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NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action.
On September 24 2015 02:14 Plansix wrote: I love who the Hilary Email story has so little meat to it that every report is about them "finding more emails". Not the content or if they did anything bad. Or that they were released to scary terrorist. Just that they found another one.
Call me when someone charges her with anything.
She won't be charged with anything. Shes a democrat so the left will give her a free pass. However if this happens under Bush's presidency there would be a huge shitstorm of liberals demanding Bush impeached and brought up on criminal charges by the media.
In other news, Trump gave a brand new impromptu speech in South Carolina today
I haven't watched Trump give a speech before, but this is some pretty damned impressive work from a technical and stylistic perspective.
EDIT: I'm not sure anyone else could pull off 45 minutes of talking about himself so well.
On September 24 2015 04:35 Sermokala wrote: All this talk about the car emissions really is small potatoes. The largest 15 sea cargo ships emit more pollution then the entire car population of the world.
Electric cars are going to help emissions but the electricity has to come somewhere and I worry that green energy might not be there in time for the handover to be really efficient.
The point is that its just the 15 biggest in the world. There are much more then 15 not even approching the huge oil tankers that keep getting bigger by the year.
Yeah that makes me think that car barely contribute anything lol. Do you happen to know how much cars actually contribute?
They do hardly contribute anything. The problems with cars is localized particulates/pollutants (colloquially smog). The push for electric is really only a sane idea in big cities because that is where the jam packing of those things can make a noticeable difference in air quality. Even in mid-size cities like Cleveland or Charlotte, there is no major benefit to the people for electric cars. As batteries become good enough, and (somewhat more importantly) the energy transfer systems become quick enough, such cars will start to really outperform the internal combustion engine, but otherwise its mostly a vanity project.
the push for electric is still a good thing even outside cities because that way you have it all down to one source that needs improvement and everything down the line will get better if you improve that one thing, rather than having to fix on 1000 different spots.
I don't think that its clear that centralizing pollution generation would generate improvements. Sometimes centralization is a good answer to a problem (like the common defense) but other times it has not worked (education, food distribution). Most of the indications I see is that decentralized power generation is actually a very likely solution with distributed solar panels etc. Also, its not clear that battery charging will every be quick enough to be practical for travel, so the standard fueling station model will remain, either with petrol, or an alternative fuel such as methane, hyrdrogen, etc.
well, if we're talking about what the most efficient strategy is it sure would be just that. You shouldn't compare it to services but rather technology when we're talking about the "stats" of something rather than the distribution. The latter obviously has downsides when it comes to too much centralization, like inability to adapt in time. But that's not an issue here. That's literally the reason why computing power makes such leapes while improvement in other fields is much slower. You improve the most basic thing and it has a positive effect on everything down the road. That obviously implies a will to improve in the first place. If that's not there the discussion is naught. And wether, the electricity comes from a centralized or decentralized source really doesn't matter at all.
As for batteries... worst case scenario instead of charging your battery you'll be changing batteries instead if it's really not possible to make it convenient enough timewise otherwise.
On September 24 2015 04:35 Sermokala wrote: All this talk about the car emissions really is small potatoes. The largest 15 sea cargo ships emit more pollution then the entire car population of the world.
Electric cars are going to help emissions but the electricity has to come somewhere and I worry that green energy might not be there in time for the handover to be really efficient.
The point is that its just the 15 biggest in the world. There are much more then 15 not even approching the huge oil tankers that keep getting bigger by the year.
Yeah that makes me think that car barely contribute anything lol. Do you happen to know how much cars actually contribute?
They do hardly contribute anything. The problems with cars is localized particulates/pollutants (colloquially smog). The push for electric is really only a sane idea in big cities because that is where the jam packing of those things can make a noticeable difference in air quality. Even in mid-size cities like Cleveland or Charlotte, there is no major benefit to the people for electric cars. As batteries become good enough, and (somewhat more importantly) the energy transfer systems become quick enough, such cars will start to really outperform the internal combustion engine, but otherwise its mostly a vanity project.
the push for electric is still a good thing even outside cities because that way you have it all down to one source that needs improvement and everything down the line will get better if you improve that one thing, rather than having to fix on 1000 different spots.
I don't think that its clear that centralizing pollution generation would generate improvements. Sometimes centralization is a good answer to a problem (like the common defense) but other times it has not worked (education, food distribution). Most of the indications I see is that decentralized power generation is actually a very likely solution with distributed solar panels etc. Also, its not clear that battery charging will every be quick enough to be practical for travel, so the standard fueling station model will remain, either with petrol, or an alternative fuel such as methane, hyrdrogen, etc.
well, if we're talking about what the most efficient strategy is it sure would be just that. You shouldn't compare it to services but rather technology when we're talking about the "stats" of something rather than the distribution. The latter obviously has downsides when it comes to too much centralization, like inability to adapt in time. But that's not an issue here. That's literally the reason why computing power makes such leapes while improvement in other fields is much slower. You improve the most basic thing and it has a positive effect on everything down the road. That obviously implies a will to improve in the first place. If that's not there the discussion is naught. And wether, the electricity comes from a centralized or decentralized source really doesn't matter at all.
As for batteries... worst case scenario instead of charging your battery you'll be changing batteries instead if it's really not possible to make it convenient enough timewise otherwise.
Your worse case scenario for electric cars is a nearly unworkable solution because it requires standardized battery sizes (everything from a Honda 2 seater to a Ford F-350), requires an entire new economic model, requires complex equipment for constantly switching batteries, and really requires near-total stagnation in the battery market (because otherwise you will be trading the battery equivalent of an iphone 7 in for an iphone 3).
On September 24 2015 02:14 Plansix wrote: I love who the Hilary Email story has so little meat to it that every report is about them "finding more emails". Not the content or if they did anything bad. Or that they were released to scary terrorist. Just that they found another one.
Call me when someone charges her with anything.
She won't be charged with anything. Shes a democrat so the left will give her a free pass. However if this happens under Bush's presidency there would be a huge shitstorm of liberals demanding Bush impeached and brought up on criminal charges by the media.
In other news, Trump gave a brand new impromptu speech in South Carolina today where he calls a 87 year old lady a vicious horrible human being. Classic! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lABQ_Lu6fG8
Not going to watch a 47 minute video just to find the quote/context...but someone being an 87 year old lady in no way prohibits someone from being a "vicious horrible human being".
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
...That isn't a free market, its simply corporations exercising powers traditionally reserved for the state. So, you are talking about a type of government, Corptocracy might be the word.
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
...That isn't a free market, its simply corporations exercising powers traditionally reserved for the state. So, you are talking about a type of government, Corptocracy might be the word.
People often forget that free markets only works with functional governments. That Adam Smith clearly stated that the government should regulate things to assure people can participate in the free market. Especially information. And that if they were poor, the government to assist them so they could reach stability, to partake in the free market.
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
...That isn't a free market, its simply corporations exercising powers traditionally reserved for the state. So, you are talking about a type of government, Corptocracy might be the word.
People often forget that free markets only works with functional governments. That Adam Smith clearly stated that the government should regulate things to assure people can participate in the free market. Especially information. And that if they were poor, the government to assist them so they could reach stability, to partake in the free market.
That is a mistake that people rarely make unintentionally. I would identify more typical mistakes as: 1) Recognizing something as a free market when it is relatively tightly regulated; 2) Blaming the dysfunctions of a tightly regulated market on the free market; 3) Using (arguably)essential government functions to justify other government actions; and 4) Confusing tax burden with market freedom.
Real-estate tycoon Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he will no longer do interviews on Fox News shows because the network has been treating him "unfairly."
The Republican presidential front-runner tweeted: ".@FoxNews has been treating me very unfairly & I have therefore decided that I won't be doing any more Fox shows for the foreseeable future."
It wasn't immediately clear what caused Trump to announce the boycott, but he has repeatedly feuded with the network in recently.
On Monday night and Tuesday morning, Trump released a lengthy tweetstorm attacking Fox hosts Bill O'Reilly and Megyn Kelly, as well as the "Trump haters" they have on their shows.
He called Kelly "the worst" and labeled her show "terrible." He said O'Reilly "was very negative to me in refusing to post the great polls that came out today including NBC."
He also said he had a hard time watching Fox News, while retweeting multiple supporters trashing Fox and calling for a boycott of the network because of its supposed bias against him.
Trump wasn't finished. On Tuesday evening, he continued berating Kelly, calling her a "lightweight" and "highly overrated." He also said her show was better when she was on vacation.
Reached for a response, a Fox News representative said Trump announced the boycott after the network canceled his upcoming appearance on "The O'Reilly Factor":
At 11:45am today, we canceled Donald Trump's scheduled appearance on "The O’Reilly Factor" on Thursday, which resulted in Mr. Trump's subsequent tweet about his "boycott" of FOX News. The press predictably jumped to cover his tweet, creating yet another distraction from any real issues that Mr. Trump might be questioned about. When coverage doesn't go his way, he engages in personal attacks on our anchors and hosts, which has grown stale and tiresome. He doesn't seem to grasp that candidates telling journalists what to ask is not how the media works in this country.
Other Trump targets have also publicly disagreed with him about the nature of their breakups in the past.
He claimed he fired his veteran consultant Roger Stone, for example, who insists he actually quit partially because of Trump's feuds with media personalities. And Trump, the former host of "The Apprentice," frequently insists he was the one who dumped NBC — and not the other way around — amid backlash over his heated rhetoric on illegal immigration.
The Trump campaign subsequently released its own statement in response to Fox:
Mr. Trump stands by his statement made earlier today. As a candidate for President of the United States and the definitive front runner in every poll, both nationally and state wide, including the just released poll in the state of Florida, Mr. Trump expects to be treated fairly. All you have to do is look at the tremendous ratings last night from the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, where Mr. Trump was the guest, or the ratings from both debates, to fully understand the facts.
Regardless, the Trump-Fox spat has taken many twists and turns. The latest salvo from Trump follows not one but two apparent cease-fires struck between the two sides last month.
The first truce was publicly brokered after Trump raged against Kelly for asking him questions he thought were unfair while she moderated the first official Republican primary debate. The fight culminated in a comment about Kelly that many interpreted as a crude reference to menstruation.
Trump insisted that he would never say such a thing.
That détente ended after Trump again went after Kelly a couple of weeks later. Trump released a flood of tweets that, among other things, promoted a supporter who called Kelly a "bimbo" and declared that her show was far better when she was on vacation.
Numerous Fox hosts and personalities then fired back at Trump, and some saw the pushback as a sign they were getting a thumbs-up from the network to do so.
But the real-estate developer eventually returned to doing regular Fox News interviews again in September, including Monday on "Fox & Friends" and "On the Record" with Greta Van Susteren.
For his part, O'Reilly dismissed Trump's attacks Tuesday morning on the "Today" show.
"I've known Trump a long time. He wants people to like him. When people criticize him, he takes it personally," O'Reilly said. "I just think this is just an extension of his reality show, 'The Apprentice.' This is just theater right now. He gets a lot of attention from the theater."
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
...That isn't a free market, its simply corporations exercising powers traditionally reserved for the state. So, you are talking about a type of government, Corptocracy might be the word.
So a "free market" has monopoly regulations? Are those like the internal angles of an isosceles triangle or are they just arbitrary regulations layered on top of a "free market" base? That is, how is regulation of monopolies an apodictic part of the concept? Do we have to read Milton Friedman to find out what the ideal equation is for determining if a particular market player is monopolistic or should we rely upon US antitrust law?
On September 24 2015 03:12 GreenHorizons wrote: Considering the pill costs about $1 per pill to make $13.50 should be more than enough to turn a profit.
What happened is some spoiled shit hedgefund guy saw an opportunity to exploit a group of people and he took it without an ounce of shame. He sat on an interview and acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong because in his head he wasn't. Just the free market working it's magic.
He pretty well summed up much of what is wrong with the pharmaceutical industry and "the invisible hand".
This isn't an invisible hand or free market problem. In a free market, someone else would start making identical pills to undercut Turing. Here, some poorly interacting regulations make it illegal to try to recreate the drug even though it's out of patent, and also interfere somewhat with attempts to directly replace it.
No, in a free market, there would be maybe 1-3 companies that completely and utterly dominated the pharmaceutical industry and they would demolish anyone that attempted to compete with them through a wide array of highly unethical business practices. They would then gouge the fuck out of the price of every single drug that people would ever need because why the fuck not? Who's going to stop them?
...That isn't a free market, its simply corporations exercising powers traditionally reserved for the state. So, you are talking about a type of government, Corptocracy might be the word.
So a "free market" has monopoly regulations? Are those like the internal angles of an isosceles triangle or are they just arbitrary regulations layered on top of a "free market" base? That is, how is regulation of monopolies an apodictic part of the concept? Do we have to read Milton Friedman to find out what the ideal equation is for determining if a particular market player is monopolistic or should we rely upon US antitrust law?
No, just the monopolies in the situation I was replying to used fraud and force to obtain and maintain them. The companies he was inventing were acting as if they were proto-states ( not yet able to collect taxes). Which is more or less how the modern state (probably) came into being. Essentially, his free market critique was actually a government critique
What is "fraud" and "force?" Is price dropping to kill competitors' business not a free action? Buying up all raw materials to force other competitors out of business? There are plenty of things that don't amount to "fraud" that monopolies can do to maintain their monopoly.
Turing Pharmaceuticals' big abuse is restricting how their acquired generic drugs are distributed to non-medical (i.e. research) users. In a free market, the competitors could acquire samples of the drug on the open market, even if it's expensive, to do the studies comparing it to their own product that the FDA or consumers would require to accept their generic alternatives to the generic. As is, the studies simply can't be performed.
On September 24 2015 12:25 IgnE wrote: What is "fraud" and "force?" Is price dropping to kill competitors' business not a free action? Buying up all raw materials to force other competitors out of business? There are plenty of things that don't amount to "fraud" that monopolies can do to maintain their monopoly.
None of those things are sustainable. Even the most classic examples (such as Rockafeller) were either caused by government support or had real competitors that were bubbling up because of the opportunity for undercutting/flanking (such as microsoft).
Every time a cow or steer in this country is sold for beef, the seller pays a dollar into a special fund.
"We collect about $80 million" each year, says Polly Ruhland, CEO of the Cattlemen's Beef Promotion and Research Board. "Half of that stays at our state chapters."
All of it, though, pays for research, promotion and marketing of American beef. It funds scientific studies on beef's nutritional quality, promotes beef exports and pays for advertising, like the familiar slogan "Beef, it's what's for dinner."
More than a dozen promotional funds like this have been set up for different parts of American agriculture. Among the biggest are programs for dairy products, eggs, pork and cotton. All together, they collect and spend more than a half-billion dollars each year.
In a way, this is perfectly natural. Everybody has a marketing budget these days.
What's unusual, though, is that the federal government collects this money, like a tax on every farmer producing these commodities (and sometimes importers), and then passes it on to groups like the Cattlemen's Beef Board, or the American Egg Board or the National Pork Board.
Farmers voted to set up each of these programs, and then Congress made them mandatory. Every farmer is required, by law, to contribute.
The dollars the the government collects are subject to certain rules. They can't be used for lobbying, or to say nasty things about other foods, or say things that aren't true. "Everything we say must be backed up by research. We can't make claims that we can't back up," says Ruhland.
But beyond that, each group gets to spend those dollars solely to benefit its own industry.
On September 24 2015 12:25 IgnE wrote: What is "fraud" and "force?" Is price dropping to kill competitors' business not a free action? Buying up all raw materials to force other competitors out of business? There are plenty of things that don't amount to "fraud" that monopolies can do to maintain their monopoly.
None of those things are sustainable. Even the most classic examples (such as Rockafeller) were either caused by government support or had real competitors that were bubbling up because of the opportunity for undercutting/flanking (such as microsoft).
I don't know what that means. Are you saying monopolies aren't a problem?
EPT
