davetufts

What about laws that state only Congress can declare war or the rules of the War Powers Resolution? These don't stop the executive branch from engaging in war. Similarly, Buffet's simplistic solution wouldn't stop future deficits, because the ruling party could so easily redefine what a deficit is or what the GDP numbers are.

Retracktable iPhone connector? Yuck. My phone & MBP can both wirelessly communicate with devices half way around the globe, yet they need a special USB cord to talk to each other?

Plus, more than 50% of iPhone users never even bother syncing with a computer after the initial activation. Wired syncing & backups will probably be dead soon.

But it's a "news" site. I want to pay more attention to what the group finds important.

As a casual visitor, I really preferred seeing scores. Yes, I can read through every comment and judge for myself what's best (note: this is still possible even when scores were shown). But I prefer scanning the comments and just reading what the crowd liked most.

Your example requires that Congress pass legislation, which is exactly what I'm making a case for. In practice, and after reading this article, I doubt that will be the way it goes down.

One option relies on the rule of law; the other relies on the ad-hoc whim of whoever is in charge. While the result would be the same, there is a huge difference.

Nowhere in the law does Congress even have the authority to extend Mueller's stay for two years. If we're OK with that, we're essentially OK with Congress granting themselves powers outside the law. Congress certainly has the power to pass a new law removing or extending tenure. They do not have the authority to extend Mueller's tenure.

The whole point of laws is that it doesn't matter what your take or my take or the President's take is. The statute for the FBI Director's tenure is clear:

   "...the term of service of the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation shall be ten years. A Director may not serve more than one ten-year term."

There's nothing about extending the term with Congressional approval. If the President wants to keep Mueller around, the only way to legal do it would be to change the law. It doesn't matter what the reason for term limits was. At this point, it's simply a public law regardless of intent.

When was the last time you crawled? Probably much longer ago than that cursive paper, yet crawling, like cursive handwriting, is an important age-appropriate skill to learn. Sure, you could skip cursive and teach kindergarteners to type, but the motor skills kids learn THROUGH cursive is so much more important. Similarly, children that walk without ever learning the motor skills of crawling often have difficulties learning other things later in life.

You're missing the core point. The politician doesn't need to say no to corporate money. He can, and should, say yes to all the money that any person or business wants to donate. The problem is when the politician writes into law a regulation, tariff, or rule that benefits a specific donor.

I fundraise for my kid's school. A local bank, ABC Savings, makes a considerable donation. There's no expectation that the school will pass a rule where we only accept students if their parents bank at ABC Savings. There's a difference between accepting campaign fundraising and quid pro quo.

I think it's incredibly black & white. It must be the legislators. They are the ones with power to pass laws. Even if businesses "encourage" (not "produce") corruption, the law makers must have some control over their own actions, right? Why don't defense contracts lobby Dennis Kucinich? Why doesn't Monsanto lobby Ron Paul? If there were 535 legislators who respected the constitution, there wouldn't be a lobbying industry.

The problem is not lobbying. A lobbyist should be free to ask a member of Congress if their organization can have a tax break. The problem is the Congressman who grants the tax break. We need to stop thinking of our representatives as innocent victims of lobbyist culture.

Why is it a "critical advantage" to measure how much the baby eats? Babies need to eat when they're hungry and they stop when their stomach is full.

> you can't formally be an LLC principal and take W2 wages

That's incorrect. An LLC can file as an S-Corp and the partners can take W2 wages.

Like I said, the discrepancy is if you're NOT logged in.

I set my profile to private. I turned off "Public Search Results" and "Facebook Search Results" is set to "Only Friends".

If you're not logged in, my URL returns a 404: http://www.facebook.com/davetufts (or by ID: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=603069147 )

Not a huge deal, because the graph page only shows my name and ID, but they are publicly accessible: http://graph.facebook.com/davetufts or http://graph.facebook.com/603069147

But a 2.5% penalty for someone who makes $150,000 is a great deal for emergency care. Obviously family and kids change the decision-making process, but if I were single and making $150k, I'd rather pay a $3750 penalty and get free emergency room care (as anyone can today) than pay an insurance company $600/month.

In the end, passing a law that create more demand for private insurance services has little chance of driving the price down.

How can you write an article about this and not mention rising minimum wage laws? For most companies, it's just not worth it to buy an hour of employment from a 17 year old for $7.25.

The US system is not private. There are so many regulations, tax codes, and state mandates that you can't possibly consider the current situation a free market solution.

If you compare the complex mess in the US to a simpler federal-based system, of course the simpler one looks better. However, remove all regulations and tax implications from the US and prices will dive bomb and quality will improve.

"500 milliseconds" sounds so much faster than "half a second".

This is an interesting idea that might work nicely as a supplement to a normal resume and coverletter.

In terms of design quality, this execution seems a bit amateurish due to all the colors and typography.

The gold standard for personal information graphics is Nicholas Felton who publishes an annual report of his life at http://feltron.com

Where's the free-market?

Has the free-market taken us to multiple wars over the past 20-years with countries that have large oil reserves so oil can keep flowing in our direction? Has the free-market kept interest rates far below reality, allowing us to go on a massive consumption binge?

Does the free-market regulate agriculture, discouraging small farms in favor of massive CAFOs? Does the free-market subsidize huge agri-business to produce more corn than we can possibly use?

It's these unchanging economic and foreign policies that encourage waste, consumption, and addiction to fossil fuels, which, in turn, have a negative effect on our planet.

I agree about the hassle factor vs. cost.

In Dan Ariely's pricing experiment, if he gave a US audience the choice: 1 Candian penny for the Lindt truffles or a US dime for the Hershey Kisses, I'm sure 70+ percent would pay the dime because it's more convenient. It wouldn't prove that people want to pay more for a (seemingly) inferior product.

While that 2002 is probably Krugman's most blatant call for a housing "bubble". Mises.org just compiled a list of 7 other pre-2002 Krugman calls for lowering interest to stimulate home buying: http://blog.mises.org/archives/010153.asp

Like another commenter on this page states, Krugman didn't think a housing bubble was a good idea...but it was necessary to avoid a recession. Still, why not just deal with the consequences of the dot-com bubble then? Inflating another market just kicked the recession down the road and made it worse.

Unfortunately, Krugman and most politicians think we can fix the housing bubble by creating a currency bubble. Instead of focusing on a single market like housing, the current plan is to, yet again, kick the recession down the road. This time, however, we're promoting spending across all government-controlled and regulated markets with massive stimulus. Obviously, creates a bubble of dollars. When the dollar bubble deflates, there won't be anything left to blow up.

I'll paraphrase what I posted there...

Putting quotes from the Bill of Rights is pure propaganda. Money, in the U.S. is not issued by the government and has nothing to do with Presidents, the Constitution, or Bill of Rights.

These are Federal Reserve Notes, issued by the private, for-profit central bank. The only connection with our government are the federal legal tender laws that force citizens to accept these pieces of paper as "legal tender for all debts, public and private"

For a quote -- instead of something from the great Bill of Rights -- I'd love to see Woodrow Wilson's sad lament of his signing of the Federal Reserve Act. It would be much more appropriate.

"I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men." -- Woodrow Wilson

Very true -- I should have said compulsory attendance.

It's nearly impossible to discuss education, but ignore politics.

It's political policy that mandates compulsory education, forces taxation to pay for said education, and outlines what is taught in public schools. Politics play a role in acceptable curriculum for home and private schools, what age children are forced into these institutions, and what drugs & vaccines they must take to participate in the public system.

Politics can certainly play a role in vocalizing opposition to these policies.

"entitled"? That implies a choice. In the US, education is compulsory for certain age groups.

From the article: "The first surprising thing was how fast the national debt has grown in the last 30 years."

The sharp incline coincides with Nixon's 1971 end of the Bretton Woods system. Domestically the dollar has been off the gold standard since 1932, but up until 1971 foreign banks could still redeem US dollars for gold. Since gold is a limited commodity there's a limit on how much we can spend or borrow. Once that tie was broken, we were free to run unlimited debts.

Right, my comments are about "right now", because they reference the article which deals with the situation right now -- specifically firing AIG's management because they are "sucking down" big bonuses.

I contend that the article focuses on one of the symptoms "right now" (bonuses to poor management still running a company); whereas the cause is government intervention. Without that intervention, the "right now" symptoms would not exist, i.e. AIG would not exist.

You bring up the long debacle that led to this situation. However, you fail to mention that our government and the Federal Reserve have been tightly tangled with AIG for a long time. Regarding "multi-decade process", there's plenty of government blame to go around. http://www.lewrockwell.com/rozeff/rozeff253.html

If you're contenting that AIG was insolvent and still issuing insurance, they should have been prosecuted under state fraud laws, not bailed out with billions of dollars.

Directing anger at AIG is misguided. Our government is the wrongdoer here. Failing to let state bankruptcy court and natural liquidation happen - as we did with Enron - started the problem.

The problem with exec bonuses was exasperated in the final version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Here, Chris Dodd added the “Dodd amendment” http://www.google.com/search?q=dodd+amendment

It reads: ‘‘(iii) The prohibition required under clause (i) shall not be construed to prohibit any bonus payment required to be paid pursuant to a written employment contract executed on or before February 11, 2009, as such valid employment contracts are determined by the Secretary or the designee of the Secretary.” http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1:

That amendment guarantees all bonuses that were contracted before the date of the Act.

Of course, Dodd and Obama are “outraged”. But why did Dodd add that provision? Why did Obama sign it?

Not surprisingly Dodd, Obama, Bush, McCain, and Shumer are the largest benefactors of AIG’s massive lobbying. http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/recips.php?id=D000000123&...

AIG isn’t taking our money. Our government is.