Trump, our next president, promised to block AT&T/Time Warner merger
arstechnica.com
arstechnica.com
My prognostication is that when they "look at" stopping it (if they do) they will find what everyone who has worked in the world he's entering found out long ago: it's only possible through strong regulation. Fine, he'll think: I'll just embolden the regulators. This, I think, will be when the people who elected him will start to realize how business is done and that, just like in their private lives, they've bought into yet another CEO's fanciful promises that once again turned out to be self-serving in their entirety.
/s
Another thing bothers me: you're supposed to look at risk/return, not simply return, in evaluating investment strategy.
And they, on average, would have done a little better than Trump did.
> Treatment of IPOs. Initial public offerings should be seasoned for six to 12 months before being considered for addition to an index.
So if the S&P 500 explicitly excludes equities to IPO into the index, then how is it that an investor in an S&P 500 index is delegating wealth creation? They're just trading the returns with other investors. And to be clear, this is totally great for the investor! But it shouldn't be confused with actual business.
[1]: https://us.spindices.com/documents/methodologies/methodology...
If I'm an investor that buys at IPO time, how many companies am I willing and able to invest in if I have to wait for the profits to come in through yearly dividends? And so, if I'm a VC, how many companies am I willing and able to invest in if the IPO market is much smaller? And so, if I'm an entrepreneur, how many companies can I found and create value from if I have very little chance of selling them off?
The index funds are the terrain that sustain the "wealth creators".
Because that doesn't change the point. They could delegate further if appropriate.
But one way or another, those mature companies create wealth. (If they did not, the S&P 500 index would not rise.)
No. How much wealth could those individuals create if they couldn't sell the companies on the market and invest that money, and had instead to accumulate dividends? The relationship is symbiotic.
Yes, Trump created wealth, but the point is that his peers would have created even more if he hadn't used that money himself. To make an analogy, I can swim a few laps, but you wouldn't want to have me replace Michael Phelps on your team.
The bigger point I want to make is that the standard deviation on returns of a single venture like Trump's is so large that you cannot meaningfully compare it to a highly-diversified basket of stocks.
To use your analogy, it'd be like evaluating the effectiveness of a coach in a swimming event by picking a single one of their swimmers and comparing them to the average times of the U.S. Olympic team. Does this necessarily imply anything at all about the skill of the coach?
I disbelieve (1) because of his multiple high-profile bankruptcies.
His father, Fred Trump, built a real estate empire of 27.000 apartments in Brooklyn and Queens. Just sitting on those and maintaining and expanding it would have resulted in a fortune many times bigger than he has today.
After all an index fund is basically just the average of all of the investments inside it.
Great respect to all who went out and built something great. Trump is not one of them; he would be penniless if his dad hadn't rushed in and saved him on at least two separate occasions.
I voted for Clinton and volunteered for the campaign, but I'll gladly push him to keep his word on this promise and the others that I believe will benefit our country.
The next election cycle is going to be brutal.
[0]: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jul/... [1]: http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/20/do...
50%+ of the country voted against him. It's up to us hold his feet to the fire and wake up the other 50%.
If Trump won, he won in the margins and due to lack of enthusiasm on Clinton's side. That is my entire point.
So-called "fact checkers" are almost never non-partisan in practice, pronouncing half-truths or outright lies as facts and truth or almost correct information as (in PolitiFact terms) "Pants on fire" lies.
Where he needs to deliver is: the wall ( not literally though) making us more powerful in military and maybe a bit protectionism for US firms. And remove obamacare.
Thats it.
For the rest not done he will blame the other ( parties) not patriotic enough.
He would make America great again!
But you know! Those damn commies!
That's bad
> force companies to give up encryption keys.
They already did that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavabit
Like anyone in power, he should be held to account, and held to his promises. At least we can look forward to the media actually challenging the powers that be in the years ahead.
I'd also like to point out I've seen a lot of people calling Trump voters racist, sexist, homophobic, fascists. Let's not pretend like there's something uniquely toxic about that place.
(disclaimer: I dont spend much time in any political forums. Can you link some if I'm wrong?)
[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5cafd5/need_a_p...
[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c8xej/presiden...
[2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c8xej/presiden...
[3]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7uk2/game_ove...
[4]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7tq2/we_won_t...
[5]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7ic6/1_trendi...
[6]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7ic6/1_trendi...
[7]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7ic6/1_trendi...
[8]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7ic6/1_trendi...
[9]: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5c7ic6/1_trendi...
Any different to Obama promising to close Guantanamo bay?
And I say this as an Obama supporter.
Bush, Bill Clinton, Obama, Trump, all the same.
"I will release my tax returns when Obama releases his birth certificate." - http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2011/04/donald-trump-intervi...
"If I run for office I will absolutely release my tax returns." - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg-5KEt1Abg
"Melania will hold a press conference on questions about her immigration." - https://twitter.com/JDiamond1/status/763158326653882368
"I will pay the legal fees of the man who punched a black guy at my rally." - http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meet-press-march-13-20...
"I will self fund my campaign." and other related promises - http://www.npr.org/2016/07/14/485699964/every-position-donal...
I'm not very familiar with his life before the campaign, but I'm sure there are more examples.
> We’ll look at that. Maybe I’m going to do the tax returns when Obama does his birth certificate. I may tie my tax returns. I’d love to give my tax returns. I may tie my tax returns into Obama’s birth certificate.
This is how Trump talks. For the entire campaign he talked about what he "might" do and backtracked if people didn't like it, so this is what we have to work with.
And Trump isn't going to veto conservative signature pieces like repealing ObamaCare.
Interesting, isn't it? Presidents aren't autocrats. The Republicans play obstructionist politics, the people get pissed off at a government that's not doing anything, and then blame the wrong party. The do-nothing government that the people have just voted against? It's the government they've just voted for...
They are completely different. Obamacare has nothing do with universal healthcare in the UK sense, but is a complex system of mandates that dictates how private health insurance is bought and sold.
Very simply there are three key parts:
1) everybody (who doesn't for qualify other government programs) now has to have private health insurance that covers certain things. If they don't get this from their employer, they're responsible for buying it themselves.
2) The government sets minimum standards as to what insurance companies have to cover and regulate what premiums they can charge for this coverage. They also forbid insurance companies from denying people coverage due to pre-existing condition.
3) To make sure that people can afford these mandatory insurance policies, they offer heavy subsidies to people who earn less than a certain limit.
In their attempts to lock in parts of the law so that an incoming shift of government couldn't easily change or repeal it, the Democrats hardcoded idiocies like a fixed date for the launch of the healthcare.gov website and features it had to have while leaving funding and development of the site a bit up in the air.
In a nominally functioning government, the ACA would have been a broad, general law laying out specific goals, requirements and mandates for compliance, delegating implementation and enforcement to a new or existing agency. But in the "regulations are bad, laws are good" environment in DC, processes and requirements which should have been regulations (which can be drawn up and vetted by a bureacracy under legislative supervision) ended up being in the actual law, which can only be changed by Congress and the President working together, which all but stopped after the 2010 midterm elections.
Add in the the Federal government is limited (by design) in what it can mandate individual States can do and you have this mess called Obamacare.
I don't support repealing it, I do support modifying it to make implementation more flexible, but that is almost certainly not going to happen under a Republican government.
It also includes mandatory purchasing of health insurance, which (while necessary to make a fully private system work) is philosophically objectionable to most people.
(The NHS is a fully state owned system that nonetheless has an internal market, which some commentators have called "playing at shops".)
This is not true. Obamacare included a very large expansion of 'medicaid' which is more like single payer healthcare, i.e. 'government paid for / free healthcare'.
There's an income tax penalty for each month you're uninsured, which eats into your tax returns. Last I checked, this penalty is still cheaper than actually paying for insurance.
Congress basically looked at the healthcare systems in Canada and Europe, looked at the existing healthcare system, took all the worst parts of both, and squished them together to make ObamaCare. Conservatives hate it because it's big government in action. Liberals hate it because it does absolutely nothing to fix the undue burden on individuals to pay for their own healthcare. It's a lose-lose proposition.
So basically, the US government system doesn't care about its populous at all, regardless who sits in the big chair?
the affordable care act is far from perfect, but it's also not useless in any sense, and it needs to be modified not repealed. And yes I'm partially saying that because I and my brother will both lose and not be able to afford health insurance if it is repealed. I'm also saying that because I strongly belief in the benefits that have come out of the bill, even at the cost of some major downsides.
The US actually has a single-payer health care system, called Medicare, for people 65 and older. It's wildly popular with the people who benefit from it, of both parties. It seems to be pretty well-run and to exert at least some useful downward pressure on costs. Extending it to all citizens doesn't seem like that big a leap to me. Of course it would all but obliterate the existing insurance industry, which has bought itself a lot of Congresscritters.
I think it would be a fascinating and hilarious irony if Trump came out supporting single-payer in the form of universal Medicare. I think the argument for having a single risk pool is very strong. And I don't see any other solution to the interlocking problems of containing costs (which are way out of hand here) and getting everyone insured.
Trump (whom I voted against, BTW) has shown he's not afraid to go against the Republican establishment. I think when he really looks at this problem he may come to this conclusion.
That said, repealing ObamaCare is one of the things upon which Trump and most Republicans agree.
Obama earnestly tried to close Guantanimo.
He's a lawyer, and should have known better.
Guantanimo is a geostrategic issue - that only 'looks like' a Constitutional problem.
The problem is there are some very, very bad people in Guantanimo - and putting them through the American justice system would not work. Obama figured this out.
Paradox:
1) US Servicement are subject to a different legal system than Americans - harsher in many ways - but Dems wanted to put terrorist on US soil, subjecting them to regular courts - it would have been a farce.
2) US Soldiers are not the FBI. They don't do fingerprints. The kinds of evidence/investigation required to convict someone in US courts (meant for citizens) ... the defense attorneys could have easily kicked out the cases against the terrorists.
3) Many of these terrorists were caught on the battlefield. They could have been killed there - and none would have been the wiser. A young Canadian, was caught attacking US servicemen - and killed a medic. He was shot in combat, and was dying. US Special Forces arrived and medivaced and then applied super USA field medical technology to save this 'terrorist'. Then he was held at Guantanimo - in a really odd legal situation.
He was just a kid, but many of these guys are really, really bad characters, caught on the battlefield.
They don't belong in the US justice system.
So they go to Guantanimo and stay in limbo.
If you ask me - many of them deserve it.
As for the 'regular combatants' - that's too bad - I wish where were some way to reintegrate them, I think it happened with some.
Anyhow - the realities of the situation hit Obama - and the above issues are far to explain to Dems in a populist manner.
Obama orders people to die in drones strikes. Not so 'peace and love eh'? He does it because he has to, and he knows it.
Obama's 1st term was pretty good.
2cnd term, he didn't accomplish much, that said, he did not have the power.
You can't feasibly try enemy combatants in a civilian court of law - and that creates a legal limbo situation.
Obama was the most 'legally educated' President in 100 years and if he couldn't solve the problem, I'm not sure anyone will.
It will take some time to figure that one out.
The point of justice is to avoid further crimes by rendering the criminal harmless, and by making an example out of them to scare away other potential criminals. What does 'deserving it' have to do with this, and how is it applicable? Do you think prisons exist out of resentment toward people?
No. Or rather - 'criminal justice' as we understand it in the civil sense, does not apply here.
" What does 'deserving it' have to do with this, and how is it applicable? Do you think prisons exist out of resentment toward people?"
Some of the people in Guantanimo are terrorists of the worst kind. The people that planned 9/11. The kinds of people that chop off heads, who commit genocidal massacres, who grab little girls from families, rape them, and sell them into slavery.
Suppose one of these mass murdering criminals could be 're-integrated' into society, without much fuss, i.e. he sees the error of his ways, admits he was 'caught up in false jihad'. And we felt he could go back to a more stable part of Iraq and roughly go about his business? And we let him do that, and he pretty much behaved.
Would that be justice?
No.
99% of ex-Nazi SS-officers, after WW2, then one's that 'escaped' - went on to live relatively normal lives in hiding. They were 'reformed' essentially, and posed no threat to anyone. Their murderous activity was really in the context of WW2. Does that mean we let people who put people in the gas chamber go free?
No - some people deserve to die - and sometimes worse.
There are some kinds of 'bad people' that are either 'not reformable' or who have committed such grievous crimes such that 'true justice' is probably impossible.
I'm not advocating anything other than saying I have absolutely no sympathy for some of the people in Guantanimo.
Now - there are definitely some people there who were just 'villagers with guns, fighting for their village/community' whatever - and are not totalitarian, ideological, terrorists etc. - and sometimes that's a fine line, but clearly they don't belong there.
The 'injustice' is not the existence of Guantanimo, but simply our failure to apply 'actual justice' meaning some 'partly innocent' people are tangled up in a system designed for truly the most nefarious and evil types.
When we caught high ranking Nazi SS officers after WW2, we sentenced most of them to death. I suggest many ISIS fighters are far, far worse than SS officers.
Go ahead and watch the YouTube executions of thousands of Iraqi soldiers by ISIS after they took parts of Iraq. They were executed by the river, the river was literally running red with blood. I don't think that 'reform' is an issue that enters into one's mind when thinking about how to apply justice in those scenarios.
I appreciate that by enlarge, criminal justice should be focused on 'reform' but especially in these kinds of situations, it's really quite another reality.
I was in the (Canadian) Army a long time ago, and it was a difficult moral issue, but death is part of the equation. Think of this paradox: someone who has a gun and running from police, shooting back occasionally - will probably get a 'death sentence' on the street and that we generally accept. To think that mass murdering, genocidal people get more than that is a little disturbing.
Anyhow - I hope that we get better at separating the 'villagers with guns' from the 'genocidal terrorists'.
I agree that is a great injustice of Guantanimo.
Cop-out in the subtitle followed by thirty paragraphs of navel gazing.
> But Trump's promise to ...... won't necessarily be fulfilled.
You can write opt-ed pieces and be a pundit for a while if you think your own opinion might interest your readers too.
But mixing reporting with fact-free punditry and a heap of general virtue signaling in the same article is just detrimental to ones journalistic reputation and will immediately alienate everybody outside of your own echo chamber.
You researched facts why Trump's immigration policies are bad? People stopped reading after the initial "Trump is such a racist!" paragraph.
You researched facts why Clinton's Libya policies backfired? People stopped reading after the initial "Hillary is so crooked!" paragraph.
When a media outlet does something like that, I just can't take anything else they report on seriously.
here's the article: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/03/when-graded-on-te...
Personally I have not noticed any particular bias here except for at backing up assertions with some facts.
* Both parties have worked hard to polarize the population and make this election the most divisive ever.
* In the case of HN, your audience is from a most progressive or libertarian background, who have no love for most of the conservative agenda
* In the case of Facebook and Reddit, the Clinton campaign is paying people to bury any criticism of her. (Correct The Record)
Republican fanatics keep missing the part that comes next, or claiming that the lack of conviction is due to the system being rigged.
And of course no mention of Bush/Cheney and the private email server saga.
This actually gave me a good laugh thank you. Invoking Bush close to a decade after he left office while simultaneously giving his own candidate a pass for using an unsecured email server.
The funny thing is all you see and hear on hacker news is stories about companies getting hacked all the SV techies calling them stupid and morons. Then you have their candidate doing the same thing and suddenly its ok??
I never understood that logic.
https://wikileaks.org/clinton-emails/emailid/30324
Use the "view original PDF" link.
1) The analysis/grading was based on policy positions.
2) You're just wasting your keypresses if you honestly can't tell the difference between reporting someone else's work and their own analysis.
3) The actual report card for those interested [1].
[1] https://static1.squarespace.com/static/571681753c44d835a440c...
This doesn't sound like policy positions to me:
Candidates were ranked on "privacy and security" based on whether they understood the importance of strong encryption and supported reforming privacy and surveillance laws.