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Comment Re:SATs for grads (Score 3, Insightful) 107

If there was any difference between racial groups, or between men and women, on such an exam, it would be lawsuit-bait. A lot of the difficulty in hiring is coming up with measures which will easily pass Civil Rights Act scrutiny while still giving good signal (it has to pass _easily_ because even if you win lawsuits every time, the cost of defense will be ruinous). A college degree in a related field is generally accepted. Things like programming tests for programmers are. But the more general your test is, the more likely its relevance will be challenged. And the more widely your test is given, even if it passes CRA muster, the more pressure there will be to water it down to reduce racial and gender differences -- and also reduce useful signal.

Comment Re:Are not hidden cameras illegal in California? (Score 1) 62

Thanks for that link. Interesting that he never mentions home security cameras, doorbell cameras, etc, except possibly covered by some of the exceptions. Also interesting that "journalists" have an explicit exception; I wonder how they define "journalist" today, where everyone can be a journalist of some sort.

Comment Re:Now we're just haggling over the price (Score 1) 95

I don't fall for clickbait. But it's impossible to ignore the headlines, and sometimes it's fun to read how silly they get, like the UN chief claiming the Earth is boiling.

I apologize for assuming you meant personal criticisms. There's too much of it everywhere, not just slashdot, and I shouldn't assume everyone is doing it.

When slashdot started requiring logins to avoid most of the spambots, it annoyed me, and when I did finally sign up, my handle was my protest. It was amazing back then how many others accused me of hiding behind the anonymous handle.

Comment Re:Now we're just haggling over the price (Score 1) 95

> The President can only direct funds at his discretion if the Congress has allocated those funds for him.

Well, in theory. Biden tried several times to soak taxpayers for student loans without Congressional approval, and that was up to a trillion dollars all told. Trump kept trying to divert funds for his wall.

If you think "falling" for Trump's trolling over this measly export tax is silly, take it up with the many pundits both pro and con who think it is worth their clickbait.

Comment Re:Now we're just haggling over the price (Score 1) 95

I don't remember now, other than not being some hysterical TDS-ridden pundit. It may have been what was planned then, it may have been the kind of hints Trump likes flicking out, I don't remember. If you say it isn't now, I'll give that more credence, but everything Trump does changes daily.

Comment Re:Now we're just haggling over the price (Score 5, Insightful) 95

I do not think it goes into his pocket. But last I read of it, it goes into a fund controlled by the President -- a slush fund, in olden terms.

Just as he does not personally own the US Steel golden shares which were the price for allowing the sale to the Japanese. But the President personally controls those shares, and he personally has veto over everything US Steel does.

One of the alleged differences between socialism and fascism is that a socialist government owns the means of production while a fascist government "merely" controls them. It's a distinction without a meaningful difference.

The big picture point is, he claimed banning the export of those chips to China was a matter of national security. Now it turns out that paying an unconstitutional 25% export tax into a fund controlled by the President makes the national security aspect vanish. There are names for this kind of corruption.

Comment Yes, an export tax is unconstitutional (Score 1) 95

But an export ban is not. And it's often said that the power to tax is the power to destroy... it turns out that works both ways. If you can ban exports, you can accept a fee in exchange for not banning them, which is effectively a tax. Not sure if it would hold up in court, but it turns out that nobody willing to challenge it will have standing.

Comment Yes, Chad (Score 1) 95

Cryptocurrency is specifically intended for the use of people who don't want Xi, Putin, Trump, Modi or God-help-you von der Leyen deciding how and where they put and use their money. If govenments couldn't resist using the monetary system for spying on and controlling their citizens, crypto wouldn't have much of a draw.

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