🙅 THE BAD IDEAS THREAD
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So basically, you once told someone you did not like lobster and they made you leave?
You don't even like lobster rolls? You're a damned dirty Communist aren't you?
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Well, you can full-flick (until it jumps into a new stable position) and a-little-flick (in which case it reverts to neutral position) them in my car.The former does the usual thing, with blink until it gets cancelled by a turn.The latter only blinks a few times (5 or so?).
Mine (2015 Subaru) do that now (3 blinks). My previous Subaru (a 2006) didn't.
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Mine (2015 Subaru) do that now (3 blinks). My previous Subaru (a 2006) didn't.
Please tell me that neither of those has/had a fart can muffler?
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Please tell me that neither of those has/had a fart can muffler?
No. I went utilitarian, not sporty. Mainly Outbacks. Having dogs means I need space for their crates (Australian Shepherds).
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the Chevy LUV was a famous case of automakers circumventing the "chicken tax".
TIL. So, apparently, was the Ford Courier, one of which I used to
owndrive. On second thought, I was still in college when it died, so it was probably still registered in my parents' names.
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As a capitalist pig, that little bit of history fascinates me. Government puts egregious restrictions on trade, industry figures out loopholes.
Of course, lobbyists basically bought some of those loopholes. Some things never change.
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Sperm donor anonymity ends
###People donating sperm and eggs will no longer have the right to remain anonymous, under a new law which came into force on Friday.
##UK national sperm bank has just nine donors
###Just nine men are registered as donors a year after the opening of Britain's national sperm bank in Birmingham.Now, who didn't see that <ahem> coming?
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You don't even like lobster rolls? You're a damned dirty Communist aren't you?
I've had lobster a couple of times. It was really bland. I'd rather put the butter on, uh, popcorn. Lobster seems like a waste of money.
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Of course, lobbyists basically bought some of those loopholes. Some things never change.
Yep. Businesses will invest wherever they think they can make the most money. More and more, that's by either keeping the government off their backs or putting it on their competitors' backs.
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I've had lobster a couple of times. It was really bland.
It had to have been low quality or cooked improperly. Good lobster should be delicately flavored and subtly sweet, but not what I would call "bland". Good lobster should not need drowning in butter. It should be fine by itself.
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Good lobster should be delicately flavored and subtly sweet, but not what I would call "bland".
Tomayto, tomahto.
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Yep. Businesses will invest wherever they think they can make the most money. More and more, that's by either keeping the government off their backs or putting it on their competitors' backs.
I understand that. Did you forget who you are talking to?
Hell, I know they will do whatever they can to increase profitability. The problem with lobbying is not that businesses do it, it is that they are able to do it. We have a situation where we have an extremely unequal access to government. But that is a discussion for another thread.
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I understand that. Did you forget who you are talking to?
I was replying to you, but I was talking to all of the people who look at the abuse of governmental powers and come to the conclusion that the solution is more of the same.
The problem with lobbying is not that businesses do it, it is that they are able to do it.
Not that they're able to, but that it's a rational thing for them to do.
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Not that they're able to, but that it's a rational thing for them to do.
Explain please?
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@boomzilla said:
Not that they're able to, but that it's a rational thing for them to do.
Explain please?
If the government were more limited, they wouldn't be doing stuff that made it so the businesses wanted to spend money lobbying government instead of in other aspects of their business. IOW, improving their competitiveness by investment instead of using the government to disadvantage their competitors.
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If the government were more limited
I am with you so far.
they wouldn't be doing stuff that made it so the businesses wanted to spend money lobbying government instead of in other aspects of their business.
Well...no. Not really. Unless there is literally no government, there will always be things that lobbyists can do to gain them an advantage. It is just not plausible. There will always be some way that lobbyists could positively influence businesses as long as there is a government where it is allowed.
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Unless there is literally no government, there will always be things that lobbyists can do to gain them an advantage.
C'mon, Mr. Businessman, think about marginal returns and which opportunity you want to put your money into.
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As a businessman, I realize that it all corresponds to scale. Once the ROI is on the positive side, they would do it.
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Once the ROI is on the positive side, they would do it.
Yes, though you're not doing a very good job if you're doing it at the expense of higher ROI. The point is, the logic of restricting lobbying is ignoring the problem and focusing on a symptom.
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Yes, though you're not doing a very good job if you're doing it at the expense of higher ROI.
Thinking like a businessman, I realize that this only makes sense when thinking about extremely limited resources and not taking in to account the likely diminishing returns on those other investments.
Mega industry has limited resources, of course, but not the same limitations that you and I think of. Even today, with as fucked as our system of lobbying and PACs and special interest groups are, industry would still likely have a better ROI with advertising, marketing, R&D, etc. But all of those things have diminishing returns. You can only advertise so much before you reach saturation. Same with marketing. Same with R&D. Mega industry still has money left in the budget to further their business agenda, so some of it gets spent on lobbying.
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You are under the mistaken impression that businessmen act logically. Or at least that successful businessmen do.
TDWTF has plenty of counter-examples to that.
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Ah, I must have read too much into that statement, then. My bad.
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No, your hipsterish-more-cynical-than-thou routine just made you wrong in every way.
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No, your hipsterish-more-cynical-than-thou routine just made you wrong in every way.
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Your'e wrong.
The entire point of behavioral economics is that people don't behave "rationally", due to being Homo sapiens instead of homo economicus like most models assume.
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But if you're going to say that they never follow any sort of logic, like that they look for whatever will have the best outcome in a situation, I'll say that you're making a similar mistake, and I'm not really interested in arguing with you because the point you're making is not really interesting or useful.
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Oh totally agree there, was just pointing out that rational analysis isn't the only thing going on.
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Yes. But then, I never said it was.
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Yes. But then, I never said it was.
You forgot to rant about shoulder aliens and then bitch about people on this forum misinterpreting your statements, to be followed up in mere moments by you misinterpreting something someone said and complaining about how you cannot infer information from reasonable statements.
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If the government were more limited, they wouldn't be doing stuff that made it so the businesses wanted to spend money lobbying government instead of in other aspects of their business. IOW, improving their competitiveness by investment instead of using the government to disadvantage their competitors.
tl;dr: The only way to get money out of politics is to get politics out of money.
Unless there is literally no government, there will always be things that lobbyists can do to gain them an advantage.
Even if government did nothing but combat violent crime and enforce property rights?
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Even if government did nothing but combat violent crime and enforce property rights?
Especially then. Just start paying for the service of protecting you from violent crime and enforce your property rights, and government will focus on that and neglect others. We don't even have to look at places where the government is more or less identical with a business with a family-like structure.
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Even if government did nothing but combat violent crime and enforce property rights?
Yeah, property rights are still a matter subject to interpretation. At first glance it seems straight-forward, but can you not imagine a way that the concept could be twisted to suit one entity more than another?
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At first glance it seems straight-forward, but can you not imagine a way that the concept could be twisted to suit one entity more than another?
We've talked about the perpetual Disney copyright extension, so I guess you're right.
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Especially then. Just start paying for the service of protecting you from violent crime and enforce your property rights, and government will focus on that and neglect others.
You've lost me here. My question assumed that government would be focusing on violent crime and property rights and not doing anything else.
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You've lost me here. My question assumed that government would be focusing on violent crime and property rights and not doing anything else.
Government should at least focus on their civil servants not taking any money besides their salary, too. Otherwise there's no need to guess what'll happen.
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We've talked about the perpetual Disney copyright extension, so I guess you're right.
There ya go. Perfect example. Also, they have been allowed to take public domain works and turn them in to their own IP that is protected by perpetual copyright. Fucking bastards.
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Government should at least focus on their civil servants not taking any money besides their salary, too.
You mean, property that they have no right to?
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You mean, property that they have no right to?
First we had to define that right.
If we extrapolate that a bit further, we see that running a society is not only more complicated than we imagine, but even more complicated than we are able to imagine.
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First we had to define that right.
What's your point?
If we extrapolate that a bit further, we see that running a society is not only more complicated than we imagine, but even more complicated than we are able to imagine.
Yes. You couldn't agree with me more.
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What's your point?
I'm not sure if I understood your "right" remark right anymore. That we have to define that right, was just the first little thing that makes governing more complicated than anticipated.
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I'm not sure if I understood your "right" remark right anymore. That we have to define that right, was just the first little thing that makes governing more complicated than anticipated.
Well...@antiquarian had mentioned property rights, and then you started talking about how they would additionally have to enforce a...property right.
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Actually, I assumed he was referring to bribery, but that essentially amounts to the same thing in this case.
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While we are at it. What is it with turning indicators? If I "flick" (the stalk) mine they flash exactly four times, what fucking use is that?
Mine has these. I find them quite useful, especially in scenarios like lane changes where they don't auto cancel when turned on normally.
The end result it that I end up sending a series of contradictory turn indications, which I am sure confuses all those around me and the only thing stopping me seeing their gestures is my total concentration on trying to turn the fuckers off so I am not confusing them an cause an accident.
What? I've never known anyone struggle to deal with this concept. Trigger the flashes accidentally, either leave it, or hold the stalk in that direction for just longer than a flash and it'll stop.
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Nothing wrong with my car, not even the driver. I am almost prepared to pay for an all-expense trip for you to come over here and witness it.
The driver sounds like the issue. My car has this feature, it's literally never been confusing.
Incidentally, the cruise control almost always drops out on lane changes
This sounds like something is broken.
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Yeah, I know. I keep getting that back. But, for me they are "finger tip controls" i.e. In whatever direction the hand in moving (as the steering wheel turns they can be flicked in the direction of turn and you do not need to take a hand off of the wheel to do so, On the plus side, as you straighten up you can flick them off.
Warning: Do not spend too much time thinking about this as any one of the hundreds of logic flaws will cause the whole argument to evaporate is a postulate of nonsense
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The offer for a demonstration is still available.
Did I say it was a "crossover" model?
Not crossover as in something that is neither a Tourer or a 4WD, but an abortion between two version of the same model