mikebike

What has struck me most on the recent threads regarding Syria is there seems to be consensus from all camps that further/continuing engagement there is stupid. Blame whomever but git the frack out seems to be fair enough!!

20 hours ago, Boon Mee said:

Yes, another well-coordinated job accomplished by Trump and his British & French partners. 

Accepting the limited Syrian engagement as a success, what other actions by 45 and his Brit and French partners are you referring to to constitute "another"?

2 hours ago, janclaes47 said:

 

How pity that he didn't manage a 500% price gain on his apartment, sure a reason to start another Trump slag off article.

 

Oh and his 2015 bankruptcy filling should tell you already that there is much more to this story.

1. Do you have no understanding of the NYC real estate market in the last 20-odd years?

2. Tells me he was a crappy businessman, much like 45.

9 hours ago, janclaes47 said:

Clinton's infidelity happened while he was in office, Trumps suspected infidelity happened decades before he was elected.

Yep. Remember 45 is born again. All his sins are now borne by the sky fairies. Don't ya just love flexible religious morality?

2 hours ago, bristolboy said:

Not so. The postal service is required to deliver mail,. For the purposes of shipping, parcels are not defined as mail. The USPS is not required to deliver parcels..

Actually congress determines what constitutes "mail", and currently that includes packages and letters.

On 4/1/2018 at 9:32 AM, mrwebb8825 said:

When this is over and he's reelected in 2020, how would you like those words served, al fresco or al dente? 

Try not to use concepts u don't understand.

Al fresco is a place to dine. Al dente is a way if cooking... verbal diahria, par for the course.

5 hours ago, sukhumvitneon said:

Keep up with that backpedaling, it's pretty amusing honestly.

 

Let me ask you something: Why do you love restricting and giving up your own constitutional rights? In any event, I really do think Jefferson said it best: "The beauty of the second amendment is that it will not be needed until they try to take it."

 

 

Danm the torpedoes. Yet to backpeddle n doubt I ever will. 

I am Canadian.

16 hours ago, impulse said:

 

And that's working so well for the likes of GE...

 

The reason I look to the past is because that's when the USA was at it's strongest and every generation expected to do better than their parents' generation.  Whatever they're doing today- isn't working.  At least not for the majority of Americans, or for the USA.

 

Edit:  BTW, if you want to know my whole belief system on the issue, look up Richard Wolff's "Capitalism Hits the Fan".  He explains it as clearly and simply as anyone I've ever seen, heard, or read.

 

Yes the USA has matured and like a 50 yr old there is nothing to be gained from wishing to be 20 again. Learn the lessons of youth, the lessons of the past, but todays solutions will not be the solutions of 1776, 1890, nor 1950.

I have read Capitalism Hits the Fan.

1 hour ago, BobBKK said:

Non-Disclosure is what it says on the box.  Why you think today's culture of 'tell-all' and chuck everyone under the bus is ok baffles me to.  If something is illegal go to the Police but most of the leaks are not about 'illegal activity' they are about politics.

I do not, and have not said, that I advocate a tell-all culture. I do however advocate a full understanding of the purpose and limitations on NDAs. Leaks will never be controlled by NDAs. To control leaks you need to have the trust and respect of your staff.

Upon reflection, I am also worried about govt ability to regulate autonomous vehicles. Without strict regulation it could be a nightmare technically.

With strict regulation not one pick up owner will ever buy one.

5 hours ago, Jingthing said:

The trouble with that POV is that there are also private facilities but the public road testing and development is totally necessary for this to go forward. I believe it will. 

I don’t believe the risk-reward balance is there yet, in the terms of human life, for real world testing, if the numbers quoted were correct.

Also think that the sharing of vehicles is never going to be economically or culturallly viable outside of urban areas anywhere in NA. That is a lot of consumers.

38 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

It was a long time ago. I fail to see what it has to do with the current situation.

The payoff was in 2016... 18 months... such a long time!! LOL!!

Armed occupation of a federal building is NOT a peaceful demonstration.

Nowhere near this topic.

15 minutes ago, impulse said:

 

You mean like Ford and Westinghouse, who realized that the only way their companies could make money is if enough of the population had jobs that paid enough to buy their products?  And when they paid their people more, GE and GM had to pay more to compete for the best employees.  And then even more people could afford to buy their products.

 

Or do you mean like the guys in today's race to the bottom?

You really love living' in the past don't you? Just as 2018 was not 1776, 2018 is not the industrial revolution at the turn of the 20th century.

Ford Motor Company and Westinghouse were not publicly traded corporations at the time you are referencing they were private.

Not that I disagree with your point, but publicly traded corporations were designed by us, and are legally bound, to maximize shareholder profit nothing else. Times have changed and looking to the past for answers is a losing game. 

20 minutes ago, impulse said:

 

Agree or disagree.  2018 isn't 1776, but governments are still governments and always looking to grab more power.

 

You want to see gun rights influencing an outcome, have a look at the recent Bundy standoff in Oregon.  Had the participants not been armed, they'd have been arrested before the standoff even started.  Whether you agree with the occupiers or not (I don't happen to agree with them), you can't tell me their being armed didn't "have an impact" on their negotiating power.  That's not to say they weren't idiots and on pretty selfish ground.  But they sure got their message out instead of being bundles off to jail on the first day.  Also shows an example of government abuse of power...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundy_standoff

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/28/us/politics/fbi-agent-indicted-oregon.html

 

Going down the Bundy hole will take us well off topic.

Suffice it to say that had the participants been armed people of colour occupying a federal facility in an urban area they would not have been extended the courtesies that the Bundy clan was.

Meaning if the Gov't had the will and wanted to remove the Bundys they could easily have done so despite their pea shooters.

3 minutes ago, Silurian said:

 

Just as the deaths of Bridget Driscoll and Henry H. Bliss in the late 1800's didn't stop the original automobile from taking off, the deaths of Joshua Brown and Elaine Herzberg won't prevent autonomous vehicles from becoming ubiquitous as well. Technology continues to move forward and hopefully so will the needed safety measures as well. To me, it seems Uber was pushing their design beyond its capabilities and someone else paid the price dearly. 

Its like early drug studies being done on humans and not lab animals.

What is with these jurisdictions that think its OK to test on public roads thereby subsidizing corporations and adding a new danger for the public?

Let these companies set up and pay for their own private testing facilities far away from public roads until the body count is roughly equal.

38 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Actually, I think most of the individual cars will be SHARED cars and they will be fully automated. The hybrid thing is strictly a transition thing and about the testing phase which of course will take several years. 

Most consumers in the USA aren't that big on "shared" anything... that communist, lefty, socialist scenario of yours will take more than the decade or two you stated... LOL!!

On 3/23/2018 at 4:10 PM, Thaidream said:

Yes, they gave away a lot.  Let's start by making  Apple bring the complete manufacturing base for the I phone out of China back to the United States.  If they don't- they can still import it back at a 50%  excise tax on the product.  Apple could easily make this phone in America   and keep the price the same but it's profit margin would go down.  Too Bad.  How about American industry start doing things for America and Americans instead of selling the company store abroadto make more billions.

Any of these companies ever hear of patriotism!

Its called fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders and is a founding and binding principle of corporations as we created them. Let me repeat - a corporation is legally bound to its shareholders and the bottom line NOT to people of any nation.

If your are looking for corporations to right the ship god help you.