Mankind extending its reach out to space is like moving out of your parent's house when you're an adult. It might not make the most sense financially but it's important for you to learn how to make it out there on your own. It's for your own good.

Greed is good if you have money and want more. Greed is bad if you don't have money but you want more.

"You want how much for working at McDonalds!?!? Fuck that! Now where's my capital gains tax break?"

No. It goes like this:

1. They take $50 from your taxes
2. Hand that money to people that are not doing anything productive
3. They spend that money, first and foremost, on things that they need
4. People that produce things they need hire more workers to handle the increase in demand.
5. People that were previously doing nothing productive now have a job and take their wages and contribute back to the economy.

Wealth redistribution should be more thought of as demand redistribution. People without wealth still have needs but have no way to express that within the market. Past a certain point, what you have are wants rather than needs. While I'm sure you think your wants are more important because you are capable of managing and hiring a bunch of minimum wage drones and keeping the profits to yourself, some people realize that it's worth sacrificing the wants of some to fulfill the needs of others. Taxing for welfare allows those needs to have a voice in the market where they otherwise would be ignored.

Free riders are a solved problem. The state I attended college in, Florida, has a tuition assistance program called "Bright Futures". It pays 50%/75%/100% of your tuition based on your HS and college grades regardless of need. However, if you flunk out of even one class, you have to pay them back the money you got for that class. I don't know the exact rules if you don't graduate but you could also make people pay the money back if they fail to graduate.

Ultimately, though, all we're talking about here is tuition. Not a full "free ride". Someone who goes to college just to party still has to pay room and board, food costs, school fees, etc.

At first I thought you meant "grow a spine." Then I realized that growing a spin makes way more sense when you're talking about politicians...

The country has moved further left? Hardly. Instead, the center point has leaped further to the right. Many of this president's poilicies are no more liberal than Ronald Reagan yet the far right calls him a socialist. Check this out. Look at the graph labeled "Party Means on Liberal-Conservative Dimension" and notice the jump on the conservative side. In particular, the Republican House of Representatives.

Here's the citation, for anyone interested: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887324103504578372342066362234

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Kelly_Thomas The actual link

This is the case that I was referencing specifically. The only thing the man was guilty of was being incapable of following the officers' orders and we all know how authoritative thugs hate it when someone doesn't listen to them. This was not supply second decision making, the man was completely unarmed. This was just a ruthless murderous beating.

They don't need to discard it. Very few officers have ever been charged with murder while on duty regardless of whether or not there's video evidence and/or tons of witnesses.

Even if you, say, bash an innocent homeless man's face in, tase him repeatedly as he screams for help, and pile six officers on him until he suffocates.

The managers are the ones that ultimately make the decision about what moves forward and what doesn't. The individual developers don't get to make that choice.

Slashdot is officially being actively destroyed because it doesn't make enough advertising revenue anymore

From the report:

Slashdot is officially being actively destroyed because it doesn't make enough advertising revenue anymore

From the report:

Holy shit, that's huge. It all makes sense now.

So here we go: BETA SUCKS!