Jack wrote in :

On 8/18/2012 3:52 PM, Han wrote:
Jack wrote in :

On 8/17/2012 5:16 PM, Just Wondering wrote:
On 8/17/2012 1:56 PM, Jack wrote:

I do know bottled water costs more than gas . . .


I can buy bottled water for under $2/gallon. Tell me where I can
buy gasoline at under $2/gallon.

Quick look on the net found PERRIER for just $19/gal. I suggest you
buy all you can for under $2 a gallon and get yourself good and
filthy rich.

Aquafina @ Amazon 32 bottles of 16.9 fl oz for $5.92. That is
$3.70/gal, like gasoline. Better look for specails ...

Aquafina is tap water, comes out of the Detroit river. $3.70 a gallon
for water you get from the local river vs. gas that is a bit more
difficult to get out of the ground and refine is plain stupid. You
pay 2000 times more for Aquafina than you would from the tap.
Gasoline on the other hand is a great deal, and the oil companies
should be applauded not attacked.

I'll tell Afina (my wife, who buys it, knowing it's a waste of money).

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

Jack wrote in :

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

Be happy. In Europe the price of gas is at least twice of what it is here,
and 2/3 goes to government. Yet they still drive big Mercedes and sit in
traffic jams rivaling LA and the LIE.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


There are (I think) people who believe that their 2nd amendment
rights are about to be violated, and they go out and get armed to the
teeth. As well as those who are afraid of perceived rising chances of
being involved in violence. I am definitely not sure that all those
people in either category get enough education in how to handle their
weapons safely, and how to keep them secure. But those are my fears.
I don't know squat about firearms.

That is where I was going with my question Han. I appreciate your
fears as I said before, but to hold those closely in the face of what
you admit is a lack of knowledge speaks more about your own fears than
it does about those you fear. Knowledge Han - go learn something
about these guys. Admitely - they are whackos of one sort or another,
but not generally in the sense that you currently fear.

Here's why I ask questions and engage dialog like that. Your current
fears and level of knowledge are not terribly atypical. So - suppose
a piece of legislation is proposed that would "limit" or "control"
these "fearful" things. In your current state of understanding, that
would seem prudent to you and you might well find yourself a supporter
of it. But - is it real and is it meaningful? It will certainly
affect the rights of others, but for a good reason, or not? That's
how feel good laws get passed and they do nothing more than that -
make uninformed people feel good. But the rhetoric from the
now-feeling-good uninformed people rises to loud levels - as if there
really were some value to it. Meanwhile...

Well, Mike, The current sharply increasing rate of weapons going out to
people who may not be able to use them or protect them is a real fear of
mine. As you might have gathered, I have nothing against knowledgable
people possessing and using firearms responsibly.

So why not register those firearms, so there is a way to trace a weapon
that escapes responsible control? So we can, hey Joe, you used to have a
(X), but didn't report it stolen, and now it was used in (Y) illegal way.
How come?

Is that really too much to ask? How does that infringe anyone's rights?
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


Call me sentimental. If there were both an asshole and a sympathetic
person working for me and I had to get rid of one, I'd get rid of the
asshole, other things being roughly equal.

Well - you just created a self serving scenario there Han. First off,
you define two extremes. On one end - the likeable. On the other end
- the despicable. Then you throw in the escape clause "other things
being equal". How often have you ever really seen that in life?

I have seen it. And I don't really have a very wide circle of work
acquaintances. Can't go in more detail.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

Han wrote:


Well, Mike, The current sharply increasing rate of weapons going out
to people who may not be able to use them or protect them is a real
fear of mine. As you might have gathered, I have nothing against
knowledgable people possessing and using firearms responsibly.

I don't follow it, so I don't know - but what is the "sharply increasing
rate of weapons going out to people who may not be able to use them..." that
you state?


So why not register those firearms, so there is a way to trace a
weapon that escapes responsible control? So we can, hey Joe, you
used to have a (X), but didn't report it stolen, and now it was used
in (Y) illegal way. How come?

Well, the most common argument is that those registration requirements have
not proven very beneficial over a long period of time. Again - feel good
laws. Beyond that there have been stricter requirements based on the same
sort of thinking. NY used to have a COBiS law which required all handguns
sold in the state to be accompanied by a spent casing which had to be sent
to the NYSP for identification if that gun were ever used in a crime. In
all of the years that was in effect, a huge database of spent casing
characterisics was built - and never once used to solve a crime or convict a
criminal. The law sure felt good to people who saw the "common sense" in it
and knowing no better, felt it must be a good thing. Now - it has been
de-funded because all that ever did was impose administrative burdens on the
NYSP, and never fulfilled against its promise.


Is that really too much to ask? How does that infringe anyone's
rights?

It's not always that legislation infringes on rights. There are other
reasons to be more aware of these things. Reasons like - even though that
sounds good to your ear - it does not work as you thought.

--

-Mike-

Han wrote:
"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


Call me sentimental. If there were both an asshole and a
sympathetic person working for me and I had to get rid of one, I'd
get rid of the asshole, other things being roughly equal.

Well - you just created a self serving scenario there Han. First
off, you define two extremes. On one end - the likeable. On the
other end - the despicable. Then you throw in the escape clause
"other things being equal". How often have you ever really seen that
in life?

I have seen it. And I don't really have a very wide circle of work
acquaintances. Can't go in more detail.

Anecdotal? As I asked - how often?

--

-Mike-

"Mike Marlow" wrote in news:1bd56$5030d9e7
:

Han wrote:
"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


Call me sentimental. If there were both an asshole and a
sympathetic person working for me and I had to get rid of one, I'd
get rid of the asshole, other things being roughly equal.

Well - you just created a self serving scenario there Han. First
off, you define two extremes. On one end - the likeable. On the
other end - the despicable. Then you throw in the escape clause
"other things being equal". How often have you ever really seen that
in life?

I have seen it. And I don't really have a very wide circle of work
acquaintances. Can't go in more detail.

Anecdotal? As I asked - how often?

It relates to people I know or have known. Just a few times.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like, their
revenue streams would wither.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business. The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

On 8/18/2012 9:29 PM, Han wrote:

I think we really agree that Gass is out for himself,

Someone needs to be out for you, best be yourself. It's when gov't gets
their sorry ass involved things start getting ugly.

and that we have to resist.

Simple to resist Gass, difficult to resist Uncle Sam.

You can puff out your chest and give Gass the bird, but when Uncle Sam
comes to help you, bend over, grab your ankles and get ready to feel the
love!

If the CPSC says that his invention is required, what is going to
determine the price?

Required? REQUIRED? Leon, he said /REQUIRED/...

Silly man...

--
Jack
The government cannot give to anybody anything that it doesn't first
take from somebody else

In article , says...

On Sat, 18 Aug 2012 16:15:11 -0400, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:

How about leaving some context?

How about leaving, period? There were 80 unread messages in this group
this evening. 22 were from you. 20 were from Han. Don't you think the
two of you have said about all there is to say on the issue?

USENET really needs a "get a room" function. If invoked, all posts in
which one of the two participants was responding to the other would
automatically go to email.

In article ,
says...

Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

It's rather ridiculous to talk about "MS and Apple monopoly" given that
the two are arch-rivals and that Apple would prefer that no Apple
product ever run a single line of Microsoft code.

Further, most of Apple's profits these days come from iphones and ipads
and ipods, all product niches in which Microsoft is pretty much a non-
starter.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like,
their
revenue streams would wither.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business. The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

There are product monopolies and service monopolies. A service monopoly
has a pretty much guaranteed continuous revenue stream--people aren't
going to stop talking on the phone or watching TV because the
infrastructure is old unless it gets so old that it stops working. On
the other hand, once every potential consumer of a product has the
product, the revenue model goes from first sales to replacement sales,
and to get those sales in any kind of volume you have to improve the
product enough that someone wants to replace it even though their old
product is still working.

On 8/19/2012 8:55 AM, HeyBub wrote:
Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

I'd love to not have a monopoly like that. MS controls 93% of the
market, Apple most of the rest. Sounds like a monopoly to me, probably
more of a monopoly than AT&T had when they were broken up.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like, their
revenue streams would wither.

Nope, that is the problem with monopolies like MS. Lack of competition
means they can sell garbage with little fear of revenue streams
withering, and, regardless of what the stooges say, Windows has been
crap from day one. Any sort of healthy competition and MS would have
died or provided a quality product. They are a perfect example of
exactly why monopolies are bad for the consumer.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business.

That is exactly wrong. Without competition, they do not have to provide
a better product. It's one of the problems with capitalism addressed by
the Sherman Anti trust act.

The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

Cable TV is a monopoly? I can get Comcast, Direct TV, Verison, Dish TV
and more, already more than the 2 companies that control 97% of the PC
OS market. So, if MS is not exactly a monopoly, neither are the myriad
of cable companies.

--
Jack
Add Life to your Days not Days to your Life.
http://jbstein.com

On 8/19/2012 5:59 AM, Han wrote:
"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:

Call me sentimental. If there were both an asshole and a sympathetic
person working for me and I had to get rid of one, I'd get rid of the
asshole, other things being roughly equal.
Well - you just created a self serving scenario there Han. First off,
you define two extremes. On one end - the likeable. On the other end
- the despicable. Then you throw in the escape clause "other things
being equal". How often have you ever really seen that in life?
All other things are never equal.

On 8/19/2012 5:58 AM, Han wrote:

So why not register those firearms, so there is a way to trace a
weapon that escapes responsible control? So we can, hey Joe, you used
to have a (X), but didn't report it stolen, and now it was used in (Y)
illegal way. How come? Is that really too much to ask? How does
that infringe anyone's rights?

It clearly infringes the right to be let alone. Of what actual
beneficial use is the registration you describe? At the point the
authorities knew of the firearm, they would confiscated the weapon after
its illegal use. Once confiscated, it's no longer in circulation. At
that point, what good would it be to harass the former legal owner?
Answer: none.

On 19 Aug 2012 11:58:13 GMT, Han wrote:

"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


There are (I think) people who believe that their 2nd amendment
rights are about to be violated, and they go out and get armed to the
teeth. As well as those who are afraid of perceived rising chances of
being involved in violence. I am definitely not sure that all those
people in either category get enough education in how to handle their
weapons safely, and how to keep them secure. But those are my fears.
I don't know squat about firearms.

That is where I was going with my question Han. I appreciate your
fears as I said before, but to hold those closely in the face of what
you admit is a lack of knowledge speaks more about your own fears than
it does about those you fear. Knowledge Han - go learn something
about these guys. Admitely - they are whackos of one sort or another,
but not generally in the sense that you currently fear.

Here's why I ask questions and engage dialog like that. Your current
fears and level of knowledge are not terribly atypical. So - suppose
a piece of legislation is proposed that would "limit" or "control"
these "fearful" things. In your current state of understanding, that
would seem prudent to you and you might well find yourself a supporter
of it. But - is it real and is it meaningful? It will certainly
affect the rights of others, but for a good reason, or not? That's
how feel good laws get passed and they do nothing more than that -
make uninformed people feel good. But the rhetoric from the
now-feeling-good uninformed people rises to loud levels - as if there
really were some value to it. Meanwhile...

Well, Mike, The current sharply increasing rate of weapons going out to
people who may not be able to use them or protect them is a real fear of
mine. As you might have gathered, I have nothing against knowledgable
people possessing and using firearms responsibly.

So why not register those firearms, so there is a way to trace a weapon
that escapes responsible control? So we can, hey Joe, you used to have a
(X), but didn't report it stolen, and now it was used in (Y) illegal way.
How come?

Is that really too much to ask? How does that infringe anyone's rights?

Whoa! Registration doesn't stop theft or criminal use of anything,
Han. All it does is give the police a person to go after when the
weapon is found, after it was used in a crime. And it wasn't the owner
who committed the crime. Besides, most weapon sales in shops are
already traceable. Don't get all gun-controlly on us, please.

--
The business of America is not business. Neither is it war. The business
of America is justice and securing the blessings of liberty.
-- George F. Will

On 19 Aug 2012 11:45:12 GMT, Han wrote:

" wrote in
:

On 19 Aug 2012 01:03:33 GMT, Han wrote:

" wrote in
:

On 18 Aug 2012 22:29:25 GMT, Han wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote in
:

On 08/18/2012 05:09 PM, Mike Marlow wrote:
Colleges graduate students where the market is heading - perhaps
with a little lag.

Maybe. But have you tried to hire a high quality plumber or
electrician lately. There is a TON of opportunity in the trades
and these are jobs that cannot easily be offshored. Unfortunately
a generation of American parents were brainwashed by the 1960s
Smelliest Generation that runs the universities that no one
can succeed without a college degree. Speaking as someone who
HAS a graduate degree (and briefly taught grad school) this is
nonsense.

Fully agree, but it seems some of that is coming back. Problem is
that a fully licensed (independent) plumber or electrician just
about has to get at least an associate degree to be able to read the
regs and do the accounting.

Even employees are needed.

Not sure what you mean.

I thought I was writing English. Plumbing companies hire plumbers,
no? These plumbers have no need to do the accounting and **** still
runs downhill. ;-)

OK. Those are more like plumbers' helpers then.

No, licensed plumbers. Maybe all the outfits in New Jersey are one-man shops,
but they certainly aren't here. There are radio advertisements for licensed
plumbers to join companies all the time, here. There *is* a high demand.

If they're all one-man shop, there, I assume there are no plumber's unions?
That's cool, but it must make building all those skyscrapers a pain. ;-)

The employees of the plumber need to know
basics, but should follow the boss's instructions. I'd like to see
more kids go into the trades than are presently doing so, but if they
want to be more than just a bit over the position of gofer, they will
soon need a real high school education, or an associate's.

A associate's is overkill. OTOH, a real high school education may be
difficult to find, these days.

Yep!


....yet you want to pay teachers (unions) even more. Amazing.

You are right about the web development stuff, but that's where
the market is. Hardcore engineering is dying here.

I'm actually saying the opposite: Web programming and Java are
now commodity skills - the manual labor of the IT industry.
There are too many people that can do this work and not enough
job openings.

Hardcore engineering is exactly what we're missing and where
all the demand is. I could probably place between 5-20 people
right now with just 1 year's experience in Linux engineering
and infrastructure if they knew basic system administration,
networking, and troubleshooting, and had good people skills
and a high integrity work ethic. The jobs I'm thinking of
start at well north of $50K/yr with full benefits, vacation,
401K matching, and instant vesting of all the money the company
does contribute to the 401K. A great first job for a young,
smart engineer ... and the company can't find 'em. That, sir,
is why jobs are leaving Dodge...

That would also be the kind of job to return ASAP when the
schools/students see the opportunity. Indeed, some of the lower
level off-shored jobs are coming back, I heard (don't ask, I don't
remember where I heard).

Not sure the (what was called "hard") engineering schools will. It
takes math, something sorely lacking in public schools these days. I
believe lower level jobs are coming back, or will if allowed to. My
CPoE shipped all production to Mexico in '08 and has already found
that it was a mistake (not sure the execs have admitted it yet).
Much of the engineering is already being "off-shored" from Japan to
the US. ;-)

What's CPoE?

Same as a PPoE, but more current. ;-) (Current Place of Employment)

Math is coming back, I hope and think. Although I was ****ed by some
kind of editorial somewhere that claimed algebra wasn't really
necessary any more.

I think someone's pulling the wool over your eyes again. The second
statement is far more usual than you want to believe.

I can hope, can't I? And the believers in the second statement are wrong


They're not. Try something simple like get change for $10.24, after giving
the cashier $10.25. Heaven forbid that you give them $10.29.

On 19 Aug 2012 11:50:52 GMT, Han wrote:

Jack wrote in :

On 8/18/2012 3:52 PM, Han wrote:
Jack wrote in :

On 8/17/2012 5:16 PM, Just Wondering wrote:
On 8/17/2012 1:56 PM, Jack wrote:

I do know bottled water costs more than gas . . .


I can buy bottled water for under $2/gallon. Tell me where I can
buy gasoline at under $2/gallon.

Quick look on the net found PERRIER for just $19/gal. I suggest you
buy all you can for under $2 a gallon and get yourself good and
filthy rich.

Aquafina @ Amazon 32 bottles of 16.9 fl oz for $5.92. That is
$3.70/gal, like gasoline. Better look for specails ...

Aquafina is tap water, comes out of the Detroit river. $3.70 a gallon
for water you get from the local river vs. gas that is a bit more
difficult to get out of the ground and refine is plain stupid. You
pay 2000 times more for Aquafina than you would from the tap.
Gasoline on the other hand is a great deal, and the oil companies
should be applauded not attacked.

I'll tell Afina (my wife, who buys it, knowing it's a waste of money).

Hmm, Afina, Aquafina? Is there a connection? Perhaps she owns a chunk
without your knowledge? ;-)

On 19 Aug 2012 11:53:08 GMT, Han wrote:

Jack wrote in :

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

Be happy. In Europe the price of gas is at least twice of what it is here,
and 2/3 goes to government. Yet they still drive big Mercedes and sit in
traffic jams rivaling LA and the LIE.

But Han, you *like* "free" everything.

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 07:55:26 -0500, "HeyBub" wrote:

Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

Considering that there are two, they can hardly be monopolies. ...and that
Apple has a larger market cap than M$, it's hard to pin that one on M$,
either.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like, their
revenue streams would wither.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business. The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

Better, consider the phone company, historically. Does anyone really think
we'd have 4G phones if it were left to Ma Bell and Uncle Sam?

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 10:33:57 -0400, "J. Clarke" wrote:

In article ,
says...

Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

It's rather ridiculous to talk about "MS and Apple monopoly" given that
the two are arch-rivals and that Apple would prefer that no Apple
product ever run a single line of Microsoft code.

Not buying that. How about Word? What about dual booting Windows? That was
one of the selling points they bought by switching from IBM/PPC to Intel/X86.

Further, most of Apple's profits these days come from iphones and ipads
and ipods, all product niches in which Microsoft is pretty much a non-
starter.

Can't start. They can't get out of their own way. Such always happens with
"monopolies".

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like,
their
revenue streams would wither.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business. The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

There are product monopolies and service monopolies. A service monopoly
has a pretty much guaranteed continuous revenue stream--people aren't
going to stop talking on the phone or watching TV because the
infrastructure is old unless it gets so old that it stops working. On
the other hand, once every potential consumer of a product has the
product, the revenue model goes from first sales to replacement sales,
and to get those sales in any kind of volume you have to improve the
product enough that someone wants to replace it even though their old
product is still working.

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 10:43:57 -0400, Jack wrote:

On 8/19/2012 8:55 AM, HeyBub wrote:
Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

I'd love to not have a monopoly like that. MS controls 93% of the
market, Apple most of the rest. Sounds like a monopoly to me, probably
more of a monopoly than AT&T had when they were broken up.

Not buying 93% but... Yet Apple's market cap is larger. Go figure.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like, their
revenue streams would wither.

Nope, that is the problem with monopolies like MS. Lack of competition
means they can sell garbage with little fear of revenue streams
withering, and, regardless of what the stooges say, Windows has been
crap from day one. Any sort of healthy competition and MS would have
died or provided a quality product. They are a perfect example of
exactly why monopolies are bad for the consumer.

Except that there have been competitors. None have done well. Sure, M$ has
pulled some pretty underhanded crap, and should have been slapped around. That
was long ago and milk spilled...

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business.

That is exactly wrong. Without competition, they do not have to provide
a better product. It's one of the problems with capitalism addressed by
the Sherman Anti trust act.

They do have to provide a better product or no one will buy the new. Exactly
that happened with Vista. It was crap, so people (almost all corporations)
told them to pound salt, and forced them to keep XP around. M$ can only force
so much crap before they lose. ...and lose they did; big time.

The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some agency of
government (think cable TV).

Cable TV is a monopoly?

In most areas, you bet.

I can get Comcast, Direct TV, Verison, Dish TV
and more, already more than the 2 companies that control 97% of the PC
OS market. So, if MS is not exactly a monopoly, neither are the myriad
of cable companies.

Very few areas have more than one terrestrial cable source. Many (including
myself) have none. I have a choice between DTV and DISH for TV. Hughes or
DSL (AT&T) for Internet. Many don't have a place to put a dish or don't have
a satellite "view". Yes, cable television is usually a government controlled
monopoly, like your power company.

On 19 Aug 2012 01:16:54 GMT, Han wrote:

"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:
"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:

I was born in the last year of WWII. Large parts of the town I
grew up in (Wageningen) were destroyed twice in that war. I know
pretty well that at times armed insurrection is necessary, and I am
also eternally grateful (that's not a sop) for the Allies who gave
their lives for our freedom. Still, I am rather fearful of white
supremacists and other paramilitary groups, whether left or right.

Those guys though, are not the people who are protected by the 2nd
Ammendment. At least the ones who act out their "anxieties".

But the anxiety that the 2nd Amendment is getting compromised is
played out in front of those, and they (unfortunately) act on it.

So - do you have some links showing these acts? I get the fear part,
but I don't get the part of you believing they are acting out threats
to the second ammendment.

There are (I think) people who believe that their 2nd amendment rights
are about to be violated, and they go out and get armed to the teeth.

It makes a statement when a few tens of millions all of a sudden buy guns.
Open wallets speak loudly, even if the politicians don't get any of the
contents.

As well as those who are afraid of perceived rising chances of being
involved in violence.

You don't think that self-defense preparation is a natural and healthy
reaction? Do you believe that people shouldn't keep water/food supplies in
case of emergency? Fire extinguishers?

I am definitely not sure that all those people in
either category get enough education in how to handle their weapons
safely, and how to keep them secure.

It doesn't take a lot.

But those are my fears. I don't know squat about firearms.

That makes them phobias, not fears.

On 19 Aug 2012 11:58:13 GMT, Han wrote:

"Mike Marlow" wrote in
:

Han wrote:


There are (I think) people who believe that their 2nd amendment
rights are about to be violated, and they go out and get armed to the
teeth. As well as those who are afraid of perceived rising chances of
being involved in violence. I am definitely not sure that all those
people in either category get enough education in how to handle their
weapons safely, and how to keep them secure. But those are my fears.
I don't know squat about firearms.

That is where I was going with my question Han. I appreciate your
fears as I said before, but to hold those closely in the face of what
you admit is a lack of knowledge speaks more about your own fears than
it does about those you fear. Knowledge Han - go learn something
about these guys. Admitely - they are whackos of one sort or another,
but not generally in the sense that you currently fear.

Here's why I ask questions and engage dialog like that. Your current
fears and level of knowledge are not terribly atypical. So - suppose
a piece of legislation is proposed that would "limit" or "control"
these "fearful" things. In your current state of understanding, that
would seem prudent to you and you might well find yourself a supporter
of it. But - is it real and is it meaningful? It will certainly
affect the rights of others, but for a good reason, or not? That's
how feel good laws get passed and they do nothing more than that -
make uninformed people feel good. But the rhetoric from the
now-feeling-good uninformed people rises to loud levels - as if there
really were some value to it. Meanwhile...

Well, Mike, The current sharply increasing rate of weapons going out to
people who may not be able to use them or protect them is a real fear of
mine. As you might have gathered, I have nothing against knowledgable
people possessing and using firearms responsibly.

You don't know that. You *fear* it. It could easily be that gun owners are
simply buying another. Before an anticipated ban is a good time.

So why not register those firearms, so there is a way to trace a weapon
that escapes responsible control? So we can, hey Joe, you used to have a
(X), but didn't report it stolen, and now it was used in (Y) illegal way.
How come?

1) it accomplishes nothing.
2) the first step in confiscation has always been registration. It's almost a
night follows day axiom.

Is that really too much to ask? How does that infringe anyone's rights?

Yes! See above.

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 01:04:29 -0600, Just Wondering wrote:

On 8/18/2012 2:06 PM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
On Fri, 17 Aug 2012 15:14:29 -0600, Just Wondering wrote:

On 8/17/2012 1:09 PM, Jack wrote:
On 8/17/2012 11:25 AM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
Han wrote:

I don't think I have ever called for paying brain surgeons the same
as dog catchers.
No, Han, even you're not that far over the edge. ;-)
Yes, that would be Larry Blanchard, the guy that quotes GB Shaw, the
Fabian socialist prick that thought the solution to stupid,
unproductive people was to gas the suckers albeit as painlessly as
possible.

I think effort, ability and execution of the job are what count.
Yeah, that's a thought that seems out of sync with the times, if you
pay attention to the lame stream media, the educational system, the
democratic party, and at least a part of the repuglican party.

However, the real problem is third parties deciding what others
are "worth". It should be *entirely* between the employer and the
employee.
It's none of anyone else's damned business.
Amen brother!

The difficulty comes when two parties to a contract don't have equal
bargaining power. Just try bargaining with an insurance company over
the terms of your automobile liability policy and the premium you will
pay for coverage.
Easy, get a quote from another company.

That's not a negotiation between parties of comparable bargaining
power.

Certainly it is. They have the right to sell whatever product makes sense for
them. I have the right to refuse and go somewhere else. It's a quite level
playing field, until government gets involved.

Look up "adhesion contract":
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedicti...esion+Contract

Irrelevant. You enter into the contract voluntarily.

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 02:43:16 -0400, Dave wrote:

On Sat, 18 Aug 2012 20:33:44 -0400, "
Are you really too stupid to use a killfile? ...or are you always trying to
limit other's speech?

The only limits to speech should be the type of bull**** you spew
here.

Case closed. You are truly a moron's moron.

Jack writes:
On 8/18/2012 1:11 PM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
Jack writes:

Recently heard on TV that oil companies make about 6-8 cents on a gallon
of gas. Government makes 40 to 66 cents on the same gallon. In
Californica the gov makes 66 cents on a gallon.

5 minutes of research would show that california makes 35.3 cents on
a gallon (WA 37.5 cents, NC 35.2 cents, maine 30 cents, Minnesota 27 cents).
When you add local (e.g. sales) taxes, CA is 50 cents, Connecticut is 51 cents,
Hawaii 49 cents, Illinois 50.6 cents, usw).

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

You explicitly said that California makes 66 cents/gal.

You were wrong.

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 10:26:13 -0400, "J. Clarke" wrote:

In article , says...

On Sat, 18 Aug 2012 16:15:11 -0400, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:

How about leaving some context?

How about leaving, period? There were 80 unread messages in this group
this evening. 22 were from you. 20 were from Han. Don't you think the
two of you have said about all there is to say on the issue?

USENET really needs a "get a room" function. If invoked, all posts in
which one of the two participants was responding to the other would
automatically go to email.

Learn how to use a kill file or grow up enough to learn how to ignore what you
don't want to read. You're no different than Larry or Dave.

" wrote in
news
No, licensed plumbers. Maybe all the outfits in New Jersey are
one-man shops, but they certainly aren't here. There are radio
advertisements for licensed plumbers to join companies all the time,
here. There *is* a high demand.

I think most plumbers are corporations. I am not sure whether everyone
of their workers doing plumbing work need to be fully licensed. I am
pretty sure that either there are different levels of licensing, or that
the lower echelon just follows instructions, but I'll ask my plumber
friend when I see him again.

If they're all one-man shop, there, I assume there are no plumber's
unions? That's cool, but it must make building all those skyscrapers a
pain. ;-)

The one I know best is not in a union shop, just part of a company doing
residential work in the 'burbs here.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

" wrote in
:

Hmm, Afina, Aquafina? Is there a connection? Perhaps she owns a chunk
without your knowledge? ;-)

Afina is a not so common Dutch name. She does NOT like jokes involving her
name.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

" wrote in
:

On 19 Aug 2012 11:53:08 GMT, Han wrote:

Jack wrote in :

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

Be happy. In Europe the price of gas is at least twice of what it is
here, and 2/3 goes to government. Yet they still drive big Mercedes
and sit in traffic jams rivaling LA and the LIE.

But Han, you *like* "free" everything.

Funny thing is, in Europe they don't complain about taxes as much as here,
by far!! And their taxes are definitely higher than here.

--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid

J. Clarke wrote:

That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they
have robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are
themselves.

It's rather ridiculous to talk about "MS and Apple monopoly" given
that the two are arch-rivals and that Apple would prefer that no Apple
product ever run a single line of Microsoft code.

Uh, much of the code that runs on an Apple was written by Microsoft. For
example, MS-Word.

On 08/19/2012 12:53 PM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 10:33:57 -0400, "J. Clarke" wrote:

In article ,
says...

Jack wrote:

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents. The oil
companies make far, far, far less at 6 - 8% profit/ and they do all
the work. The asshole socialists want to tack on a windfall profit
tax on companies making a small profit, while they are the ones
ripping off the public. Then, the dicks turn around and give 1/2 a
billion to Solyndra to **** away into the wind. Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.


That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

It's rather ridiculous to talk about "MS and Apple monopoly" given that
the two are arch-rivals and that Apple would prefer that no Apple
product ever run a single line of Microsoft code.

Not buying that. How about Word? What about dual booting Windows? That was
one of the selling points they bought by switching from IBM/PPC to Intel/X86.

Apple was forced to do this to stay competitive and live in Reality. But they
are the most closed source company in the world, far, far worse than Microsoft.
They also are currently behaving quite badly. See:

http://culturewrench.com/?p=141



--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/

Jack wrote:

That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they
have robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are
themselves.

I'd love to not have a monopoly like that. MS controls 93% of the
market, Apple most of the rest. Sounds like a monopoly to me,
probably more of a monopoly than AT&T had when they were broken up.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the
like, their revenue streams would wither.

Nope, that is the problem with monopolies like MS. Lack of
competition means they can sell garbage with little fear of revenue
streams withering, and, regardless of what the stooges say, Windows
has been crap from day one. Any sort of healthy competition and MS
would have died or provided a quality product. They are a perfect
example of exactly why monopolies are bad for the consumer.

If MS did not develop a successor to Windows 3.11 or XP or any other
version, their revenue stream would wither. If everybody already has, say,
XP, where is any new sale going to come from? Oh, there will be some buying
their first computer, but that's not the same as the millions who replace
XP, at some cost, with a newer version.


That is exactly wrong. Without competition, they do not have to
provide a better product. It's one of the problems with capitalism
addressed by the Sherman Anti trust act.

Not true. Not true at all. Assume you have a company in a town with 100
prospects. You sell each of the 100 prospects your product your first year
in business. Where does your revenue come from next year? If you don't make
a NEW product to replace the first, you're out of business.

Secondly, monopolies are GUARANTEED by the US Constitution (Article I,
Section 8).

Third, a monopoly that comes into existence and continues by actions solely
within the organization are NOT covered by the Sherman act. A company can
set whatever price it wants for its product or service and nothing illegal
has taken place. Only when a company suppresses competition by some external
process (such as buying the competing company) does the Act latch in.


The exceptions
to this rule are the monopolies established or controlled by some
agency of government (think cable TV).

Cable TV is a monopoly? I can get Comcast, Direct TV, Verison, Dish
TV and more, already more than the 2 companies that control 97% of
the PC OS market. So, if MS is not exactly a monopoly, neither are
the myriad of cable companies.

On 8/19/2012 2:02 PM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 10:43:57 -0400, Jack wrote:

On 8/19/2012 8:55 AM, HeyBub wrote:
Jack wrote:

Meanwhile, MS and
Apple are making 30-40% profits on their monopoly, and no one even
whispers windfall profit. Quite a joke.

That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they have
robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are themselves.

I'd love to not have a monopoly like that. MS controls 93% of the
market, Apple most of the rest. Sounds like a monopoly to me, probably
more of a monopoly than AT&T had when they were broken up.

Not buying 93% but...

What would you buy? MS has slipped a bit because of mobile OS's but
there DT share is still in excess of 90%. Mac about 5.25%, iOS has
2.05%, Linux is at 0.95%, Java ME is at 0.81% and Android is at just
0.49%. So MS controls 90% of the market, close enough to a monopoly for
me. Moreover, when competition is "robust" your profit margin will be
way closer to 7% of oil companies than the 30% of MS.

Yet Apple's market cap is larger. Go figure.

Stock prices are related to the imagination of the buyer. It may or may
not reflect whats going on.

If they didn't improve their products with new features and the like, their
revenue streams would wither.

Nope, that is the problem with monopolies like MS. Lack of competition
means they can sell garbage with little fear of revenue streams
withering, and, regardless of what the stooges say, Windows has been
crap from day one. Any sort of healthy competition and MS would have
died or provided a quality product. They are a perfect example of
exactly why monopolies are bad for the consumer.

Except that there have been competitors. None have done well. Sure, M$ has
pulled some pretty underhanded crap, and should have been slapped around. That
was long ago and milk spilled...

Yes, and the consumer is still paying the price, and MS continues with a
monopoly on the DT PC OS. What will happen with Mobile crap may or may
not be another issue.

So it is with most "monopolies." They've got to periodically provide a
better product at a lower price or they're out of business.

That is exactly wrong. Without competition, they do not have to provide
a better product. It's one of the problems with capitalism addressed by
the Sherman Anti trust act.

They do have to provide a better product or no one will buy the new. Exactly
that happened with Vista.

So you think if a monopoly turns out crap, then sells you some improved
crap, but still crap, and does it in a way that makes their old crap
obsolete with no support, that is somehow competition? You sound like
HeyBubba...

It was crap, so people (almost all corporations)
told them to pound salt, and forced them to keep XP around. M$ can only force
so much crap before they lose. ...and lose they did; big time.

What did they lose, market domination went from 93% to 92.99%? They
lost nothing, they are a monopoly.


--
Jack
Add Life to your Days not Days to your Life.
http://jbstein.com

In article ,
says...

J. Clarke wrote:

That's because Microsoft and Apple are not exactly monopolies: they
have robust and effective competitors. Their competitors are
themselves.

It's rather ridiculous to talk about "MS and Apple monopoly" given
that the two are arch-rivals and that Apple would prefer that no Apple
product ever run a single line of Microsoft code.

Uh, much of the code that runs on an Apple was written by Microsoft. For
example, MS-Word.

I'm sorry, but a single office suite does not constitute "much of the
code that runs on Apple". I did not say that there is no Microsoft code
that runs on Apple, I said that Apple would prefer that there not be.

Note that Word runs on Linux, too, so I guess there's a "MS and Linux
monopoloy".

On 19 Aug 2012 19:16:05 GMT, Han wrote:

" wrote in
news
No, licensed plumbers. Maybe all the outfits in New Jersey are
one-man shops, but they certainly aren't here. There are radio
advertisements for licensed plumbers to join companies all the time,
here. There *is* a high demand.

I think most plumbers are corporations.

I *HIGHLY* doubt that. Most of the plumbers I've known have been union
members and certainly do not work for themselves.

I am not sure whether everyone
of their workers doing plumbing work need to be fully licensed. I am
pretty sure that either there are different levels of licensing, or that
the lower echelon just follows instructions, but I'll ask my plumber
friend when I see him again.

It's a hierarchy, just like most trades. There are helpers, apprentices,
journeymen, etc. That doesn't change the fact that plumbers work for
corporations, too.

If they're all one-man shop, there, I assume there are no plumber's
unions? That's cool, but it must make building all those skyscrapers a
pain. ;-)

The one I know best is not in a union shop, just part of a company doing
residential work in the 'burbs here.

A non-union shop in Jersey? Shock! ;-)

On 8/19/2012 2:19 PM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
Jack writes:

Recently heard on TV that oil companies make about 6-8 cents on a gallon
of gas. Government makes 40 to 66 cents on the same gallon. In
Californica the gov makes 66 cents on a gallon.

5 minutes of research would show that california makes 35.3 cents on
a gallon (WA 37.5 cents, NC 35.2 cents, maine 30 cents, Minnesota 27 cents).
When you add local (e.g. sales) taxes, CA is 50 cents, Connecticut is 51 cents,
Hawaii 49 cents, Illinois 50.6 cents, usw).

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

You explicitly said that California makes 66 cents/gal.

I explicitly said I heard it on TV. I could have heard wrong, but
according to you, they make 50 cents which is between 40 and 66 cents,
and, the point, it's over 6 times more than the oil companies themselves
make.

The best part is the oil companies get every stinking penny they pay in
taxes from their customers, so we pay every dime, and Hans' oil company
pays nothing.

--
Jack
Add Life to your Days not Days to your Life.
http://jbstein.com

On 8/19/2012 5:05 PM, HeyBub wrote:
Jack wrote:

That is exactly wrong. Without competition, they do not have to
provide a better product. It's one of the problems with capitalism
addressed by the Sherman Anti trust act.

Not true. Not true at all.

Yes, it is true, totally true.

Assume you have a company in a town with 100
prospects. You sell each of the 100 prospects your product your first year
in business. Where does your revenue come from next year? If you don't make
a NEW product to replace the first, you're out of business.

If you make a piece of crap, your out of business, unless you have a
monopoly that makes it close to impossible for competitors to get a foot
in the door.

Secondly, monopolies are GUARANTEED by the US Constitution (Article I,
Section 8).

Limited time exclusive right to the inventor does not mean you have the
right to prevent competition from like products. MS did exactly that,
and were found guilty in court, but apparently learned that huge
political contributions would make their problems go away.

Third, a monopoly that comes into existence and continues by actions solely
within the organization are NOT covered by the Sherman act. A company can
set whatever price it wants for its product or service and nothing illegal
has taken place.

I don't give a damn what MS charges, they sell junk, and they made sure
competing systems could not get a foot in the door.

Only when a company suppresses competition by some external
process (such as buying the competing company) does the Act latch in.

Or threaten business that dare sell competing products with sanction,
among other things.

--
Jack
Add Life to your Days not Days to your Life.
http://jbstein.com

On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 21:36:09 -0400, Jack wrote:

On 8/19/2012 2:19 PM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
Jack writes:

Recently heard on TV that oil companies make about 6-8 cents on a gallon
of gas. Government makes 40 to 66 cents on the same gallon. In
Californica the gov makes 66 cents on a gallon.

5 minutes of research would show that california makes 35.3 cents on
a gallon (WA 37.5 cents, NC 35.2 cents, maine 30 cents, Minnesota 27 cents).
When you add local (e.g. sales) taxes, CA is 50 cents, Connecticut is 51 cents,
Hawaii 49 cents, Illinois 50.6 cents, usw).

Gov't making 50 cents on a gallon is between 40 and 66 cents.

You explicitly said that California makes 66 cents/gal.

I explicitly said I heard it on TV. I could have heard wrong, but
according to you, they make 50 cents which is between 40 and 66 cents,
and, the point, it's over 6 times more than the oil companies themselves
make.

California takes $.491 per gallon (not the worst but right there) and the feds
take $.184 totaling $.675. So the state shares it with the feds.

http://www.commonsensejunction.com/n...-tax-rate.html

The best part is the oil companies get every stinking penny they pay in
taxes from their customers, so we pay every dime, and Hans' oil company
pays nothing.

Of course but try convincing a leftist loser like Lurndal of that.

On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 09:41:52 -0400, "
Of course but try convincing a leftist loser like Lurndal of that.

Better that than trying to explain facts to an asshole nutbar like
you.