I'm not going to state my opinion on the whole S-Corp thing except to say this: Is the poor sad owner of the S-Corp paying more taxes than he would as a C-Corp? If no, then shut up. If yes, then reorganize as a C-Corp.
Seriously, this is getting a little screwy...if you can't keep down the amount of 'money' you're holding from the corporation down at tax time, then you're either do it wrong and have crappy accountants or are in an industry where have to hold a lot of taxable assets and have mistakenly structured your business as an S-Corp when it should be something else.
But none of this has anything to do with employment, which obviously _reduces_ the amount of money the owner of an S-Corp pays income tax on. So the entire complaint is dumb to start with.
The idea that someone would see 'Oh no, any money my S-Corp (aka, me) holds at the end of the year is going to be taxed slightly more than before...I better not hire those guys I was going to hire. Because either they'll make me more money to help cover my taxes, or, um, they'll make me less money than their salaries, reducing my taxes.' If anything, this change in tax law would make more incentive to hire people, not less. At least if you were anywhere near a million in assets.
Really, for this premise to make any sense, you have to postulate that all businesses are exactly right at the peak of the Laffer curve, and are so perfectly situated that not only do the owners not want to 'work harder', but somehow they don't feel like employing people who will work harder. It's some sort of Platonic Ideal of the Laffer Curve, where hiring people is too much work even if they make more money.
Yes. As I've argued in other venues, whether or not we 'want' copyright is a moot point at this time. The fact is, for copyright to work, as you say, it requires some sort of cost. Not just making the 'copy'...but distributing it. Copyright would probably be fine with CD burners but without an internet.
In the past, making and/or providing copies cost money and time, so all copying was either internal personal and friend use (And frankly no one cares about mix tapes.) or an actual business set up to violate copyright and sell at a profit, where violators can be tracked down. In that universe, copyright works.
In this universe, it doesn't. I'm not saying it's bad, I'm not saying I want to get rid of it, I'm not actually stating any position at all. I'm stating a fact. In this world, the sky is blue, and copyright law doesn't work anymore.
It doesn't matter what the laws say, it doesn't matter if the laws are a very good idea, it doesn't matter if there's some moral purpose to them, it doesn't matter if society will crumble if those laws do not exist. The fact is, in a society where everything is on a computer and can be instantly and infinitely copied, it is physically impossible for copyright laws to work. Doesn't matter if we want them or even need them to work.
DRM tried to make this harder, and unlike most people I have to say kudos to someone for actually understanding the problem and trying to stop it by imposing added copying costs...but the fact that DRM is utter nonsense and cannot work loses them the points they just gained. If a computer can decode information to present it to a person, it can decode information to store an unencoded copy of it. The entire premise is stupid.
So I urge people who think copyright law actually serves a purpose to try to figure out exactly how to fix it. It cannot work in this world. (Alternately, you could attempt to undo the information revolution. Good luck with that.)
Indeed. They're willing to put up with some women escaping from traditional gender roles. At least in this point in time. It would be nearly impossible to oppose that, they're barely holding on there as it is, and fighting to keep women 'out' of man's role is impossible. (Instead, they 'let them in', and then just discriminate against them, or treat them as a joke.)
In other words, a woman operating outside of traditional gender roles is the enemy, and you can't really do anything about that. But a man operating outside of traditional gender roles is a traitor.
The fundamentalists' nonsense makes a lot more sense when you stop trying to make it to some sort of idiotic moral position, and look at some of the weird disconnect that the 'hypocrites' seem to have. No one's actual problem is with gay sex (Not even them), and saying that people who have sex shouldn't be able to get married first is utterly nonsensical according to their own premises.
Likewise, all this nonsense about masculinity and whatnot. I volunteer in theatre, where 25% of the men are 'effeminate' or just don't care, and 15% are gay...and those two groups do not overlap anywhere near as much as people think. It's utter nonsense.
No, the problem fundamentalists have is exactly what they say it is, with the 'sanctity of marriage' It's why they can stand there and repeat that marriage is 'a man and a woman' without being able to explain why...it's because the actual belief they hold is secretly 'a marriage is when a man gets a wife to be in charge of, and the man does man things and the wife does wife things', but they can't admit this to anyone. Not even to themselves.
So they end up in some weird floundering where they cannot exactly explain why marriages must have two people in specific gender roles.
You are suffering from the effects of Poe's Law. Actually, from the corollary of it.
It is almost impossible for outsiders to tell the difference between parody of fundamentalism, and actual fundamentalism. Hell, it's often impossible for fundamentalists to tell the difference, as Conservapedia appears to be riddled with stuff that cannot actually be the actual beliefs of anyone.
However, the effeminate=gay and thus effeminate=satanic conspiracy? I'll go out on a limb and reassure people that's real. The fake stuff doesn't make the front page.
Why? You'd be astonished as to how much homophobia with fundamentalist men is not because of gay sex, but because of gender roles. (Hence they can have gay sex whenever they want...in an airport bathroom, and go home to be the 'head' of their house.)
Their actual problem with teh gays is not sex, it's that teh gay men refuse to find a women to boss around, and tey gay women refuse to be bossed around. No one seems to know their place. (Frankly, something like half the far-right problems with the world can be summed up as 'X doesn't know their place.)
This is what all their gibberish about 'protecting marriage' is about. Whenever anyone on the right says 'marriage', I urge people to mentally replace that with 'traditional roles in marriage'.
I have an easy rule to tell sci-fi and fantasy apart. I don't. ;) But here is how I used to define them: Spec-Fi is any story set in an obviously untrue universe.
All works of fiction are 'untrue' in some manner, but by 'obviously untrue', I mean if we were placed in such a universe, and did not know of the work of fiction, we would not think it odd. There may be no actual Dunder Miffler, but The Office is not spec-fi, because if we ended up there (and had never heard of The Office.) we would think it was entirely reasonable.
Please note that 'obviously untrue' sometimes gets a little vague, which is why I once confused some people by referring to Touch by an Angel as Fantasy. Apparently, they _wouldn't_ have been startled to be in a world with walking and talking angels sent by God.
But, anyway, there are three sorts of common untrue worlds:
Fantasy, in which the world is untrue by things that appear to violate physics. Science Fiction, in which the world is untrue by things that are not true, but could be. Alternate History, the one everyone's forgotten about, which is untrue because events that we know went one way actually went another.
But at _this_ point, science fiction refers to stories with certain things, like FTL and aliens and time travelers and whatnot. And fantasy refers to stories with certain things, like magic and elves and vampires and stuff.
None of those things are _actually_ more plausible than anything else. There's a subset of science fiction called 'hard sci-fi' that claims to stick to plausible things, but the point isn't what _does_ violate physics, it's what _appears_ to, and I've given up trying to tell them apart, because my 'appears' doesn't appear to match anyone else's 'appears'
I realized that that the idea that FTL is probably _less_ based in physics than a magical secret world that memory-erases people.
Are we _sure_ about the 'they can do anything'? It actually seems like a constitutional convention would be limited by topic.
If 'general convention' calls could result in one, we'd already have one. More than enough states have, throughout the history of the US, called for such a thing with no time limit, and yet it has not happened. Which is probably a good thing. Just because some state wanted such a convention 100 years ago does not mean we should think they still want one.
I tend to think of it as a 'called meeting' at a non-profit, where x% of the members can petition for a meeting on a specific topic. Although that's a really high petition requirement...it's usually like 20% to call a meeting, which then might have a higher quorum requirement.
And, just like it seems like constitutional conventions require, the meetings have to stay on topic. Granted, meetings are operated by the people at the meeting, so if the majority of the people wish to stray off topic, no one can stop them. The question is, via what process is their result declared _on_ topic? I guess the Supreme Court declares it so. (Which raises the interesting idea of just having the Supreme Court act as Parliamentarian in the first place.)
The whole process of calling for a convention is very vague and baffling, especially as Congress has never bothered to actually create any sort of real process for it. (Which they arguable should do.) They do count specific requests that have gotten close, like the balanced budget demand, but that's it, and no one knows what happens if the threshold is actually tripped.
And that's not getting into the actual convention, which we have no idea how it should work. While most of it can be worked out internally by Robert's Rules of Order, there's a a major hangup at the very start: Do larger states get more votes?
That is pretty much exactly what I've been saying happened.
Economies rely on a circle of goods and services, and this circle must include every good and service. It is a closed loop, it is the modern version of the 'circle of liiiiiife'. (Or, if you're of a sci-fi bent, it's the 'Great River' of the Ferengi.)
This loop can get very complicated at time, but there's a fundamental problem with off-shoring: What are we providing them? Well, money, obviously, but then what are we providing to get the money back?
Well, nothing, because it's not actually the off-shore workers getting the money, it's the corporations and corporate leaders, both here and there. It is not being returned to American worker pockets. The rich mostly sit on their money, or trade it amongst themselves.
...and because of that our circle of life has a gap in it, our great river drains into some cave system somewhere. There is money actually _disappearing_ from the actual economy, that is, the people who work and purchase stuff with the money they make from the work. (No, the stock market is not the 'economy'.)
But, no fear. Sure, money's vanishing out of the economy but there's an easy solution: People in the economy can just borrow money from all those corporations that ended up with it. (Or, rather, from the banks that are holding the money.) <futurama>Thus solving the problem ONCE AND FOR ALL</futurama>
The gap between the rich and the poor isn't 'really' the problem. Offshoring is not 'really' the problem. The fact that the rich's money is not participating in the economy, and has not done so for decades, and all the money is collecting there like a clogged pipe, is the problem.
Or maybe a better analogy there is like a clotted blood vessel...and we just had a stroke to the rest of our money-starved brain as a result. The solution of cutting taxes to the 'job creators' is like saying 'We just need to put more blood behind that clot. Perhaps some of it will squeeze past! And the rest of the brain won't be too dead by then, probably.'
Or, you know, we could do things to try to break up the clot, stop letting blood pool there in the first place.
And while we're talking about correct terminology, let's not forget that the correct form for a state where the executive branch can have you executed, or even imprisoned, without any other branch of the government having any say so, is _correctly_ called a 'police state'.
That is what that term literally means. It's often misused to mean 'unjust police action' or even 'police enforcing laws I don't like', but it actually means 'police action that is legally unconstrained by the laws or the courts'. It's not a police state if the police go in and bash the heads of protestors in violation of the law...it's a police state if such behavior is not against the law, or someone's invented some sort of 'executive prerogative' that makes them untouchable.
I warned the other Democrats that we couldn't just _ignore_ the nonsense of Bush, we needed to fucking impeach him _even if_ we were going to win the election. We have gotten dangerously close to putting _the infringement of constitutional rights_ as a _constitutional right_ of the president via the nonsensical idea that he has some sort of magical executive power to defend the country.
The president has _no_ military power outside of what the legislature provides for him, and the legislature has no power to make laws that exceed constitutional limits. (As evidenced by the right to suspend habaes corpus...the fact the constitution includes a specific singular exception to civil rights in specific circumstances rather implies that you aren't supposed to be able to randomly suspend civil rights simply because you're at war.)
That's not really how the poverty threshold is set. It is set at the level where people are 'lacking the resources to meet the basic needs for healthy living; having insufficient income to provide the food, shelter and clothing needed to preserve health'.
That line does move due to inflation and what we consider 'sufficient', but there is nothing, theoretically, stopping every single person from being above that point. (Or, strangely, below that point. If we has a zombie apocalypse, for example, the entire population would probably lack the shelter needed to preserve health, because the requirements for that got much larger, and thus would technically be in poverty.)
There are other poverty guidelines, for example the EU has 'people making less than 60% of the median income, but also doesn't require anyone above it...if the median income is $50,000, then if everyone make $30,000, no one is in poverty. (This standard fails rather horrifically in a recession, though, because the less in general people are paid, the less 'poverty' there is.)
There's really no poverty guideline that says 'The lowest 10% are in poverty', which is the only way what you're talking about could work. That wouldn't really make sense, though, because what would it measure? We already know how many people are counted under it!
I'm confused. What exactly is the left not going to like about this idea? I'm on the left, and I think it's somewhat silly, but if I actually had a vote on it, I'd vote for it, simply to fix immigration.
The left wouldn't like the whole 'losing national lands', but in reality, we're already doing that, very cheaply, to mega-corps. If this plan _replaced_ that, then fine, no objection. (Except to ask why we're limiting it to just immigrants.)
You seem to think the left wants a 'strong welfare state', which we do...but that does not mean 'a lot of people on welfare'. That just means that welfare should be broad and actually helpful. The left wouldn't mind if no one was on welfare.
Well, strictly speaking, _some_ people probably 'need' to be on welfare, or we'd stop it. Just like _some_ people 'need' to be sick...or we'd close hospitals. Those outcomes would be well and good if all problems have been solved and no one's ever going to be sick or poor again, but in the real world, it's not so good. OTOH, in the real world, there will always be sick and poor to start with, so the idea that the left 'want' anyone to be that is a bit silly.
As I've mentioned before, there's a much cheaper way to make sure that people don't commit crimes. Give them GPS anklets, and simply compare their location against any crimes reported. A GPS anklet costs about $10 a day. (I'm not sure where that number comes from.)
Car stolen? Check the database for criminals there.
Of course, this only helps with _reported_ crimes, and not, for example, victimless crimes. But I think we all know the standard answer as to what to do about _those_.
And, um, there's another 'religion freedom' concept violated by this nonsense. Not only do they have to be 'Christian', but their freedom is entirely based on saying on the 'good side' of a pastor.
So we could, in theory, send someone back to jail who got a real honest job, is staying away from his criminal associates, is saving up to go to trade school and get his degree in air conditioning repair, and has refrained from committing any crimes... because he decided to move in with his girlfriend. Or, worse, his boyfriend.
Even ignore the whole 'What about non-Christians?' question, I'm not entirely sure that giving religious leaders the power to judge and thus imprison people is even slightly sane.
Or what if he starts denying the trinity and insisting Jesus was merely a mortal man, and the preacher goes 'Fine, whatever, you're going back to jail.' I mean, we could be imprisoning people because of actual religion heresy. Wow. It's hard to come up with a more misguided policy.
Rather than telling them not to do drugs (which is a decision they’ll ultimately make for themselves regardless of what we tell them), talk to them about being a little smarter with their decisions. Don’t smoke in a car parked in the middle of an empty parking lot with your lights on.
You'd be amazed at how well that doesn't work.
I know someone who is addicted to alcohol. They get arrested for DUIs. They've also been arrested for pot possession...because they had it in public and were also drinking in their (parked) vehicle. (That got throw out. Can't charge people with violating open container laws by drinking in the back of a turned-off pickup, and hence cannot legally search their pickup to find the pot. I don't know what sort of stupid cop that was.)
Seriously, I've tried to talk to him, saying 'Look, you have a problem with addiction, and that sucks, it really does. I would wish that you would get help for it...but if you don't, can you at least stop getting arrested for it? Go buy booze, go buy pot, smoke it in the safety of your own property, and don't go to jail? It would be a fuckload _cheaper_, and as a bonus, I would not have bail you out of jail.'
It does not appear to work. (Or, rather, it appears to work...until he's arrested again. I do not bail him out anymore.)
When I commit crimes, I commit them in private, and feel no shame. When I do commit crimes in public, I make very sure of what the legality of everything I'm doing is. (I.e., I don't speed with drugs in the car, not that I do drugs.)
But apparently part of having an addictive personality is making very bad choices about that addiction. Logically, alcoholism shouldn't be related to DUIs...people who are alcoholic should know they're going to get drunk, and thus be less likely to plan to drink. And should drink enough that they purchase in ways other than bars, anyway. It's the people who are not paying attention and get drunk that should be doing the DUIs.
No, I presume that people _can function as if_ they are no longer in a small village. Whether or not most people operate in this matter, or what the distribution is, I have no idea.
All I know is that people can arbitrarily decide they will not, or will no longer be, operating within their previous small village, so can utterly escape any harmful repercussions to their behavior.
If people can 'opt-out' of punishment, it doesn't work so well. It keeps punishing the people who act in good faith and do minor things, but doesn't do a damn thing about the person who doesn't actually live there, or perhaps does live there but is sustained by out-of-area employment and shopping and whatnot, so doesn't care what anyone local thinks about him.
Erm, not only would Federal law trump both state constitutional amendments and state law, there's actually a pretty clear Federal Constitutional argument it's unconstitutional.
Specifically, the Supreme Court has argued that 'Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival' in Loving vs. Virginia. Laws that effect a 'fundamental right' are under strict scrutiny. Ergo, the law must:
1) Be justified by a compelling governmental interest.
2) Be narrowly tailored to achieve that goal or interest.
3) Be the least restrictive means for achieving that interest
It pretty much automatically fails all those tests.
However, let's be charitably and pretend marriage isn't actually a fundamental right. It's still gender-discrimination, so is under 'intermediate scrutiny'. And thus, it must simply:
1) further an important government interest in a way that is substantially related to that interest.
Remember when I talked about 'shaming'? Yeah, that's not an 'important government interest'. The government doesn't get to shame some people and not other people based solely on their gender.
Misdemeanors usually have the option of paying a fine or jailtime, and that entire system needs to be changed, as that is pretty clearly set up to let the rich do whatever they want, and send the poor off to jail. So the problem isn't 'jailtime', the problem is that that's only the problem for the poor.
I'm tempted to recommend we ditch both fines and jailtime, and bring back putting people in stocks. No throwing things or harsh positions, but people who commit misdemeanors should have to sit under a sign saying what they did, in the courthouse, for a specific number of hours. But a lot less hours than they'd spend in jail. (In fact, an off the cuff ratio would be an hour a day. Instead of 30 days in jail, thirty hours sitting at the couthouse.) We can have it to some extent where people can work it around their job if they have only a few hours.
This is sorta what community service is supposed to be, but that's more 'paying back' instead of 'shaming'.
And a lot of stuff would be almost trivial. Having your kid ski without safety equipment? An hour to sit there and think about what you did. It's almost more work for you to set the thing up and go there then to do it. The point is to say 'Yeah, don't do that anymore, you idiot.'.
Well, yes, we could stop gay marriage as a way to frown on homosexual relationships. (Although this point in time, it is questionable whether society is generally against them.)
Except that part where we passed a law decades ago banning discrimination based on sex. You know, the law that should have instantly remove any sort of gender requirement for anything, including marriage.
I am confused as to how 'public safety' and 'how the public thinks you ought to behave' can't be the same thing.
The public is opposed to all sorts of things that endanger it, and thinks you ought not do them. (In fact, that's the most consistent thing the public opposes!)
I was just making the point that 'Ought' is just less than 'must'. Felonies are things you 'must' not do, so we oppose them very much, and will lock people away for them. Misdemeanors are supposed to be simply things you ought not do, and basically are public disapproval.
I think what a few people have failed to notice is that small fines and taxes are how we, as society, registers disapproval. Society is not small enough that we can give people a 'good frowning'. Instead, we have the police stop you and give you a ticket. (And some people have also failed to notice that skiing is an activity that almost entirely takes place inside of a specific business set up for that purpose, so requiring helmets will simply mean you get handed a helmet when you show up at the ski lodge, and they won't let you on the lift without it.)
There seems to be some sort of disconnection in libertarian thinking about the purpose of misdemeanors. Their purpose is not to punish people, or to protect other people, their purpose is to say 'We, as society, think you need to stop doing that.'. Aka, you do need to wear a helmet, you do need to buckle your seatbelt, you do need to stop parking in handicap places. We will keep annoying you until you do.
This is a _replacement_ for how the world used to work, in small villages, where people used to know who you were.
And, admittedly, abuse of police powers makes me hesitant to give them any more authority. But the correct solution is to stop them from abusing their powers.
Likewise, some stuff isn't really any of society's business. It's not really anyone's business whose sexual partner is whose, or what color bookcases you have in your house. This is a great advantage of having the shaming 'formalized', we can actually change it, instead of waiting 60 years for all the old busybodies to die off.
And there's a specific problem of misdemeanor creep, where we take misdemeanors and turn them into felonies when they almost certainly shouldn't be. For a random example, public indecency laws should be misdemeanors, not the 'sex felony' we've turned them into, which is worse then normal felonies. Likewise, drug use should be a misdemeanor, if that.
But, again, the correct solution something else, specifically to stop this 'tough on crime' nonsense. We need to be tough on _assailants_, tough on people who run around hurting others. We don't need to be tough on misdemeanors, which is _supposed_ to be how society wags its finger at people.
(Incidentally, I know there's a problem with misdemeanors and the level of punishment for the rich vs. the poor. But that's an issue for another day.)
Right. The show tends to use adults when talking about serious topics, or at least have them the subject of the topic.
Muppets are a stand in for children, yes, even the 'adult' muppets like Bert and Ernie. (People forget, they live alone with no authority figures, they are 'adults'. They're not a 'couple', but they are adult roommates. And it's to show how children should act when living with roommates.)
But 'adult' muppets are the equivalent of 'playing house'. It's a 'Here is what you can be when you grow up' fantasy, as opposed to 'Here are some adultish issues', which tend to be shown by having real humans.
Well, unless it's the kids themselves who have the issues, at which point they get muppets. The HIV-positive muppet, Tami, over in Africa, was not to teach children about 'people who have HIV', it's because of the sad fact is that all too many of Sesame Street's viewers _themselves_ have HIV, so those kids got a standin.
However, Sesame Street's viewers are not gay. Well, not yet...and there's plenty of talk about people who are 'different' that applies to gay (or pre-gay, or whatever you want to call it) children equally well.
However, they do know gay adults and teenagers. And thus there should be (human) adult gay characters on the show.
Erm, the idea of teaching gun safety to kids is not insane, and has probably already been done at some point on Sesame Street. Although at that age gun safety is 'Don't touch guns'. (Sometimes, I think a lot of people talking about Sesame Street don't actually remember it.)
I'll ignore the babysitter stuff, which is possibly a mistake on the part of lawmakers, and concentrate on the nannies, because the laws doesn't make sense there either.
I'm the last person to be willing to shrug and say 'They knew what they were in for' when it comes to employment. I don't think workers should be required to work in smoke-filled bars, or near dangerous machinery, even if they explicitly are told that as part of their employment. Employers can't just disclaim that sort of thing.
And even I think this law is stupid. Being woken up in the middle of the night is part of the actual job of a live-in nanny. That is the reason they exist. There is otherwise no purpose to having a nanny live in your house.
Likewise, part of the premise of a nanny is they are caring for children when there is no one else around. It makes absolutely no sense for them to have 'breaks'. Perhaps there could be some sort of mandated 'relaxation time' where the parents can't tell them what to do, and they're allowed to just stick the kids on the couch and relax...but I'm not entirely convinced this has ever not been happening. (We've all heard horror stories of parents who give babysitters entirely full schedules, with every minute planned out, and that might happen to 3 hours a month babysitters...I have a feeling it doesn't really happen with 40 hour a week nannies. No one has the time to schedule that stuff.)
I quite agree that a live-in nanny is an employee, not a contractor, and there have been all sorts of abuses in that regard, including minimum wage violations. But that doesn't mean regulating them as if their job is identical to everyone else's makes sense.
Although I will argue that there should probably be a slightly lower wage allowed if they are given room and probably board. Or just flat daily deduction from wages for that. Actually, I'd argue that someone living in your house on call at any time of day technically should be a contract worker, and not paid by the hour at all. Although danger lies in that direction, because you know people will pay for six hours of work a day and expect 14. But as that's already happening...
Ah, I don't use them there, because I had a limited amount, so I first replaced them in places I have on for hours at a time, like the kitchen and office and hall. I will make a note that short term lights need to be LEDs, which I've been planning on looking into anyway.
Incandescents, while we're talking about places you shouldn't use types of lights, are crap in enclosed fixtures. Incandescents get killed by heat, and it's amazing how poorly designed many lighting fixtures are.
I have some 'flower' looking fixtures in the kitchen, where the bare bulb points downwardish and is surrounded by fancy glass, and those just ate incandescent bulbs. The glass had holes that in theory would let the heat out, but that clearly didn't work.
Same with the desk lamps with the enclosed metal 'head' that you point downward. Even if you follow the rules and only use 45 watt, they only last so long before they cook themselves. (Table lamps, OTOH, have hole at the top the heat can escape out, so don't do that.)
If you have any of those, replace them with CFLs right now. (I don't actually know CFLs last longer if placed in the 'same' heat...but as they generate much less heat to start with, it's moot.) Although if you turn them on and off a lot, you might want LED.
I have exactly one CFL that has 'failed' over the three years or so I've been using them. And that failure seems to because the base is loose...I can tap it a few times it and it comes back on. This seems to be some sort of manufacturing defect, unless this is how CFLs 'burn out'. (I've been assuming they fail like normal florescent tubes...having weird flickers and light only at the ends. But I admit I don't know this for a fact.)
Meanwhile, I've replaced multiple incandescent bulbs over those three years, some of them multiple times. (I didn't replace them all with CFL at once because a) money, and b) I wanted use up all the old bulbs I had...which I am doing. It's about time for another bulk CFL purchase, though, I'm out of incandescent 60 watts, and had to stick a 45 in for one of them a few weeks ago.)
I have no idea if I'm saying money on the cost of the bulbs _alone_, but I'm pretty certain that once you factor in reduced power consumption and reduced air conditioning, I am.
And if CFLs are going out at your house, you probably have crappy power. Possibly you're having slight brownouts and under- or over-voltages. Do you also have problems with computers crashing? (Although note that the less crappy the power supply of a computer is, the less that will happen. Good power supplies can coast through those. And laptops obviously have no problem at all.)
I’m not sure which liberatarians you’re talking about.
I think you've misunderstood my post. I'm not talking about the actual 10% who do have a philosophical position. I know Paul is one of those, and Barr, after he retired, had a 'come to Jesus' moment about both marijuana and SSM. (He's doing work for the ACLU right now!) I don't know anything about Flake, but I'll take his web page at its word and assume he's one also.
I'm talking about people like Glenn Beck, whose described himself as 'conservative with a libertarian leaning'. I'm talking about a guy I talk politics with in real life, whose a 'libertarian' as long as we're talking about social services and thinks 'Obamacare' is unconstitutional, but has no problem with waging war forever.
And then they rant about 'big government' when it's talking about government regulation, and rant about being 'pro-family' when they're talking about forcing women to give birth, etc, etc.
The entire right seems have a series of random positions, and half a dozen philosophies that gets pulled out whenever needed to justify each individual position.
I can respect people who _actually have a position_, even if I don't agree with it. I can even respect people who mostly have a position but sometimes have exceptions to it, or at least what looks sorta like exceptions. (For example, a libertarian who thinks that drugs should be restricted, because everyone should be free to do whatever they want, and once people take addictive drugs, they are no longer free. I.e., people should be free, but not free to enslave themselves.)
But I can't respect people who can yank out a 'pro-family' position to demonize abortion, and then in their next breath yank out a 'small government' position to justify reducing WIC.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Why the GOP is Wrong About Millionaire Small Business Owners”
I'm not going to state my opinion on the whole S-Corp thing except to say this: Is the poor sad owner of the S-Corp paying more taxes than he would as a C-Corp? If no, then shut up. If yes, then reorganize as a C-Corp.
Seriously, this is getting a little screwy...if you can't keep down the amount of 'money' you're holding from the corporation down at tax time, then you're either do it wrong and have crappy accountants or are in an industry where have to hold a lot of taxable assets and have mistakenly structured your business as an S-Corp when it should be something else.
But none of this has anything to do with employment, which obviously _reduces_ the amount of money the owner of an S-Corp pays income tax on. So the entire complaint is dumb to start with.
The idea that someone would see 'Oh no, any money my S-Corp (aka, me) holds at the end of the year is going to be taxed slightly more than before...I better not hire those guys I was going to hire. Because either they'll make me more money to help cover my taxes, or, um, they'll make me less money than their salaries, reducing my taxes.' If anything, this change in tax law would make more incentive to hire people, not less. At least if you were anywhere near a million in assets.
Really, for this premise to make any sense, you have to postulate that all businesses are exactly right at the peak of the Laffer curve, and are so perfectly situated that not only do the owners not want to 'work harder', but somehow they don't feel like employing people who will work harder. It's some sort of Platonic Ideal of the Laffer Curve, where hiring people is too much work even if they make more money.
On “Everything happens for a reason?”
Yes. As I've argued in other venues, whether or not we 'want' copyright is a moot point at this time. The fact is, for copyright to work, as you say, it requires some sort of cost. Not just making the 'copy'...but distributing it. Copyright would probably be fine with CD burners but without an internet.
In the past, making and/or providing copies cost money and time, so all copying was either internal personal and friend use (And frankly no one cares about mix tapes.) or an actual business set up to violate copyright and sell at a profit, where violators can be tracked down. In that universe, copyright works.
In this universe, it doesn't. I'm not saying it's bad, I'm not saying I want to get rid of it, I'm not actually stating any position at all. I'm stating a fact. In this world, the sky is blue, and copyright law doesn't work anymore.
It doesn't matter what the laws say, it doesn't matter if the laws are a very good idea, it doesn't matter if there's some moral purpose to them, it doesn't matter if society will crumble if those laws do not exist. The fact is, in a society where everything is on a computer and can be instantly and infinitely copied, it is physically impossible for copyright laws to work. Doesn't matter if we want them or even need them to work.
DRM tried to make this harder, and unlike most people I have to say kudos to someone for actually understanding the problem and trying to stop it by imposing added copying costs...but the fact that DRM is utter nonsense and cannot work loses them the points they just gained. If a computer can decode information to present it to a person, it can decode information to store an unencoded copy of it. The entire premise is stupid.
So I urge people who think copyright law actually serves a purpose to try to figure out exactly how to fix it. It cannot work in this world. (Alternately, you could attempt to undo the information revolution. Good luck with that.)
On “Colbertesque”
Indeed. They're willing to put up with some women escaping from traditional gender roles. At least in this point in time. It would be nearly impossible to oppose that, they're barely holding on there as it is, and fighting to keep women 'out' of man's role is impossible. (Instead, they 'let them in', and then just discriminate against them, or treat them as a joke.)
In other words, a woman operating outside of traditional gender roles is the enemy, and you can't really do anything about that. But a man operating outside of traditional gender roles is a traitor.
The fundamentalists' nonsense makes a lot more sense when you stop trying to make it to some sort of idiotic moral position, and look at some of the weird disconnect that the 'hypocrites' seem to have. No one's actual problem is with gay sex (Not even them), and saying that people who have sex shouldn't be able to get married first is utterly nonsensical according to their own premises.
Likewise, all this nonsense about masculinity and whatnot. I volunteer in theatre, where 25% of the men are 'effeminate' or just don't care, and 15% are gay...and those two groups do not overlap anywhere near as much as people think. It's utter nonsense.
No, the problem fundamentalists have is exactly what they say it is, with the 'sanctity of marriage' It's why they can stand there and repeat that marriage is 'a man and a woman' without being able to explain why...it's because the actual belief they hold is secretly 'a marriage is when a man gets a wife to be in charge of, and the man does man things and the wife does wife things', but they can't admit this to anyone. Not even to themselves.
So they end up in some weird floundering where they cannot exactly explain why marriages must have two people in specific gender roles.
"
You are suffering from the effects of Poe's Law. Actually, from the corollary of it.
It is almost impossible for outsiders to tell the difference between parody of fundamentalism, and actual fundamentalism. Hell, it's often impossible for fundamentalists to tell the difference, as Conservapedia appears to be riddled with stuff that cannot actually be the actual beliefs of anyone.
However, the effeminate=gay and thus effeminate=satanic conspiracy? I'll go out on a limb and reassure people that's real. The fake stuff doesn't make the front page.
Why? You'd be astonished as to how much homophobia with fundamentalist men is not because of gay sex, but because of gender roles. (Hence they can have gay sex whenever they want...in an airport bathroom, and go home to be the 'head' of their house.)
Their actual problem with teh gays is not sex, it's that teh gay men refuse to find a women to boss around, and tey gay women refuse to be bossed around. No one seems to know their place. (Frankly, something like half the far-right problems with the world can be summed up as 'X doesn't know their place.)
This is what all their gibberish about 'protecting marriage' is about. Whenever anyone on the right says 'marriage', I urge people to mentally replace that with 'traditional roles in marriage'.
On “The Truth is Out There, But is It A Fantasy?… on the X-Files and the difference between sic-fi and fantasy”
I have an easy rule to tell sci-fi and fantasy apart. I don't. ;) But here is how I used to define them: Spec-Fi is any story set in an obviously untrue universe.
All works of fiction are 'untrue' in some manner, but by 'obviously untrue', I mean if we were placed in such a universe, and did not know of the work of fiction, we would not think it odd. There may be no actual Dunder Miffler, but The Office is not spec-fi, because if we ended up there (and had never heard of The Office.) we would think it was entirely reasonable.
Please note that 'obviously untrue' sometimes gets a little vague, which is why I once confused some people by referring to Touch by an Angel as Fantasy. Apparently, they _wouldn't_ have been startled to be in a world with walking and talking angels sent by God.
But, anyway, there are three sorts of common untrue worlds:
Fantasy, in which the world is untrue by things that appear to violate physics. Science Fiction, in which the world is untrue by things that are not true, but could be. Alternate History, the one everyone's forgotten about, which is untrue because events that we know went one way actually went another.
But at _this_ point, science fiction refers to stories with certain things, like FTL and aliens and time travelers and whatnot. And fantasy refers to stories with certain things, like magic and elves and vampires and stuff.
None of those things are _actually_ more plausible than anything else. There's a subset of science fiction called 'hard sci-fi' that claims to stick to plausible things, but the point isn't what _does_ violate physics, it's what _appears_ to, and I've given up trying to tell them apart, because my 'appears' doesn't appear to match anyone else's 'appears'
I realized that that the idea that FTL is probably _less_ based in physics than a magical secret world that memory-erases people.
On “Pop Quiz”
Are we _sure_ about the 'they can do anything'? It actually seems like a constitutional convention would be limited by topic.
If 'general convention' calls could result in one, we'd already have one. More than enough states have, throughout the history of the US, called for such a thing with no time limit, and yet it has not happened. Which is probably a good thing. Just because some state wanted such a convention 100 years ago does not mean we should think they still want one.
I tend to think of it as a 'called meeting' at a non-profit, where x% of the members can petition for a meeting on a specific topic. Although that's a really high petition requirement...it's usually like 20% to call a meeting, which then might have a higher quorum requirement.
And, just like it seems like constitutional conventions require, the meetings have to stay on topic. Granted, meetings are operated by the people at the meeting, so if the majority of the people wish to stray off topic, no one can stop them. The question is, via what process is their result declared _on_ topic? I guess the Supreme Court declares it so. (Which raises the interesting idea of just having the Supreme Court act as Parliamentarian in the first place.)
The whole process of calling for a convention is very vague and baffling, especially as Congress has never bothered to actually create any sort of real process for it. (Which they arguable should do.) They do count specific requests that have gotten close, like the balanced budget demand, but that's it, and no one knows what happens if the threshold is actually tripped.
And that's not getting into the actual convention, which we have no idea how it should work. While most of it can be worked out internally by Robert's Rules of Order, there's a a major hangup at the very start: Do larger states get more votes?
On “Promises Were Broken”
That is pretty much exactly what I've been saying happened.
Economies rely on a circle of goods and services, and this circle must include every good and service. It is a closed loop, it is the modern version of the 'circle of liiiiiife'. (Or, if you're of a sci-fi bent, it's the 'Great River' of the Ferengi.)
This loop can get very complicated at time, but there's a fundamental problem with off-shoring: What are we providing them? Well, money, obviously, but then what are we providing to get the money back?
Well, nothing, because it's not actually the off-shore workers getting the money, it's the corporations and corporate leaders, both here and there. It is not being returned to American worker pockets. The rich mostly sit on their money, or trade it amongst themselves.
...and because of that our circle of life has a gap in it, our great river drains into some cave system somewhere. There is money actually _disappearing_ from the actual economy, that is, the people who work and purchase stuff with the money they make from the work. (No, the stock market is not the 'economy'.)
But, no fear. Sure, money's vanishing out of the economy but there's an easy solution: People in the economy can just borrow money from all those corporations that ended up with it. (Or, rather, from the banks that are holding the money.) <futurama>Thus solving the problem ONCE AND FOR ALL</futurama>
The gap between the rich and the poor isn't 'really' the problem. Offshoring is not 'really' the problem. The fact that the rich's money is not participating in the economy, and has not done so for decades, and all the money is collecting there like a clogged pipe, is the problem.
Or maybe a better analogy there is like a clotted blood vessel...and we just had a stroke to the rest of our money-starved brain as a result. The solution of cutting taxes to the 'job creators' is like saying 'We just need to put more blood behind that clot. Perhaps some of it will squeeze past! And the rest of the brain won't be too dead by then, probably.'
Or, you know, we could do things to try to break up the clot, stop letting blood pool there in the first place.
"
Damn, you figured out the secret, how to get rid of the unhappiness in this country.
Now all the superrich have to do is make sure everyone has a job at 42k a year with a medical plan, and the protest will amount to nothing!
On “Something to Go Galt About”
And while we're talking about correct terminology, let's not forget that the correct form for a state where the executive branch can have you executed, or even imprisoned, without any other branch of the government having any say so, is _correctly_ called a 'police state'.
That is what that term literally means. It's often misused to mean 'unjust police action' or even 'police enforcing laws I don't like', but it actually means 'police action that is legally unconstrained by the laws or the courts'. It's not a police state if the police go in and bash the heads of protestors in violation of the law...it's a police state if such behavior is not against the law, or someone's invented some sort of 'executive prerogative' that makes them untouchable.
I warned the other Democrats that we couldn't just _ignore_ the nonsense of Bush, we needed to fucking impeach him _even if_ we were going to win the election. We have gotten dangerously close to putting _the infringement of constitutional rights_ as a _constitutional right_ of the president via the nonsensical idea that he has some sort of magical executive power to defend the country.
The president has _no_ military power outside of what the legislature provides for him, and the legislature has no power to make laws that exceed constitutional limits. (As evidenced by the right to suspend habaes corpus...the fact the constitution includes a specific singular exception to civil rights in specific circumstances rather implies that you aren't supposed to be able to randomly suspend civil rights simply because you're at war.)
On “A Man for No Season in Particular”
That's not really how the poverty threshold is set. It is set at the level where people are 'lacking the resources to meet the basic needs for healthy living; having insufficient income to provide the food, shelter and clothing needed to preserve health'.
That line does move due to inflation and what we consider 'sufficient', but there is nothing, theoretically, stopping every single person from being above that point. (Or, strangely, below that point. If we has a zombie apocalypse, for example, the entire population would probably lack the shelter needed to preserve health, because the requirements for that got much larger, and thus would technically be in poverty.)
There are other poverty guidelines, for example the EU has 'people making less than 60% of the median income, but also doesn't require anyone above it...if the median income is $50,000, then if everyone make $30,000, no one is in poverty. (This standard fails rather horrifically in a recession, though, because the less in general people are paid, the less 'poverty' there is.)
There's really no poverty guideline that says 'The lowest 10% are in poverty', which is the only way what you're talking about could work. That wouldn't really make sense, though, because what would it measure? We already know how many people are counted under it!
"
I'm confused. What exactly is the left not going to like about this idea? I'm on the left, and I think it's somewhat silly, but if I actually had a vote on it, I'd vote for it, simply to fix immigration.
The left wouldn't like the whole 'losing national lands', but in reality, we're already doing that, very cheaply, to mega-corps. If this plan _replaced_ that, then fine, no objection. (Except to ask why we're limiting it to just immigrants.)
You seem to think the left wants a 'strong welfare state', which we do...but that does not mean 'a lot of people on welfare'. That just means that welfare should be broad and actually helpful. The left wouldn't mind if no one was on welfare.
Well, strictly speaking, _some_ people probably 'need' to be on welfare, or we'd stop it. Just like _some_ people 'need' to be sick...or we'd close hospitals. Those outcomes would be well and good if all problems have been solved and no one's ever going to be sick or poor again, but in the real world, it's not so good. OTOH, in the real world, there will always be sick and poor to start with, so the idea that the left 'want' anyone to be that is a bit silly.
On “Jesus Saves… $75 Dollars a Day Plus Jail Time”
As I've mentioned before, there's a much cheaper way to make sure that people don't commit crimes. Give them GPS anklets, and simply compare their location against any crimes reported. A GPS anklet costs about $10 a day. (I'm not sure where that number comes from.)
Car stolen? Check the database for criminals there.
Of course, this only helps with _reported_ crimes, and not, for example, victimless crimes. But I think we all know the standard answer as to what to do about _those_.
And, um, there's another 'religion freedom' concept violated by this nonsense. Not only do they have to be 'Christian', but their freedom is entirely based on saying on the 'good side' of a pastor.
So we could, in theory, send someone back to jail who got a real honest job, is staying away from his criminal associates, is saving up to go to trade school and get his degree in air conditioning repair, and has refrained from committing any crimes... because he decided to move in with his girlfriend. Or, worse, his boyfriend.
Even ignore the whole 'What about non-Christians?' question, I'm not entirely sure that giving religious leaders the power to judge and thus imprison people is even slightly sane.
Or what if he starts denying the trinity and insisting Jesus was merely a mortal man, and the preacher goes 'Fine, whatever, you're going back to jail.' I mean, we could be imprisoning people because of actual religion heresy. Wow. It's hard to come up with a more misguided policy.
"
Rather than telling them not to do drugs (which is a decision they’ll ultimately make for themselves regardless of what we tell them), talk to them about being a little smarter with their decisions. Don’t smoke in a car parked in the middle of an empty parking lot with your lights on.
You'd be amazed at how well that doesn't work.
I know someone who is addicted to alcohol. They get arrested for DUIs. They've also been arrested for pot possession...because they had it in public and were also drinking in their (parked) vehicle. (That got throw out. Can't charge people with violating open container laws by drinking in the back of a turned-off pickup, and hence cannot legally search their pickup to find the pot. I don't know what sort of stupid cop that was.)
Seriously, I've tried to talk to him, saying 'Look, you have a problem with addiction, and that sucks, it really does. I would wish that you would get help for it...but if you don't, can you at least stop getting arrested for it? Go buy booze, go buy pot, smoke it in the safety of your own property, and don't go to jail? It would be a fuckload _cheaper_, and as a bonus, I would not have bail you out of jail.'
It does not appear to work. (Or, rather, it appears to work...until he's arrested again. I do not bail him out anymore.)
When I commit crimes, I commit them in private, and feel no shame. When I do commit crimes in public, I make very sure of what the legality of everything I'm doing is. (I.e., I don't speed with drugs in the car, not that I do drugs.)
But apparently part of having an addictive personality is making very bad choices about that addiction. Logically, alcoholism shouldn't be related to DUIs...people who are alcoholic should know they're going to get drunk, and thus be less likely to plan to drink. And should drink enough that they purchase in ways other than bars, anyway. It's the people who are not paying attention and get drunk that should be doing the DUIs.
However, this is not even slightly correct.
On “California Governor Jerry Brown vetoes ski helmet mandate, language bill, and higher cell phone fines: “Not every human problem deserves a law””
No, I presume that people _can function as if_ they are no longer in a small village. Whether or not most people operate in this matter, or what the distribution is, I have no idea.
All I know is that people can arbitrarily decide they will not, or will no longer be, operating within their previous small village, so can utterly escape any harmful repercussions to their behavior.
If people can 'opt-out' of punishment, it doesn't work so well. It keeps punishing the people who act in good faith and do minor things, but doesn't do a damn thing about the person who doesn't actually live there, or perhaps does live there but is sustained by out-of-area employment and shopping and whatnot, so doesn't care what anyone local thinks about him.
"
Erm, not only would Federal law trump both state constitutional amendments and state law, there's actually a pretty clear Federal Constitutional argument it's unconstitutional.
Specifically, the Supreme Court has argued that 'Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival' in Loving vs. Virginia. Laws that effect a 'fundamental right' are under strict scrutiny. Ergo, the law must:
1) Be justified by a compelling governmental interest.
2) Be narrowly tailored to achieve that goal or interest.
3) Be the least restrictive means for achieving that interest
It pretty much automatically fails all those tests.
However, let's be charitably and pretend marriage isn't actually a fundamental right. It's still gender-discrimination, so is under 'intermediate scrutiny'. And thus, it must simply:
1) further an important government interest in a way that is substantially related to that interest.
Remember when I talked about 'shaming'? Yeah, that's not an 'important government interest'. The government doesn't get to shame some people and not other people based solely on their gender.
"
Misdemeanors usually have the option of paying a fine or jailtime, and that entire system needs to be changed, as that is pretty clearly set up to let the rich do whatever they want, and send the poor off to jail. So the problem isn't 'jailtime', the problem is that that's only the problem for the poor.
I'm tempted to recommend we ditch both fines and jailtime, and bring back putting people in stocks. No throwing things or harsh positions, but people who commit misdemeanors should have to sit under a sign saying what they did, in the courthouse, for a specific number of hours. But a lot less hours than they'd spend in jail. (In fact, an off the cuff ratio would be an hour a day. Instead of 30 days in jail, thirty hours sitting at the couthouse.) We can have it to some extent where people can work it around their job if they have only a few hours.
This is sorta what community service is supposed to be, but that's more 'paying back' instead of 'shaming'.
And a lot of stuff would be almost trivial. Having your kid ski without safety equipment? An hour to sit there and think about what you did. It's almost more work for you to set the thing up and go there then to do it. The point is to say 'Yeah, don't do that anymore, you idiot.'.
"
Well, yes, we could stop gay marriage as a way to frown on homosexual relationships. (Although this point in time, it is questionable whether society is generally against them.)
Except that part where we passed a law decades ago banning discrimination based on sex. You know, the law that should have instantly remove any sort of gender requirement for anything, including marriage.
"
I am confused as to how 'public safety' and 'how the public thinks you ought to behave' can't be the same thing.
The public is opposed to all sorts of things that endanger it, and thinks you ought not do them. (In fact, that's the most consistent thing the public opposes!)
I was just making the point that 'Ought' is just less than 'must'. Felonies are things you 'must' not do, so we oppose them very much, and will lock people away for them. Misdemeanors are supposed to be simply things you ought not do, and basically are public disapproval.
"
I think what a few people have failed to notice is that small fines and taxes are how we, as society, registers disapproval. Society is not small enough that we can give people a 'good frowning'. Instead, we have the police stop you and give you a ticket. (And some people have also failed to notice that skiing is an activity that almost entirely takes place inside of a specific business set up for that purpose, so requiring helmets will simply mean you get handed a helmet when you show up at the ski lodge, and they won't let you on the lift without it.)
There seems to be some sort of disconnection in libertarian thinking about the purpose of misdemeanors. Their purpose is not to punish people, or to protect other people, their purpose is to say 'We, as society, think you need to stop doing that.'. Aka, you do need to wear a helmet, you do need to buckle your seatbelt, you do need to stop parking in handicap places. We will keep annoying you until you do.
This is a _replacement_ for how the world used to work, in small villages, where people used to know who you were.
And, admittedly, abuse of police powers makes me hesitant to give them any more authority. But the correct solution is to stop them from abusing their powers.
Likewise, some stuff isn't really any of society's business. It's not really anyone's business whose sexual partner is whose, or what color bookcases you have in your house. This is a great advantage of having the shaming 'formalized', we can actually change it, instead of waiting 60 years for all the old busybodies to die off.
And there's a specific problem of misdemeanor creep, where we take misdemeanors and turn them into felonies when they almost certainly shouldn't be. For a random example, public indecency laws should be misdemeanors, not the 'sex felony' we've turned them into, which is worse then normal felonies. Likewise, drug use should be a misdemeanor, if that.
But, again, the correct solution something else, specifically to stop this 'tough on crime' nonsense. We need to be tough on _assailants_, tough on people who run around hurting others. We don't need to be tough on misdemeanors, which is _supposed_ to be how society wags its finger at people.
(Incidentally, I know there's a problem with misdemeanors and the level of punishment for the rich vs. the poor. But that's an issue for another day.)
On “On Sesame Street and Gay Marriage”
Right. The show tends to use adults when talking about serious topics, or at least have them the subject of the topic.
Muppets are a stand in for children, yes, even the 'adult' muppets like Bert and Ernie. (People forget, they live alone with no authority figures, they are 'adults'. They're not a 'couple', but they are adult roommates. And it's to show how children should act when living with roommates.)
But 'adult' muppets are the equivalent of 'playing house'. It's a 'Here is what you can be when you grow up' fantasy, as opposed to 'Here are some adultish issues', which tend to be shown by having real humans.
Well, unless it's the kids themselves who have the issues, at which point they get muppets. The HIV-positive muppet, Tami, over in Africa, was not to teach children about 'people who have HIV', it's because of the sad fact is that all too many of Sesame Street's viewers _themselves_ have HIV, so those kids got a standin.
However, Sesame Street's viewers are not gay. Well, not yet...and there's plenty of talk about people who are 'different' that applies to gay (or pre-gay, or whatever you want to call it) children equally well.
However, they do know gay adults and teenagers. And thus there should be (human) adult gay characters on the show.
"
Erm, the idea of teaching gun safety to kids is not insane, and has probably already been done at some point on Sesame Street. Although at that age gun safety is 'Don't touch guns'. (Sometimes, I think a lot of people talking about Sesame Street don't actually remember it.)
On “California’s Nanny State Nanny Law”
I'll ignore the babysitter stuff, which is possibly a mistake on the part of lawmakers, and concentrate on the nannies, because the laws doesn't make sense there either.
I'm the last person to be willing to shrug and say 'They knew what they were in for' when it comes to employment. I don't think workers should be required to work in smoke-filled bars, or near dangerous machinery, even if they explicitly are told that as part of their employment. Employers can't just disclaim that sort of thing.
And even I think this law is stupid. Being woken up in the middle of the night is part of the actual job of a live-in nanny. That is the reason they exist. There is otherwise no purpose to having a nanny live in your house.
Likewise, part of the premise of a nanny is they are caring for children when there is no one else around. It makes absolutely no sense for them to have 'breaks'. Perhaps there could be some sort of mandated 'relaxation time' where the parents can't tell them what to do, and they're allowed to just stick the kids on the couch and relax...but I'm not entirely convinced this has ever not been happening. (We've all heard horror stories of parents who give babysitters entirely full schedules, with every minute planned out, and that might happen to 3 hours a month babysitters...I have a feeling it doesn't really happen with 40 hour a week nannies. No one has the time to schedule that stuff.)
I quite agree that a live-in nanny is an employee, not a contractor, and there have been all sorts of abuses in that regard, including minimum wage violations. But that doesn't mean regulating them as if their job is identical to everyone else's makes sense.
Although I will argue that there should probably be a slightly lower wage allowed if they are given room and probably board. Or just flat daily deduction from wages for that. Actually, I'd argue that someone living in your house on call at any time of day technically should be a contract worker, and not paid by the hour at all. Although danger lies in that direction, because you know people will pay for six hours of work a day and expect 14. But as that's already happening...
On “Climate Change is Real, and it’s Heating Up”
Ah, I don't use them there, because I had a limited amount, so I first replaced them in places I have on for hours at a time, like the kitchen and office and hall. I will make a note that short term lights need to be LEDs, which I've been planning on looking into anyway.
Incandescents, while we're talking about places you shouldn't use types of lights, are crap in enclosed fixtures. Incandescents get killed by heat, and it's amazing how poorly designed many lighting fixtures are.
I have some 'flower' looking fixtures in the kitchen, where the bare bulb points downwardish and is surrounded by fancy glass, and those just ate incandescent bulbs. The glass had holes that in theory would let the heat out, but that clearly didn't work.
Same with the desk lamps with the enclosed metal 'head' that you point downward. Even if you follow the rules and only use 45 watt, they only last so long before they cook themselves. (Table lamps, OTOH, have hole at the top the heat can escape out, so don't do that.)
If you have any of those, replace them with CFLs right now. (I don't actually know CFLs last longer if placed in the 'same' heat...but as they generate much less heat to start with, it's moot.) Although if you turn them on and off a lot, you might want LED.
"
I have exactly one CFL that has 'failed' over the three years or so I've been using them. And that failure seems to because the base is loose...I can tap it a few times it and it comes back on. This seems to be some sort of manufacturing defect, unless this is how CFLs 'burn out'. (I've been assuming they fail like normal florescent tubes...having weird flickers and light only at the ends. But I admit I don't know this for a fact.)
Meanwhile, I've replaced multiple incandescent bulbs over those three years, some of them multiple times. (I didn't replace them all with CFL at once because a) money, and b) I wanted use up all the old bulbs I had...which I am doing. It's about time for another bulk CFL purchase, though, I'm out of incandescent 60 watts, and had to stick a 45 in for one of them a few weeks ago.)
I have no idea if I'm saying money on the cost of the bulbs _alone_, but I'm pretty certain that once you factor in reduced power consumption and reduced air conditioning, I am.
And if CFLs are going out at your house, you probably have crappy power. Possibly you're having slight brownouts and under- or over-voltages. Do you also have problems with computers crashing? (Although note that the less crappy the power supply of a computer is, the less that will happen. Good power supplies can coast through those. And laptops obviously have no problem at all.)
On “The economic hurdles of a left-libertarian alliance”
I’m not sure which liberatarians you’re talking about.
I think you've misunderstood my post. I'm not talking about the actual 10% who do have a philosophical position. I know Paul is one of those, and Barr, after he retired, had a 'come to Jesus' moment about both marijuana and SSM. (He's doing work for the ACLU right now!) I don't know anything about Flake, but I'll take his web page at its word and assume he's one also.
I'm talking about people like Glenn Beck, whose described himself as 'conservative with a libertarian leaning'. I'm talking about a guy I talk politics with in real life, whose a 'libertarian' as long as we're talking about social services and thinks 'Obamacare' is unconstitutional, but has no problem with waging war forever.
And then they rant about 'big government' when it's talking about government regulation, and rant about being 'pro-family' when they're talking about forcing women to give birth, etc, etc.
The entire right seems have a series of random positions, and half a dozen philosophies that gets pulled out whenever needed to justify each individual position.
I can respect people who _actually have a position_, even if I don't agree with it. I can even respect people who mostly have a position but sometimes have exceptions to it, or at least what looks sorta like exceptions. (For example, a libertarian who thinks that drugs should be restricted, because everyone should be free to do whatever they want, and once people take addictive drugs, they are no longer free. I.e., people should be free, but not free to enslave themselves.)
But I can't respect people who can yank out a 'pro-family' position to demonize abortion, and then in their next breath yank out a 'small government' position to justify reducing WIC.
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