone else's version of what is important. I didn't like a lot of what Clinton did while in office, but the man was extremely well-read and informed about what was going on in his administration. Those terms are pretty subjective. I personally think some of the "deals" politicians are forced to make seem pretty corrupt, but many think that kind of "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" deals are just the normal compromises inherent in the system. I suppose as long as a politician isn't lining their own pockets (or future status) or those of their family and friends, they shouldn't be termed corrupt. Self-serving? How can you fairly apply that to anything? If a politician does anything that helps society yet also gives him a great photo opportunity, is that self-serving?

Personally, I think Franken is more accepted as a smart individual with a great political education (Harvard cum laude, PoliSci). You can't really say that about Palin. Smart wins out on a science forum, even though many of us nerds think Sarah looks hot.