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Comment over a decade of hard work at getting it right (Score 4, Informative) 192

From a decade ago until now, the Perl devs have spent those ten years improving upon what you either misunderstood or are exaggerating for comedic effect.

Java was rushed out quickly, and early versions of Java made that obvious. Perl6 is the opposite - they've taken all the time needed to perfectly implement their vision, to make it exactly what it's supposed to be. Not everything is nail, so a hammer isn't the right tool for every job, but Perl6 is a mighty fine hammer. If you have a task well suited to what Perl6 is made for, it's a fine tool for the job.

Comment requires record-breaking barometric pressure (Score 1) 239

As you noted, the altitude of the locker room is effectively the same as the field, so altitude would not be a factor. You made me curious about barometric pressure, so I looked it up. The highest-ever recorded pressure was less than 1 PSI above standard pressure, so even a record-breaking barometer reading wouldn't explain it.

Comment Re:Double Irish (Score 1) 825

That's easy. The only bit that is taxed is corporate income. Yet any money spent for redistribution, investment in the corporation, etc is not taxed. In short, the only part that's taxed is the money earned in a year and sitting in a bank account, dividends from stock for a year, etc. Taxing corporations motivates them to not sit on piles of cash but instead either (1) pay it as wages or dividends or (2) improve the company and presumably improve the economy/country.

Were you proposing a system? Or confused about today's system? It's an interesting proposal, but of course dividends are double-taxed today.

Overall, though, I think people are confused about why a corporation would "hoard" money in bad times. The greater the uncertainty, the greater the reserves needed to see you through a couple standard deviations of possible futures. We all benefit from corporations not going under if bad times continue, after all. So, unless you're actually a fan of bailouts, perhaps cut a company some slack when they build some reserves when facing uncertain times?

Why? If they're still hiring people in the US, still being taxed in the US, etc, why does it matter?

The executives want all the most important jobs close to them. All the top-tier engineering jobs, all the HR, product managers, senior corporate managers and other "useless overhead" jobs, all the jobs that pay really well tend to be where the corporate HQ is.

Comment two more reasons. It kills people, and it kills pe (Score 3, Interesting) 224

Others have already pointed out two reasons. One, making it a billion times safer than carrots also makes it cost a million times as much as it already does, and two, if it's more costly than coal, people will just burn coal instead. I'd like to point out two more reasons.

Suppose you make $60,000. You can only spend that $60,000 once. If you pay $100 more on your electric bill to make your power even more safe, that's $100 you don't have to spend on having your car a bit safer - two more airbags, perhaps. Spending your safety budget on the wrong things gets people killed, because any money from your pay check that ends up paying for safer energy is money that can't be used for traffic safety, food safety, etc. So the way to have the safest LIFE is to spend your safety budget where it does the most good, which probably isn't energy related.

Secondly, have you ever worked at a place that makes you change your password monthly? Pretty much everyone there increments their password, so all passwords end with two digits. Ever seen a highway with a speed limit posted that's clearly much too low? Everyone ends up speeding, but by vastly varying amounts since there's no reasonable guidance on how fast you should be going. Excessive rules are counterproductive because they just get people in the habit of ignoring the rules. If you wnt people to follow the rules, you need a) rules that are reasonable and b) people who understand why the rules they are handed are reasonable.

So the proper set of safety rules, the most effective are:
Carefully selected for maximum effect per cost, keeping the safety budget in mind.
Reasonable to follow.
Well explained, so people understand WHY they are reasonable rules that should be followed.

Comment Re:Double Irish (Score 2, Insightful) 825

We "must" tax the corporation? What kind of goal is that? Do you see the end-goal of a government as being to tax everything it can as much as it can? Many people do, it seems.

How about, instead, the government works to grow the US economy as much as possible. More jobs, more income, the tax revenue thing will work out OK in the end.

. Don't like it, go somewhere like Somalia and conduct your business. Good riddance

No, you fool, how about we have more jobs here instead of your befuddled plan? Only a statist cares more about taxes than the health of the nation.

Comment Too bad mdSOLAR didn't mention WHAT proposal (Score 0, Troll) 224

It's too bad that neither mdsolar's summary nor the article he linked to mention what change was proposed. Some changes may be good, others bad. No way to know about this one without knowing just what is was that someone wanted to change.

You know, mdsolar, you'd probably sell more by engaging in discussions on forums more targeted to your market and just answering questions people have have solar power systems. That would include forums that have a lot of people who want to be "off the grid" or less reliant on the grid, prepper forums for example. Also certain home renovation forums would have people who might be interested in buying. Pitching the general concept here, especially through negative FUD about your competitors, is kind of a waste of your time.

Comment Re: Double Irish (Score 3, Insightful) 825

Did you have an argument to go with that assertion?

No system of taxation has ever gotten federal revenues above 19% of GDP for long, and corporate taxes are a fairly small portion of federal revenue to begin with. We only tax corporations out of some sense of social justice, not because it's a useful way to fund the government. The key ingredient to "saving the country" is to spend less that we actually take in in federal revenue. We can hypothesize all day about what might happen with some new tax plan, but long term if we don't spend less than we make, it will end in tears.

The proper goal and aim of the government is not to feather its own nest with larger taxes in the first place, but to grow the economy! I give 0 fucks whether corporations pay taxes here or not, the important thing is whether the incentives are to have jobs here or not - especially well-paying high-skill jobs! And each and every law that makes it more expensive to do business in America detracts from that,

But perhaps you had an argument along those lines?

Comment Re:So what's the real story here? (Score 4, Interesting) 145

First, their job is to make life safer for everyone and to prevent crime. They do that.

WTF? Someone actually believes this? *boggle*

I used to deliver pizza for a living. Sometimes you get mugged. Once as I returned to the store, battered and bleeding, there was a cop right there in the store, getting some free pizza.

He seemed annoyed that we interrupted his free-pizza-getting by asking him to at least write an incident report. He outright rejected the notion that the police should make the area safer, and instead chastised us for doing business in such a dangerous neighborhood. He also wrote me a ticket for something about my car. Presumably the only reason he didn't shake me down for the money I had on me was that someone else had already stole that.

0 interest in policing. 0 interest in making things safer. 0 interest in preventing crime in any way that required effort on his part. They don't do that. They take your money and extort businesses for free stuff. That's what the police do.

Comment Corporate taxes are hidden taxes, and evil (Score 1) 825

Corporate taxes are really just a way to tax individual shareholders, employees and customers, but without any of them noticing that the money is coming out of their pockets. Taxes are necessary, but hidden taxes are evil. Taxes should be visible, so the taxpayers know what they're paying and can weigh it against the value they receive, to decide if they're getting good value for their money, and vote accordingly.

This particular proposal is a great example. Obama wants to go after this particular pool of money because to American taxpayers it appears to be "free" money. It doesn't cost them anything... or at least that's how it looks. I suppose to the extent that this is taxing foreign income generated by foreign workers producing goods and services for sale to foreign customers, it is "free". The only Americans who will be hurt are the Americans who are shareholders in the targeted companies, and there are also plenty of foreign shareholders. So to the extent the money is all foreign, it's taken from foreign taxpayers, which is, if anything, even more insidious.

We do need to maintain our infrastructure, and we should pay for it. But up front and in the open.

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