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Comment Re:Escaping only helps you until a war. (Score 1) 339

So you are actually asserting that taxes after the money has been taxed once are unfair?
In the face of all the taxes that we have to pay after we've paid income tax and social security premiums which I removed from the list ( might have missed a couple )

#1 Air Transportation Taxes (just look at how much you were charged the last time you flew)
#2,3,4 Biodiesel Fuel Taxes #3 Building Permit Taxes #4 Business Registration Fees
#5 Capital Gains Taxes #6 Cigarette Taxes #7 Court Fines (indirect taxes) #8 Disposal Fees
#9 Dog License Taxes
#10 Drivers License Fees (another form of taxation)
#11 Employer Health Insurance Mandate Tax
#12 Employer Medicare Taxes
#14 Environmental Fees
#15 Estate Taxes
#16 Excise Taxes On Comprehensive Health Insurance Plans
#19 Federal Unemployment Taxes
#20 Fishing License Taxes
#21 Flush Taxes (yes, this actually exists in some areas)
#22 Food And Beverage License Fees
#23 Franchise Business Taxes
#24 Garbage Taxes #25 Gasoline Taxes #26 Gift Taxes #27 Gun Ownership Permits #28 Hazardous Material Disposal Fees #29 Highway Access Fees #30 Hotel Taxes (these are becoming quite large in some areas) #31 Hunting License Taxes #32 Import Taxes
#33 Individual Health Insurance Mandate Taxes
#34 Inheritance Taxes
#35 Insect Control Hazardous Materials Licenses
#36 Inspection Fees #37 Insurance Premium Taxes #38 Interstate User Diesel Fuel Taxes #39 Inventory Taxes
#40 IRA Early Withdrawal Taxes #41 IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax) #42 IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax) #43 Library Taxes
#44 License Plate Fees #45 Liquor Taxes
#46 Local Corporate Taxes #47 Local Income Taxes #48 Local School Taxes #49 Local Unemployment Taxes #50 Luxury Taxes
#51 Marriage License Taxes
#52 Medicare Taxes #53 Medicare Tax Surcharge On High Earning Americans Under Obamacare
#54 Obamacare Individual Mandate Excise Tax (if you donâ(TM)t buy âoequalifyingâ health insurance under Obamacare you ill have to pay an additional tax)
#55 Obamacare Surtax On Investment Income (a new 3.8% surtax on investment income)
#56 Parking Meters #57 Passport Fees
#58 Professional Licenses And Fees (another form of taxation)
#59 Property Taxes #60 Real Estate Taxes #61 Recreational Vehicle Taxes
#62 Registration Fees For New Businesses
#63 Toll Booth Taxes
#64 Sales Taxes #65 Self-Employment Taxes #66 Sewer & Water Taxes #67 School Taxes
#68 Septic Permit Taxes
#69 Service Charge Taxes
#70 Social Security Taxes
#71 Special Assessments For Road Repairs Or Construction
#72 Sports Stadium Taxes
#75 State Park Entrance Fees
#76 State Unemployment Taxes (SUTA)
#77 Tanning Taxes (a new Obamacare tax on tanning services)
#78 Telephone 911 Service Taxes
#79 Telephone Federal Excise Taxes
#80 Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Taxes
#81 Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Taxes
#82 Telephone State And Local Taxes
#83 Telephone Universal Access Taxes
#84 The Alternative Minimum Tax
#85 Tire Recycling Fees
#86 Tire Taxes
#87 Tolls (another form of taxation)
#88 Traffic Fines (indirect taxation)
#89 Use Taxes (Out of state purchases, etc.)
#90 Utility Taxes
#91 Vehicle Registration Taxes
#92 Waste Management Taxes
#93 Water Rights Fees
#94 Watercraft Registration & Licensing Fees
#95 Well Permit Fees
#96 Workers Compensation Taxes
#97 Zoning Permit Fees

---
Your position is unrealistic. The one thing most noticable about these taxes is that most of them are FIXED amounts. So they fall heavily on the poor, are burdensome to the middle class, but are miniscule to the wealthy. Almost all of them are extremely regressive taxes.

Comment Re:Escaping only helps you until a war. (Score 2) 339

Moving gold or large amounts of dollars from your basement when the country goes to hell doesn't happen. Over and over, wealthy people have had to leave their physical wealth behind when they fled for their lives.

So put it in electronic banks? Well -that "wealth" can be invalidated by an over turn in the government and new policies with the stroke of a pen. That also happens all the time in less stable countries.

It is very much in the wealthy segment's self interest to promote a stable happy society where they are currently based.

Most people don't need a lot of money to be non violent. Give them 3 squares, a roof over their head, some entertainment and a couple grand of spending money a year and they will never be a problem.

Once they lose faith in the system and lose hope, they are capable of anything. It is in every one's self interest to avoid letting people get to that state.

Comment Re:Escaping only helps you until a war. (Score 1) 339

China is making huge investments in their military. It is just obscured by low labor costs. They can build an aircraft carrier for half (or less) the cost the united state does. I think china is preparing for war or at least to be able to back down the U.S. in their corner of the world.

Their economic policy is really just warfare without guns too. I think china has a massive superiority complex laying over a foundation of an even more massive inferiority complex. Bad combination.

Comment Re:Who eats doughnuts with the doughnut men? (Score 1) 468

Actually, the population is about 200 million (give a current google).

So it's about 40 citizens killed by police vs 1240 citizens killed by united states poice.

The list of citizens killed in uk by police in 2014 is
Dean Joseph (5 September 2014 in London)
That's it.
We don't even officially track about 800 citizen deaths at the hands of united states police.

Thanks for the link! It was late- I was tired.

Submission + - Valve's Economist Yanis Varoufakis Appointed Greece's Finance Minister (ibtimes.co.in)

eldavojohn writes: A turnover in the Greek government resulted from recent snap elections placing SYRIZA (Coalition of the Radical Left) in power — just shy of an outright majority by two seats. Atheist and youngest Prime Minister in Greek history since 1865 Alexis Tsipras has been appointed the new prime minister and begun taking immediate drastic steps against the recent austerity laws put in place by prior administrations. One such step has been to appoint Valve's economist Yanis Varoufakis to position of Finance Minister of Greece. For the past three years Varoufakis has been working at Steam to analyze and improve the Steam Market but now has the opportunity to improve one of the most troubled economies in the world.

Comment Escaping only helps you until a war. (Score 5, Insightful) 339

A bunch of rich people with no real military protecting them will be like ripe fruit for the picking (as they have been over and over and over for centuries).

They would really be much better served by being in a functioning healthy country. Give up 10% of their money to taxes and spread it around the population and they will be immeasurably safer.

But I think their greed just gets the better of them. As it has over and over and over for centuries.

Comment Re:Big Myth #1 (Score 2) 339

You need to do your research.

If you had said bill gates of the gates family, you'd be right. They were wealthy.

Jobs wasn't wealthy. Was adopted. Did not have a good relationship with his bio father when he finally turned up (tho it was a reasonable adoption case- young pregnant mother and father with no means). He also denied his daughter was his daughter for several years when he knew better.

Jobs started from the middle income layer- did not do the ivy league college bit- did not have a silver spoon in his mouth.

But I'm sure some good ideas came from wealthy pompous people. They have more time and they have the money to try their ideas.

Comment Re:Who eats doughnuts with the doughnut men? (Score 5, Interesting) 468

Agreed and trapster and other apps do the same crowdsourced speed trap locating trick.

Trapster had better audio alerts but they don't work on my new phone so I use waze now.
It also flagged "likely" speed traps even when the police were not yet reported in the location.

Using the app to locate a speedtrap is about as productive as driving along the road and observing parked police cars then circling back around and attacking them now that you know where they are.

The police have a problem because they have been killing united states citizens at a rate of roughly 1200* citizens per year (via 528 validated trustworthy news source reported face page reports). More of those citizens killed by united states police were children than all the citizens killed by the police forces of england, france, and germany combined. It is literally (not figuratively) about 120* citizens vs under 20 citizens in england, france, and germany total per year.

Not to mention countless beatings, illegitimate property seizures, and a solid reputation of "good cops" standing aside doing nothing while the "bad" cops commit crimes.

*People who are police officers killed about 1450 citizens but 528.com found that about 200 of the killings were not related to their police status or police duties.

** I support the police and donate to the police fund but our police are out of control and have terrible community relations. We need to get them out of dealing with drug gangs and drug money and swat teams and military equipment. Move that activity to the FBI and return the police to ordinary police enforcement actions. Having a tank and heavy automatic weapons misleads them into killing 7 year old girls when they were at the wrong address.

Comment Rumor: Fox Is Planning an X-Files Revival (Score 1) 480

In the news recently are rumors that Carter, Anderson and Duchovny will reunite for new X-Files episodes. Fox has sorta confirmed this.

I own all the DVDs, a couple years ago I rewatched them. I may come off as a rabid fan at times but the background music was atrociously horrid. Also the story arc plot became overly convoluted and impossible to explain at times. That said, one of the most convoluted characters (Krycek) was my favorite. Aside from several minor valid criticisms like that, I really think it's a great platform for modern storytelling.

I do have to ask myself, at times, if there is some level of insane conspiracy theory today that we owe at least in part to those people watching X-Files when younger. I have to admit that the 9/11 inside job truthers movement claims could have been ripped from the pages of an X-Files script.

My biggest concern, of course, is whether or not it could still be fresh. With recent high quality additions to television canon, we'd have to be prepared for Chris Carter coming back at us with a 90's angle when episodes like Home really aren't as shocking anymore. The bar has been raised (thankfully).

Right now, The X-Files is going to occupy a contextual place in television history like The Twilight Zone. A revival could very well tarnish that. On the other hand, I've never felt like I really received closure on the whole story arc ...

Comment Different than the H2O thing tho (Score 2) 351

Because it's easy to misinterpret the question ..

Do you want to label foods with DNA as

Do you want to label foods with foreign DNA added from other plants, insects and animals (or even entirely created).

Yes... I'd like to know if you added peanut genes to my tomato. It may taste fine- but it would be nice to know.

Comment Re: No way! (Score 1) 514

May ... may.

However the shirt may be just fine. And the shirt you pay $25 for ..may.. be a piece of crap (lookin at you land's end).

The software may be good- or it may be a piece of ill designed crap written by a 1st world citizen who is a better huckster than programmer.

But the money is in your hand.

Comment Re:No way! (Score 1) 514

Yes. I worked with an office which had 400 indian programmers and 400 american programmers. They laid off 350 of the american programmers and did just fine.

I worked directly with the indian coders. They had some very solid coders who were better coders than the standard american programmer. And at a business that isn't focused on IT, it's pretty hard for them to retain really good programmers. Heck- it's hard to hire them in the first place.

Back in 2002, the indians were very good- I think it was mostly their masters degree candidates. By 2005, they sucked pretty bad. But by 2010, they were decent again. The only issue was the turnover and the failure to say "no" to management (instead saying "I'll do my best"). The other issues you mention were on the wane since 2008.

Comment Since no one else appears to be answering you... (Score 1) 467

I've used AVG and Avast plus malwarebytes and the microsoft cleaner.

They are free.

It's been 20 years since I got a virus but I've had several caught attempts.

I left AVG a couple years ago and went to Avast. It's a little pushing on upselling lately.

I've had to clean virii off of friends computers. Malwarebytes is good for that.
Avast is also good for that.

Avast has a "web page reputation" feature.. but to be honest, the only thing it ever flagged for me is the site that records all DMCA filings (which I knew was safe which mean the corporations had corrupted Avast's rating system for that page).

I'm not sure how the hell my friends get them. I has to be lol cats or something like that. I got to a few porn sites now and then and never had a problem.

Malwarebytes has been effective for cleaning a machine that was infected already.

I don't keep the microsoft cleaner on disk but download it as needed so I always have to look it up.

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