Boo fricking hoo, if "some" are "troubled" by the very natural fact that hard work can overcome all sorts of impediments. Their answer is to pretend hard work makes no difference by taking away the rich kids' advantages.

Speak for yourself, eh.

They annoy me because they set up such stupid pointless conditions. Why would anyone want to go to market with a fox and chickens? Who carries so much gold that it will sink a boat, who would want to hire and trust a riverman with such a marginal boat, and what happens if the next passenger weighs five pounds more?

It's more fun to ask questions back and make them admit the questions are pointless.

And I don't want to work at companies that think such questions have anything to do with how I work, so I figure I may as well have fun blowing up the interview.

I'd hope to come up with some smart ass answer involving walking on a moving bus.

It's like those annoying questions about having two chickens, a fix, and a bag of gold, trying to cross a river in a small boat which can only carry you and one thing at a time. I always imagine saying that's a pretty sorry ass boat, and maybe he needs some good ole market competition in the form of someone with a bigger boat. Or maybe to say that if I am going to market, what's with the fox -- no one sells fixes at market, so why not kill it and drape teh skin over your shoulder so you can sell the only sellable part? Or if it is a fox market, let it eat the chickens now. Or if you are coming from market, leave the fox behind. And if you are carrying so much gold that it would sink the boat, you are either an incredbly attractive thief target, or you should be able to find someone with a bigger boat, or that boat is incredibly dangerous if it is that close to sinking. /get off my lawn

Would a dose of common sense do?

Consider for a moment if LA were to increase the minimum wage to $1,000/hr for all workers. What do you suppose would be the impact of that on jobs and the local economy?

Yes, and the riots in the streets of Paris combined with debts so bad the EU is rejecting their budgets and forcing them to reduce their spending ought to tell us all we need to know about that brilliant example.

You're right, let's get ahead of the game now and make the minimum wage in LA $1,000/hr. Better yet, do it at the Federal level.

That should solve all the problems, right? Everyone will be rich!

No, the problem is that there is inflation. It's a tax on everyone that's been crushing the purchasing power of everyone but the rich for decades.

What happens to those who were making $15/hr or $16/hr? They're likely frequenting places full of minimum wage workers and their costs will now rise - inevitably - to at least some degree because of this. Further, they've all now been reduced to minimum wage (or close thereto) by the stroke of a pen.

Beyond that, how many jobs will now cost enough that automating them starts to make good financial sense? How many people with little to no skills - especially those without a good education who are most in need of steady legal employment - will find that their lack of marketable skills make them not worth hiring at this higher price point?

This is the kind of feel-good thing that bring down the middle class, raises some in the lower class (those lucky enough to ride the wave), and leaves behind large swaths of the most vulnerable people. What's going to happen is that people with little to no marketable skills in surrounding areas will get hired at the state or Federal minimum wage, gain some valuable experience, become more valuable employees, and then move or commute into LA to take jobs from poor, undereducated residents. This is an anti-poor measure masquerading as a hand-up. It will drive the middle class further down the chain (by negatively impacting their purchasing power), reduce the number of available jobs for everyone (and especially for residents), and drive many of the poor right into the ground.

Mark my words, within 5 years of this taking effect, all or nearly all indicators of poverty will worsen in LA.

No, they're inherent to the fact that we're living, sentient beings with dignity and value.

No, rights cannot be "given" because something given can be taken away. Privileges are given and privileges can be taken away. Rights are inherent (see above) and can only be infringed inasmuch as we allow them to be.

Strawman; no such claim has been made. Precisely the opposite. On the other hand, sometimes people say "rights" when they mean "privileges" and vice versa.

There's nothing extremist about living, sentient, valuable individuals having rights. Whether you believe they're inherent to the existence of that individual or endowed upon them by their creator is irrelevant. In either case, the individual is naturally provided with their rights as a fundamental component of their existence. Once this is understood and accepted, it becomes obvious why no law or act of violence can rob you of your rights; rather, merely infringe upon their free exercise. As limited creatures, we lack the requisite ability to alter the fundamental nature of mankind.

Put another way: you can prevent me from exercising my right to self-determination or my right to self-defense, but you cannot eliminate those rights. You can - at worst - kill me.

It only preserves their ads when they're coming from the same server or domain . . . of course, there would then be an arms race between the ad companies and blockers for obfuscation, a la 1980s copy protection . . .

hawk

"News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters"
Some of what they post falls under the latter category, not the former.
Could it be that this article annoyed you *because* you're an electrical engineer?
Doesn't matter I was happy to see his article this morning.

Protip: If someone has to give them to you, they aren't rights; they're privileges.

No, I mean illegal. The US Constitution recognizes that there are things beyond the reach of any government's authority and by their very nature, such things cannot emanate from the government. Ergo, violation of such rights is inherently illegal regardless of what laws or judges or kings and queens might say or do.

Regardless of the unfortunate case you cited and the suspicions that a grave injustice was done, capital punishment is not murder by its very definition. To clarify my example, the Supreme Court cannot order or authorize me to go out and kill random schoolchildren. They can order or authorize the capture and punishment of a person convicted of a capital crime, but they lack the requisite authority to allow or require that I go kill innocent people.

There are things the state cannot grant or authorize because they would violate the rights of the people. The US Constitution recognizes some of that (at least on paper; in practice...). The government lacks the requisite authority to authorize those rights to be denied or revoked.

When they do it anyway, all involved should be hauled off to prison, even if it takes an army of the people to do so.

Well I'm sure the Executive branch can define it for you, though you may find the particulars of their definition convoluted and self-serving.