>> ^A10anis:

Don't get me wrong. I hate any legislation which inhibits our freedoms. But considering the horrific injuries sustained every year - especially to kids - surely it's time to stop selling explosives (which is, basically, what they are) to the general public. Sorry if I sound like a party pooper.


The interesting thing is, I live in Japan now where fireworks are easily accessible to just about everybody and you don't see anything like that kind of dangerous behavior here. And that's not because Japanese kids participate in less risky behaviors or anything--they get into their fair share of trouble. But I think growing up in a culture where fireworks are just normal and seeing adults using them safely all the time (it's a tradition to set them off in the summer), kids here don't see anything special about them and apparently don't even considering doing stupid and dangerous things with them.

>> ^A10anis:

Don't get me wrong. I hate any legislation which inhibits our freedoms. But considering the horrific injuries sustained every year - especially to kids - surely it's time to stop selling explosives (which is, basically, what they are) to the general public. Sorry if I sound like a party pooper.


Yeah leave them to the professionals. http://americanpyro.com/State Laws (main)/statelaws.html from http://www.hardocp.com/news/2012/07/03/fireworks_laws_in_all_50_states ... It was interesting. I didn't know it was legal in my CA state. I always thought it was illegal.

I finished the equivalent of 1.5 years of high school over a 4-year period, dropped out for a few years, did my equivalency, and got in the top ten percentile, then made the Dean's List and got scholarships my first year at university.

So yeah, screw high school. Bloody useless, especially comapred with taking care of your family. Geez.

Much like the cotton candy guy in the top ten - stop it and gimmie what I ordered. Seriously if I'm thirsty I don't want to sit through a 3 minute performance before I get my food/drink. We really need to slap these minimum wage servants back to reality. I don't wanna see the monkey do tricks - I can hold down a job, family and house at once, nice work on juggling a bottle.

@renatojj

Politicians don't have their hands all over businesses, it's the opposite. Businesses have their hands in the strings that direct the politicians. Which means politicians are not serving society, but serving businesses. There are many examples of things happening that you know are wrong and can see are wrong, but nothing ever happens...why? Because businesses are either making money on them or mitigating money loss by it happening.

Look at nuclear power regulations, they have been loosened and the inspectors are actually limited in what they can inspect so much so that they don't actually see more than 5 or 10% of the workings of a nuclear plant. How can they say something is safe if they see less than 10% of it and those 10% don't even allow them to do tests they used to do?

Oil company regulation, why did the BP oil spill happen? It was because they are not held to standards damn near every other country on the planet holds them to. And when you see more into it, many times the oil inspection agents were going to work for the oil company when they retired. And yet they rarely busted their balls on questionable things and got caught with their pants down many times with not catching violations.....so they probably weren't hired for their inside knowledge on how to best keep the existing equipment up to standards....since they aren't being held to them.


And as for the last post you made...you can't just drop regulation on all of these things. There's countless reasons for it but I'll try to list a few.

1) They basically hold a monopoly in many industries or a small number of very large companies that end up basically being a monopoly, so there would be no counter balance of a free market because the market has never been free to begin with. If it were truly free there'd be 100/1000/10000/100k/1mil businesses in these industries all competing on either features or price because they should all be about as reliable as one another...since we always have to picture the "perfect" free market. I'll bet you can name a couple people who have shit internet service pretty easy or pay a lot for very little.

2) You are putting the policing of industries in the industry hands if you dial back regulation. They already can not regulate themselves. How many companies supported SOPA and now how many more support CISPA? They do what's best for them and they do it cooperatively not independently. That's why you have groups formed of these companies putting bills forward that are basically passed nearly word for word if edited at all by congress critters.

3) We hear all the time about businesses only responsibility is to make money. We don't even hold a person to that standard, an individual has more responsibilities than that...earning a living is probably in the top ten but it's not your sole major responsibility as a member of society. Number 1 could arguably be "obey the law" or "don't be a dick". Business number 1 should probably be don't negatively impact people as your business model....this could be not polluting, keeping a safe work environment, not overworking people, making underhanded deals in the name of profit, making deals you know you will back out of or have no intention to honor, etc. Yes shit happens, but you shouldn't make your business model based on making shit happen to profit. Banks and financial institutes arguably did this with bad mortgages and false rating of these mortgages when selling them.

@messenger

It's not just bribing politicians, but businesses openly courting people for employment after their term of service or the people regulating them. It makes it more profitable to be lenient and not enforce regulations or laws on companies when you'll be making 3x your salary when you go to work for them after kissing their ass for a decade or two. Both the bribes and the business tie ins with Haliburton made the early days of the current war seem pretty shady when you look specifically at Dick Cheney. But it happens with advisors to people in office as well, it's something that really should be stopped because government should be about public service and not service with the intention of landing a sweet gig at some company you helped make a few billion dollars for awhile a public servant.

You can't stop it entirely, but there should definitely be some lawful punishments put in place to make it have to cost the companies exorbitant amounts to court people to court them with the severe punishments placed on people who stray too far from the path. Like prison terms or fines to the tune of percentages of their life savings and 25% of a company's value if they are caught. Unfortunately, the people who would put forth these laws are the same people who would be directly affected by them....because they are all business owners anymore...it costs too much money to get into office and rich people are the only people who tend to have the wealth/power to pull it off.

So......regulations on companies it the best you can hope for, make it so politicians can't offer them anything worth the huge donations they make to these people because regulations would make the attempts worthless, unless of course it was deregulation. Which they've already done and continue to do, to the detriment of all. Profits are up for all the big companies sometimes higher than pre-crash, and yet they employ less people than they did 5 years ago. How are they pulling THAT off....they are cutting corners or doing something shady somewhere to keep earning like that despite being less capable of producing like they did prior when a lot more people had disposable income.

Jayden and Aiden in the top ten in 2010. This is why I'm using a traditional family name for my first son. Eleazar III

EDIT: I'm old fashioned... I think names should mean something or come from somewhere or at least NOT be picked from a top ten list of baby names.

George Carlin stopped being funny 10 yrs before he died. I don't laugh I just get annoyed at the cranky old bastard taking his logic too far. I'm not just following a generational pattern. Jayden, Cayden, Brayden... these are genuinely dumb names and you're a goofy trend follower if you name your kid this way (including any time past 2004, when it was already old).

EDIT #2: Literally MORE THAN HALF of my friends' male kids born in the past ten years have names like this. I'm so fucking sick of it.

>> ^Trancecoach:

I think you've got a point.>> ^budzos:
What is with this name Jayden? Why is every second male being on the planet now named Jayden, Cayden, or Brayden? When did the world become so fucking stupid!?

>> ^jonny:

dead


Boo. I can't find a replacement.

Still so angry that Montoya went Nascar. The man is still one of the top ten best drivers on the planet and he's floundering in a series where your driving talent only counts for 10% of your success, (who you know and who you blow being the other 90). What a waste.

Well, this seems to have turned into a public forum....

I, too, miss the QUALITY contributions of blankfist, @RhesusMonk. The QUALITY contributions have been stellar. Some of the funniest things on the Sift came from his observations. Funny and smart. What's not to like?

Let me tell you.

It wasn't just the obvious trolling.

I don't miss the personal attacks, and the thin-skinned whining that followed when blankie was told off by fellow Sifters and then ultimately dag. Talk about being able to dish it out but not being able to take it!

If anyone has received preferential treatment, it has been blankie. Blankie has been responsible for driving many folks away from the sift, but because he did make QUALITY contributions, he was allowed to come back again and again.

Besides, I think this is a perfect way to flameout on the Sift, and is an absolutely PERFECT final troll on the Sift. A mere 90 or so vids away from Galaxy, and to walk away from that glory? That is classy, funny, in-your-face proud and defiant. Listed on the Top Ten with the Circle Line logo as a Galaxy symbol, as @Fusionaut noted?

The Perfect Troll. Absolutely Perfect Troll.

4 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

>> ^budzos:

You sound like a real connoisseur of comedy. Dice is top ten of all time, and not just for that nursery rhyme stuff, which I never liked. (and I'm not talking about top ten most successful... top ten most talented).
>> ^spoco2:
Most people don't like just abusive comedy, we don't.
Sure, there's got to be some market for it, otherwise Andrew Dice Clay, with his complete lack of talent, wouldn't have become famous for just insulting people... but generally? Not going to happen.


You point me to ONE performance of his that is actually funny. Like, is AT ALL clever. AT ALL witty. AT ALL insightful.

You can go blue in the face ranting about the size of the stadium shows he used to do, but none of it is ever good comedy. It's not. He's not top ten of all time in any terms of 'good comedy'. It's all base, all simplistic, none of it is good. He's just not funny.

Now, me not finding him funny doesn't make him not so to many, but he is also not top ten of talent in anything.

You sound like a real connoisseur of comedy. Dice is top ten of all time, and not just for that nursery rhyme stuff, which I never liked. (and I'm not talking about top ten most successful... top ten most talented).

>> ^spoco2:
Most people don't like just abusive comedy, we don't.
Sure, there's got to be some market for it, otherwise Andrew Dice Clay, with his complete lack of talent, wouldn't have become famous for just insulting people... but generally? Not going to happen.

I'll dig out some more when I'm at home. For now, give Port-Royal a shot: http://port-royal.bandcamp.com/ It's not all ambient though.

Track 6, Karola Bloch on the Flares album may be my favourite electronica track of all time. It's a 12 minute epic of electronic excellence.
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

@Hybrid - I have "A Strangely Isolated Place" by US and love the heck out of that album. It's one of my top ten ambient albums, along with Boards of Canada's 'Music Has the Right to Children', 'Geogadi', Aphex Twin's "Ambient Works - II" "Drukgs" and Brian Eno's "Ambient 1, Ambient 4" and "Apollo".
What other ambient stuff do you listen to?

@Hybrid - I have "A Strangely Isolated Place" by US and love the heck out of that album. It's one of my top ten ambient albums, along with Boards of Canada's 'Music Has the Right to Children', 'Geogadi', Aphex Twin's "Ambient Works - II" "Drukgs" and Brian Eno's "Ambient 1, Ambient 4" and "Apollo".

What other ambient stuff do you listen to?