Americans (people, really) care about what they're told to care about. Everyone is terrified of Ebola and ISIL and know something must be done; and it's not because of their good judgement and risk analysis.

Maybe all the commenters here who have maintained that H-1B workers are paid the same as domestic workers and don't contribute to wage suppression in the IT industry.

This is kind of what I was thinking. Can't you just get some of these overweight recruits into training and whip them into shape? After all, you control their exercise and diet. Maybe they need to bring Bob Harper on as a consultant.

I quite agree. As someone who gave up his artistic dreams for a steady paycheck, this vision speaks to me personally.

All you really need is to understand how money works at the federal level. The US government cannot go broke. It can print all the money it needs. So there really isn't any question of how to pay for it. I know our politicians and news media talk about taxes and the federal budget like they have some kind of relationship. But the reality is that the US government does not have to tax or borrow to spend. If we need more money, we simply create it.

If anyone actually reads this post, they will probably take some umbrage with that notion. But that's the reality in a country that prints it's own currency. That only danger is printing money too fast (which is the purpose of reserve requirements in our current system) which will induce inflation. As long as the money supply doesn't outpace GDP, you will not get inflation. Heck, the Fed has tripled the money supply since 2008. Tripled! So you can see there is some elasticity present.

Saying the Federal government does not have enough money is a red herring. It can, and does, print all the money it needs. Having the funds for a project is a political decision, not a monetary one.

The proper way to use a radar detector is to detect radar hitting a car in front of you. As long as you have traffic in front of you, you can get a warning. It works quite well, as my detector has saved me from a number of tickets.

What, just give people money for doing nothing? Who do you think they are, bankers?

I like the idea of a basic income. It would be an interesting experiment both economically and socially. I would love to see how it would be received in a country that loves its myth of the self-made man, pulled up by his own bootstraps. People in America work for what they have, so if they have more they must have worked harder or smarter for it. How would that square up with people getting money just for existing? It might change our perception of money and wealth and how it is supposedly tied to work or ability.

It's the editorial page. The editorials have always been right-wing wacko objectivist crap. Maybe not as bad as now, but not that far off. The rest of the paper still reports on business.

Being offended is a choice.

Nope, all that is authorized so it doesn't fall under this law. It's kind of like how the US government defines terrorism as non-state actors using violence against the public for political gain. The key is "non-state". That way when the CIA uses a secret bombing campaign to turn the population of a foreign country against its leaders, it's not terrorism.

Not a bad movie. Europa Report, I think it was called. Kinda slow, but good payoff at the end.

Apparently there is something keeping people from competing if a major player decides it's not worth it to compete.

It's a fact? Can you even come close to supporting that assertion? We have anti-trust laws specifically because players in a capitalistic system are incentivized to gain as much market share as possible up to 100%.

What? Capital is not a barrier to entry because anyone with a good business plan will always be able to find funding? That sounds nice on paper, but I don't think it works that way in the real world. I don't know how much it would cost to try to break into the cable TV business, but I expect it's in the hundreds of millions. Who is going to put hundreds of millions on the line for someone with just a good plan? Not with my money!

Choice is good, I agree. But then you say as long as all these things that happen, don't happen. When will libertarians get it through their heads that governments create the framework for markets and that "free" markets do not exist? Econ 101 works because it makes all kinds of unrealistic assumptions about supply and demand and competition and consumer information. You sound like you have come up with the way it should work, and overlaid that on the way it does work.

Everyone should see the movie Network. It is absolutely brilliant. The dearth of investigative journalism has a lot to do with news departments being expected to turn a profit and get ratings. Once that requirement is in place, everything will be subordinated to the bottom line. Journalism stops and profit seeking begins.

It's not that all will be well if you are transparent. It's that you have a commitment to the truth and are honest in your dealings. The old saying that it's not the crime, it's the coverup remains true. And even if it's not a coverup, but just trying to spin the news, that type of behavior causes people to distrust you.

I don't trust much of what I hear in the news, because I know this dynamic is in place. When I hear that ISIL is rolling across Syria and Iraq, and that they are a threat to the US, I think, "Yeah, sure. What aren't you telling me?" The reasons we are given are never the true or complete reasons. In a democracy, that's a problem, and an old one.

The population in the US is presented with an artificially simple view of what their government is doing and what is going on around the world. Things in both arenas are often complicated. It's much easier to just present a picture of good guys fighting bad guys that keeps things straightforward, than to deal with the nuance and deeper details. It's easier for the news media and for the administration. But it's not accurate, and ends up giving people a skewed view of the world. It's convenient for the establishment and destructive to democracy. You can't make good decisions with bad information. And it enables the powers that be to mislead the public in the direction they want them to go.