The Glade 4.0

That is an interesting interpretation which I hadn't considered within scope. I assumed he meant businesses should be taxed their fair share to cover the infrastructure that they use (even the playing field with individuals who are taxed higher than businesses). Even though as I said, I don't think he's going to spend a dime on infrastructure.

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But reverse it. Take that energetic, risk taking, enterprising, hardworking genius and drop him in the middle of the wilderness and he or she is not going to be equally successful.

Lets compare this to say, cell phones.
One phone is 4 years old and one is straight off the shelf top of the line. The new phone is faster, smarter, even has a better battery life--it all respects it is superior to the older phone. The new phone uses 5x the bandwidth of the old phone. It can and does do much much more. But...It costs the infrastructure more to support it. (to translate into the real world, a business uses far more telephone time, roads for shipping, power, etc than any individual) Yes, it produces more, yes its more efficient... but it also benefits more. That cellphone users is going to pay comparatively higher costs in network access and even power to charge the thing.

So your contention is that ... businesses get free gas, power and telephones? I'm not following.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Yes, but everyone has access to that infrastructure. So, it washes out of the model. Like air, water, a monetary system. None of that determines success since everyone has access to it. So what does?

Not everyone quit dramatically. Some people just quietly took a few month hiatus. And it had nothing to do with a heated political discussion, so it's really not relevant.



^ This. I agree with this perspective.

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Right because clearly LOCAL government is the best way to build interstate highway systems, set currency, manage bandwidth (for television, wireless, internet and radio), internet throughput, international shipping/excises/tariffs/duties and security.

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And some people get banned and then circumvent the intent of the ban by using an alt. You never can tell, with some people.

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and some people can't get over the fact that they tried to whine about this once and were told by admins that there was nothing done wrong.

Let's be accurate, here. Simply because you didn't post in the main forums doesn't mean that your use of an alt for behind-the-scenes PMing wasn't dishonest and in violation of the intent of your suspension. You're still a slimeball.

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Nice try, but as stated before my very first act was to verify that such was ok with an admin.

But please, continue to keep crying about it, months later. While you're at it, try calling me a few names.

Really? You asked if you could PM people with an alt account for the purposes of continuing in the conversation that netted you a suspension? I'd certainly like to see that message. Quite frankly, the fact that your defense of your behavior is "I got away with it" doesn't shed a very flattering light on you.

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I'm not going to be baited any more on this. No one got away with anything. There was nothing to get away with. End of story. Further debate on this is only making you sound petulant.

More like exposing your lack of integrity. Further. I do applaud your bowing out while you've still got a perceived shred left.

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And so the implication is what, nobody else uses highways and currency or businesses don't pay enough taxes to cover that.

What you're detailing is basic stuff... and more taxes or tarrifs =p. I'm still not seeing the point to Obama's rant beyond the naked political red meat.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

V

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+1

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"Said I never had much use for one, never said I didn't know how to use one!"~ Matthew Quigley

"nothing like a little meow in bed at night" ~ Bruskey

"I gotta float my stick same as you" Hondo Lane

"Fill your hand you son of a *****!"

How do roads benefit the individual?

The individual is permitted to drive on them to get to work. Okay.

Walmart is permitted to ship him the latest DVD for him to buy at his convenience. Right? Who benefits "more" from this, the individual, or Walmart?

Because I see a lot of people in here trying to charge Walmart more taxes per dollar than the individual because they're the one that benefits from the latter case. When it seems to me that, since an economic transaction took place between Walmart and the individual, they both consider themselves to have gotten equivalent value out of it.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

New Scott Brown ad, who I'm not a fan of but this ad is a good one. It includes Obama's comments and also Sacagawea (aka Elizabeth Warren) snidely saying "You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I wanna be clear, you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for" :



Full disclosure, I'm actively working on opening my own business. I'm pretty sure I have helped build the roads too and will continue to do so for the rest of my life lest I be thrown in jail.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

LOL! Apparently, Obama was just paraphrasing Romney's view of individual achievement in the context of communal support:


Collectivist bastard! How dare he attack and diminish the achievements of those athletes.

I beg to disagree. Most energetic, risk taking, enterprising and hardworking (genius) types would be successful in nearly anything they do. Not always, but most of the time. You could drop them in the wilderness, and they would pass on complaining and get to work improving their lot.

No one is disagreeing that such people are more likely to be successful than people without those qualities.

You're arguing against a point that no one is making. What we're saying is not that those qualities don't increase the odds of success--in fact they do.

The problem is that there is not much in the way of a yardsticks for energy, talent, genius, industry, inspiration, hard work.

The only measures people seem to use are financial success and/or notoriety.

But that produces a selection bias. It gives you no idea of the percentage of people who are equally energetic, talented, intelligent, industrious, inspired or hard working who are not as successful or well known.

What about the genius homemaker who puts in 18 hours a day to make a life for their family? Are they less successful? Or what about the same person who happened to develop cancer or some other debilitating disease? Their energies go into fighting (and maybe even beating) the disease. It certainly doesn't make them less of a genius, less hard working. It means they got a crappy lot.


What about those wildly successful people who didn't graduate college or high school because they partied all the time. But someone gave them a leg up --parents, etc.

I agree that those qualities in question DO dramatically affect the chance of success. But having those qualities is NOT guarantee of success any more than not having them a guarantee of financial ruin.

This is exactly what conservatives are saying is the real problem with Obama's idiotic rant. We are part of a society. Family, neighbors, churches and other groups. To somehow make it about "you businesses owe us! we built ROADS!!1!" is stupidity.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

In line with your point above.

I was watching "Through the Wormhole" from last week (Science Channel show) and the topic was Evil and can it be eliminated from society. Pretty blase topic for the most part until the very end when a psychologist made a statement that we are living in the most non-violent times in history, crimes are declining worldwide, deaths from war, etc. All very much down. His reason these are down? Because of Government. Sigh. Definitely not the spread of the internet and greater connectivity between societies, nor the spread of satellite television, no it is because of increased Government. Someone needs to smack that ******* over the head with the collected histories of Russia, Germany, China, Rome, etc.

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since Governments pioneered the space programs that made those satellites possible, started the internet , built the roads that allow for greater geographical mobilization, I don't see how you separate those too.

Their argument may well fail, but not for the reason you're attributing.

Governments also give tax breaks to religious organizations so by your rationale they enabled priests to molest little boys.

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