Actually I'd argue it is the government's job to protect cultural value; that's precisely why they fund libraries and museums.

No..... libraries and museums are common goods which the public wants and everyone benefits equally from, and preservation of cultural history is one of the benefits. It is the job of the government to support such common goods, as long as there is majority support for the good.

Without government support, then there would be the problem of freeriders --- people who paid nothing in the long run, would get just as much benefit from the existence of the good as those who did pay for the construction of the library or museum.

It's the central purpose of government to provide a structure to help fund such goods, by requiring a majority to agree --- then everyone has to pay their equal share (relative to the benefit they and their descendants will derive from that good over their lifetimes), no freeriders, no tragedy of the commons.

And when they don't have it they order it directly from the publisher. Hence they definitely have a useful cultural role.

So you're saying that since there's a portion of the population interested in buying 5-6 year old books, the folks offering those need to be protected against competition on sales for the newest bestsellers?

That's ridiculously anti-consumer.

If the population of aficionados for older books is so small that they cannot support these businesses, or if after visiting the local library, their needs were met and they don't need to buy old books, then these businesses by definition don't have sufficient value for society anymore.

Public policy should not be based on nostalgia. It's not the government's job to try to protect "cultural value" either.

that supermarkets would only stock bestsellers and that smaller shops were necessary to ensure the availability of more specialized, less popular books.

Well... if they only stock bestsellers, then they've created a market opportunity for smaller shops to carry the non-bestsellers at higher prices. How do you know if a book will be a bestseller, before it sells, anyways? :)

Maybe not. The law says they need to charge shipping costs

I'm sure they are charging the shipping costs, at least on average. Amazon is a business, therefore, they need to make money off the transactions.

The costs are likely just buried in the item price, to make it easier for consumers to see what the total cost of buying that item will be ---- you think shipping is free, but it really means the item isn't discounted as much as it would otherwise be, if the shipping were charged separately.

If France pushes it.... I see Amazon changing the logic for the display of the final bill in France to display a "discount" for each item, and then offset the total discount by a Shipping line item.

I'm sure Amazon has the computer science know-how to figure out what portion of the shipping belongs to each item, after considering all the shipping costs savings that are possible by combining items in the order together in the same shipment in the most optimal manner.

The first laws passed by the First United States Congress after the ratification of the constitution were tariffs.

There were extreme situations extant at the time necessitating a tariff. And by extreme situations; I don't mean fiscal irresponsibility. I mean: there was no such thing as an income tax; the new government needed a bit of money to get on its feet, and the tarrifs were low and not a significant barrier.

Tariffs on international trade in order to fund the new government, largely the tariff was a penalty against Great Britain, and provided to help pay down the government debt. And then to help protect certain manufacturing industries just getting started in the young nation against foreign imports, so the country could begin to become self-sufficient, after surviving almost a decade of british blockades.

If the law has been broken, then it is always chargeable as a offence, even if it's as a result of stupidity not criminal intent.

This is incorrect; unless the particular act or omission rises to the level of criminal negligence, meeting the specific requirements of criminal negligence, then ignorance of the potential consequences of the act or omission is an absolute defense; if it is the case, then the act or omission cannot be a crime.

The waitress who delivers the poisoned drink to the patron is not liable for the murder, in case she was ignorant that the glass contained a poison.

It doesn't matter that she was leveraged in a murder. If she didn't know about the poison or the murder plan, then she doesn't have the criminal mind required for a charge of murder.

That is what should happen surely?

Only if someone is criminally culpable. It's more likely to just be plain stupidity, which unfortunately cannot be prosecuted, even when it's a government official.

So the employees didn't use protective gear during their work, and that got them slated for a killing?

They thought the samples they were working with were supposed to be specimens which had been killed and were no longer alive, so they got complacent and started letting technicians handle them without the proper gear and procedures strictly implemented to help ensure safety.

Giardia comes from animals, and is more dangerous than the things you "fear"

Giardia is a microscopic particulant and 99% will be removed with a 1 micron filter. Combine with disinfection using Chloride dioxide, and you have a very effective treatment.

It is much easier to safely eliminate the Giardia threat than medicines/chemical liquids such as alcohols which pass right through a filter.

not like the wild animals and fish don't piss and shit into our water

The concern is not piss and shit --- it's synthetic chemicals, such as rubbing alcohol, medications, petrol/motor oil, ethylene glycol; pesticides, fertilizer, and materials containing heavy metals or other toxins, that folks sometimes flush down the drain.

Some of these chemicals may be non-particulant, solvate in water, and have similar physical properties that water has.

This is a fair question, and perhaps I would think differently in this position. I'm not in this position so my view is not tainted by my greed.

The patent holders often view the public as greedy. These other companies want to capitalize on their invention and not compensate the patent holder their 'fair share' for creating their 'invention'!

Why didn't I think of that.... penal colony for illegal immigrants involving long term imprisonment and hard labor.

Instead of returning them home, send them on a one-way trip to mars or the moon.

the contractor supplied off-the-shelf nuts and bolts from a hardware store.

Sounds like criminal fraud.... I hope those responsible or the contractors' management are spending a long time in jail after paying for all losses incurred due to the failure plus the costs of paying another contractor to fix it and bring everything up to the spec promised.

6. Mathematician
7. Physicist
8. Doctor
9. Electrical Engineering

My tolerance for learning curves grows smaller every day. New technologies, once exciting for the sake of newness, now seem like hassles.

Welcome to Management!