Displaying comments 1 to 50 of 2025
MeFi post:
Dating A Banker Anonymous
I only hope that Americans' fondness for guns means a class revolution instead, as bloody and terrible as that would be. To paraphrase, Up against the Wall Street, Motherfuckers.
Yeah, well, I hope somebody decides to shoot your ilk.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:08 PM on January 28, 2009
MeFi post:
Tomato Juice Terrorism in the Skies
Well, it's not that much of a derail if it's the centerpiece example of both posted links, and if it is a derail then it's one that is contributed to just as much by those arguing in the woman's defense.
And if the best example of PATRIOT Act overreaching they could find was a child abuser who wasn't even convicted under the PATRIOT Act, well, it makes you wonder.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:37 PM on January 25, 2009
Threatening passengers with violation of federal offenses and felony charges (and lying about passenger behavior) must constitute some kind of criminal violation, since flight attendants are not officers of the law.
Lying to the police can of course be a crime. I'm not sure why you think it's a crime to tell someone that what they're doing or contemplating doing is a crime, and that if they continue, you'll report them to the police, though.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 5:23 AM on January 26, 2009
MeFi post:
Why Google Employees Quit
I'm sorry, I don't understand your reasoning. You don't think people should pass laws against unethical work practices (like 80-100 hour work weeks). But then you say...
I don't really see the ethical problem with skilled workers working long work weeks. I don't work 80 hours a week, typically, but I usually work more than 40, and this is a choice. I decided that I wanted more money and that I wanted to be doing a particular type of work, so here I... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 9:24 AM on January 19, 2009
It's the same thing with an 80 hour work week - you're destroying your life in order to compete. If you do it then everyone else will have to do it, because it provides you a competitive advantage and eventually it becomes the standard. However, we'd all be better off if we made a rule that it was cheating and threw anyone who did it out of the competition.
Would we all be better off? If my job had an enforced 40 hour work week, either my salary would... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:51 AM on January 19, 2009
But by saying the work week should be unregulated, so you can burn out in a burst of Libertarian glory, you're also saying you know what's best for everyone else. Or, what is more likely, you just don't care about anyone other than yourself.
I didn't say that the work week should be unregulated, though. If you read the post I was responding to, it was advocating a hard limit of hours worked per week. My post, in turn, is responding to that idea,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 11:41 AM on January 19, 2009
So as that's largely irrelevant due to lack of information, you've got to either argue the larger issue (whether we'd collectively be better off) or continue on with a tangent that doesn't matter to anyone who's not you.
No, it doesn't work that way. There's even less information about what you term the "larger issue", so don't pretend that this is about information. In fact, nobody here has any idea what would happen over all.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:58 PM on January 19, 2009
Also, realistically, they're not going to replace you with someone smarter. They're going to hire the smarter guy on the side, since if they can't con one person into doing the work of two they're going to have to hire both of them.
You're ignoring fixed per-employee costs. Also, it's not a "con" if it was disclosed ahead of time.
Well, unless you're on the edge of survival, trading your entire home life... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 11:03 PM on January 19, 2009
MeFi post:
“They didn’t tell me I had to do anything particular with it”
The US really should've looked at how the Swedes did it in the '90's.
They did. The capital puchase program under TARP is a lot like what you describe. Here is a set of model documents, if you're interested (you'll probably want to start with the the term sheet). You can find weekly transaction reports here.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 11:37 PM on January 18, 2009
That's not true. As the Times article says, "Congress approved the $700 billion rescue plan with the idea that banks would help struggling borrowers and increase lending to stimulate the economy."
That just doesn't make any sense. Using the TARP investments to make more risky loans would've put us right back where we started. You talk about banks being "relentlessly irresponsible", but would it really have been responsible to use... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:34 AM on January 19, 2009
Should we *not* be upset that billions of taxpayer money were given away to the financial industry, with no promise of any sort of return on our investment?
As I pointed out earlier in the thread, the TARP capital purchase program (which seems to be the only ongoing, active TARP program) involves the sale of preferred shares, senior debt, and warrants to the Treasury. I frankly don't see how you can characterize this as "no promise of any sort of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 11:16 AM on January 19, 2009
Totally in agreement, and that's kind of my point. Was what these bankers did with TARP illegal?
It's worth noting that the TARP capital purchase plan letter agreement (in the fourth paragraph) contains an integration clause that would make it difficult to argue that there was a side agreement to use the funds in a particular way not set forth in the agreement itself.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 4:20 PM on January 19, 2009
MeFi post:
No pals in Canada
Who would have guessed that belonging to a radical revolutionary group that planned and committed bombings would lead to trouble down the road with law enforcement? Oh, the injustice!
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 3:31 PM on January 19, 2009
MeFi post:
what the luck
Rally cars are members of the set of race cars.
True, but even worse, ericb called them "racing cars". It would be difficult to argue that the cars in the video weren't, in fact, racing. Incorrect pedantry makes me so angry!
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 2:52 PM on January 17, 2009
Clearly this didn't need to be so big a deal, but that doesn't mean that people can't use (admittedly precise) terms correctly
What you're not understanding is that "racing" and "car" are not precise terms, necessarily. The words "racing" and "car" both can be used in their ordinary senses and combined according to the rules of English grammar to form basically semantically compositional phrases.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 3:19 PM on January 17, 2009
MeFi post:
Taibbi reviews Friedman's latest
Forget the Cinnabon.
Name me a herd animal that hunts.
Name me one.
"Herd of seals" seems to have the most ghits. "Pack of wolves" obviously trounces "herd of wolves".
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:43 AM on January 17, 2009
Interestingly, "pod of dolphins" is far more popular than "herd of dolphins", but "herd of dolphin" is substantially more popular than "pod of dolphin". "Herd of dolphin" is much more popular than "herd of dolphins", too.
Nobody says "herd of seal", though.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:49 AM on January 17, 2009
What does "porn-starched" mean? I know what porn is and I know what starch is, but, and I know this betrays some great lack of imagination on my part, I can quite picture them together.
You misread. It's "porn-stached". It means, roughly, "mustachioed in the manner of a actor in pornography".
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 9:16 AM on January 17, 2009
Herd of mudkips?
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 1:49 PM on January 17, 2009
MeFi post:
So, how would I go about laundering money?
I don't really understand the Social Security panic. It's not a Ponzi scheme in any ordinary sense of the word. It's a system whereby current wage-earners fund benefits for retirees. I guess this would resemble a Ponzi scheme if it required an unrealistically expanding group of wage-earners in order to continue to fund benefits, but nobody has shown me this is the case.
A system like this is certainly subject to demographic problems, and the ratio of wage-earners to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 9:25 AM on January 17, 2009
Social Security money is invested in Treasuries.
There's an interesting question. Can the federal government sensibly be said to invest in its own debt? I guess it depends on what the debt proceeds are.
If I have $10 and I lend it to myself and then use it to buy an investment asset, that still looks like an investment. If I use it to buy candy, it looks less like an investment.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:49 AM on January 17, 2009
MeFi post:
Sometimes it is; Sometimes it isn't.
It should be immediately obvious that the Israelis aren't attempting a genocide.
Nobody said they were. Somebody just said the Rwandan Genocide was worse than the Israeli massacre, and this almost certainly correct.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 6:43 PM on January 16, 2009
Yeah, it's a regular laugh riot.
I think he was just expressing the opinion that characterization as a "massacre" is specious, not that the underlying event (however it should be characterized) is funny.
Personally, I don't know what a massacre is with any specificity, so I have no opinion. There are certainly exemplars of both massacres and non-massacres: herding 1,000 unarmed people into a pen, then machine gunning... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:05 PM on January 16, 2009
It's terrorism if Khalid puts on an explosive vest and gets on a bus full of Israeli kids to takeout one IDF soldier; it's "defending Israel's right to exist" if Avi drops a cluster bomb on a Gazan school full of kids, to take out one reported possible "sniper".
Did either of those events even happen?
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 9:29 PM on January 16, 2009
And what's the purpose of smoke? Screening large movements of armoured units? I'm not buying it -- Sounds like 50 year old excuses to me.
It doesn't seem at all implausible to me. If you want soldiers to advance across an open area, such as a field, square, or even up a street, that's open to enemy fire from a hidden location, a smoke screen strikes me as a very effective solution. What do you think the modern alternative would be?... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 9:03 AM on January 17, 2009
MeFi post:
Pete Souza
I have dealt with hundreds of biographies (which generally include pictures) of U.S. government officials over the last 8 years or so, but I can't remember more than a handful where the official is not in the center of the frame.
Really? Look at these: George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, and Gerald Ford.
(Before anyone accuses me of not acknowledging Democrat Presidents, Clinton and Carter both are well-centered... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:08 PM on January 16, 2009
Yea, really. Most of the bios I deal with, the people look like in these DoD leader pics.
It's quite funny, then, that Republican Presidents (and Obama!) wander off the right side of the portrait. Obama is a stealth Republican? You heard it here first, folks.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:26 PM on January 16, 2009
MeFi post:
Popaganda
"How come you're allowed to have private property on public space?"
Under certain circumstances, the governmental authority tasked with administering the public space will lease you a limited right to place or affix your property to public property in exchange for a fee. HTH.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:23 PM on January 16, 2009
When a outdoor advertising company is permitted, you're under the corporates rules, in which the First Amendment doesn't apply.
It's not that the First Amendment doesn't apply. It just doesn't generally protect expressive defacements of other people's property.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 8:59 PM on January 16, 2009
MeFi post:
Ibuprofen: serious business
I think this case will really torment the SC. On one hand they, like all red-blooded Americans, hate pedophiles and want them tortured and killed in a way that is inhumane as medically possible...On the other hand, the "conservative" members of the court desire to undermine the rights of citizens to be free from unreasonable search.
While "liberal" members of the court desire to undermine the rights of citizens to a jury trial. It's a real pickle.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:57 PM on January 16, 2009
MeTa post:
Two heads are better than one
I've thought long and hard on why people like to ridicule PETA for trying to help animals, and I've come to a very exquisite conclusion: Those people are bad people.
People don't ridicule PETA for trying to help animals. They ridicule PETA for trying to help animals in ridiculous ways.
posted to MetaTalk by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 6:06 AM on January 16, 2009
MeFi post:
Tax Trouble at Treasury
Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I don't think a tax dodger should be the head of Treasury. Secretary of Education? Sure. Secretary of Agriculture? Why not. But Treasury?
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:07 PM on January 14, 2009
According to the transition team, Mr. Geithner's accountant advised him that he was not required to pay the employer payroll taxes on his IMF salary.
Really? The Form 1040 SE isn't conducive to that error, because it doesn't have you calculate the employer and employee halves separately.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:46 PM on January 14, 2009
And I don't even want to get started on the lack of corporate tax enforcement under Bush, as I want to get a good night's sleep
It's more complicated than that. Apparently, under Bush, corporate tax revenues as a percentage of GDP hit their lowest since 1983 (in 2003) and their highest since 1978 (in 2006).
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:09 PM on January 14, 2009
If this man's defense is that his paid professional made a minor, non-criminal error, and he has subsequently paid the correct taxes and penalties, I literally care not a tap about it.
My point was that it's not a minor error. If it was an honest error, it was a bafflingly stupid one, particularly if made by a tax professional. It's also interesting that the same mistake was apparently made both in years Geithner was filing his own taxes and in years... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 10:27 PM on January 14, 2009
Guy messed up his taxes, and trying to devine whether or not he did it on purpose, whether or not he knew what he was doing was improper, is idiotic.
The way you frame the issue, as "guy messed up on his taxes", does heavily lean toward the conclusion that this isn't a big deal. It's worth asking why you frame the issue that way, though.
Suppose, for a moment, that Geithner didn't pay the correct amount of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:44 AM on January 15, 2009
MeFi post:
Three Opinions On What to Do With the Bush Administration's Misdeeds
Quite simply, I think he misses an important point: it is not for us to decide whether forgiveness is appropriate. No matter how personally some may have taken the Bush Administration, the victims of their torture policies were in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, and perhaps for victims of rendition, elsewhere. Let them decide.
There's nothing even remotely simple about what you just said. What are you suggesting?
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:23 PM on January 11, 2009
How we put that into motion is not my area of specialty, but at the very minimum it should involve the communities this administration affected...We need to hybridize in clever ways (perhaps asset forfeiture ahead and contingent liability ahead of imprisonment and execution).
Why do we need to do this? Before inventing some exotic new legal regime, it's worth reflecting on just what the exigency is.
When you say that the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:45 PM on January 11, 2009
Bush made such political theater about Iraqi's voting with their purple fingers, how fitting would it be for a referendum. Have a nationwide referendum and let that inform the Obama administration.
Ah. You're daydreaming. Maybe we can have Superman throw Bush and his cronies into the sun.
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 7:52 PM on January 11, 2009
MeFi post:
Land of my Fathers
In my opinion the apparent long-term intractability of the I/P conflict is not a given--despite the fact that Israel's current position is both so morally bankrupt and counter-productive (Israel has done more for Hamas recruitment this week than anything Hamas could ever have done).
"Morally bankrupt" is totally meaningless, but what do you think would be most productive to Israel's interests?
posted to MetaFilter by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 4:38 PM on January 3, 2009
MeTa post:
This dude is a troll.
When reading your passive-aggressive attacks on members of the site, such as the one above, it is worthwhile to point out that this is what you contribute to this site, on the whole.
Seriously, what are you talking about? I typically figure that your total inability to deal with anything resembling reality is just performance art, but you seem kind of earnest now. What did you interpret as a "passive-aggressive attack"?
posted to MetaTalk by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America
at 3:36 PM on January 2, 2009
