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Comment Re:"unbanked citizens" (Score 1) 161

It also doesn't make sense for poor people to have to pay to get their money (check cashing services) and pay to spend their money (money order fees for bills). The reason these people don't get bank accounts are pretty easy to discover if you ask a person who doesn't have one. First, they don't get time off of work to go open one. Even if they happen to be in a community with decent public transportation, getting to the bank on a 30 minute lunch break during banking hours is almost impossible. Additionally, while I am doing well enough to keep enough money in my accounts to avoid fees, poor people live paycheck to paycheck. And should you spend down to 0 and get hit by a fee before your next paycheck, an overdraft fee can negate a half a day's work.

6.5% of the roughly 140 million working people in this country is a LOT of people. All we are doing by continuing a system that they can't participate in is costing ourselves money. Ask your employer how happy they would be if they no longer had to cut paper checks. Ask your state government how much they would save if they could e-deposit benefits for every person on disability. You afraid of government services, fine, take those saved costs and spend them on free accounts with established banks if someone absolutely MUST make a profit to pass your purity test. You still end up with a massive quality of life increase for the people who need them.

Comment Re:Venmo = PayPal for phones only. (Score 2) 161

Economist have been recommending for decades that the Fed start offering free checking accounts for americans. There are large numbers of people who don't have them and are incurring fees every time they cash their paychecks and then incurring money order fees when they pay their bills, not to mention that having to cut physical checks is costing the government lots of money that we, the taxpayer, are on the hook for. Not to mention there are a whole range of consumer services it is nigh impossible to engage in without a checking account, limiting the money that can be made by institutions which offer them.

Of course our worship of the private sector in this country has prevented this plan from happening, no matter how much it makes sense.

Comment Re:Potential geothermal power source (Score 2) 27

I would say, probably yes, though I am not a geoscientist. I can say with confidence, however, that if you want it to STAY a finger of lava, you will need convected heat, because it will start loosing heat to the the mantle instantly. You have to remember, we on earth are sitting on basically a very thin skin on top of a roiling, liquid like material (over very long periods) folding over itself punching holes into the liquid like parts.

Mars doesn't have (as far as we know) those plate tectonics making convenient inroads to the hot places. This quake could easily be caused by other mechanisms, maybe even sub surface liquid water, if we are lucky. But active volcanism of any kind would be surprising to say the least.

Comment Re:Nice (Score 1) 185

You can't know that the state of one photon was changed by observing the state of the entangled photon without knowing the state of the entangled photon.

Imagine you have an hourglass that flips over randomly throughout the day, but it is also magically linked to my hourglass a thousand miles away, and it is always the opposite of mine. You are sitting at home watching your hourglass, and if flips 3 times. How do you know which, if any, of those times were me flipping mine? You still have to pick up the phone and call me, and ask. While this is neat, it's not going to be useful for "unconnected communication."

Also, wireless cameras are already a thing, you can be spied on without those being connected too.

Comment Re: Translation (Score 1) 772

Responsible news organizations are supposed to provide context, not just parrot both side's lies. I listen to NPR in my standard daily news podcast rotation and I haven't ever heard them offer spin. In fact, you can often hear them choking back comments while dispassionately explaining the implications of whatever current egregious act of the day.

Comment Re: Thanks for the House in 2020 (Score 1) 1183

It is already backfiring. Trump's approval numbers are up.

Yeah, they are spiking so much that he is ALMOST as popular as Lyndon B. Johnson was at the same point in his presidency.

You gotta love the blind partisan enthusiasm it takes to look at the least popular president in US history and say "stupid dems are making everyone love him!"

Comment Re: Thanks for the Presidency in 2020 (Score 4, Insightful) 1183

The fact that he used economic coercion to actually get someone fired (especially someone who was in the process of investigating his son) is a clear conflict of interests and abuse of power.

He was sent there by half the god damned civilized planet, including the united states congress, to do exactly that! What, do you think he was on vacation? Just popped by for tea?

Trump simply ASKED if the situation could be looked at. With NO threats of withholding aid, etc.

....while withholding aid....

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