Re: dbts: Privacy Fetishes, Perfect Competition, and the Foregone(fwd)

[Petro <petro@playboy.com>]

At 7:52 PM -0500 11/10/98, Jim Choate wrote:
>Forwarded message:
>> 	Really, you are saying they couldn't possibly recognize the
>> benefits of teaming up and co-locating fire stations, or that they wouldn't
>> sub-contract to a company that handled fires?
>So, you want to sub-contract out which is going to raise the cost and
>doesn't alleviate the insurance company from regulatory and supply issues.
>It'd cost a fortune.

	Sub-contracting can often lead to cost savings. For instance,
instead of each insurer having their own fire station network, they could
all share one, and only pay a certain cost-per-subscriber.

	Kind of like today where insurers don't usually own hospitals &
doctors offices.
>> 	"reasonable" in cost? There is a LOT if inefficiency in the system
>> that competition could eliminate.
>Yep, and a lot of people the competition would eliminate as well. I'll live
>with the inefficiency as long as the cost is affordable for the quality of
>service delivered. I don't mind fireman sitting around eating bar-b-q unless
>somebodies house burns down.

	I am not just talking about firehouses Jim, and I don't mind them
barbequing either.

>> 	Read that last bit. They got so carried away, that they spent
>> themselves out of existence.

>That is one example, I know of several fortune 100 companies that are equaly
>extravagant. The problem with Compu-Add was they shot their whole wad.

	Extravagance isn't always bad. I just spent 1 1/2 weeks (well
almost) living at a hotel in Sunnyvale on Playboy's dime. They let us spend
a bit of money, stay in nice hotels (Marriot Residence Inn), eat pretty
much what we want (I've never hit the meal limits, but I don't eat too
fancy) we can get up to a full sized car (they wouldn't let me rent a
motorcycle, but that was more insurance than anything), it is a bit on the
extravagant side, but I was also working 10 to 15 hour days for 12 straight
days (worked before I left to go out there as well). It's sort of a
"payment in kind".

	It isn't the extravagance of Business, it's the idiotic things they
spend money on. Microsoft Exchange for instance. About 5 times more
expensive than a competitive product, and about 20 times more expensive
than the cheapest commercial solution that will work.

	There is also a lot of free software out there that does the same
thing.

	So no, I am not going to try to say that Business is has to be more
efficient than Government, just that the market is usually more efficient
than Government.

>> 	Ok, so you limit the senators and congressmen, then the unelected
>> beaureacrats have the power since they know the system and run the system.
>
>Not at all, they are limited in what they can do by the laws. It's not like
>they're running around sending bills to people out of the blue and making up
>the system as they go along. Despite your protestations to the contrary the
>system just don't work that way.

	Look at the IRS, they make their own rules, and send bills to
people randomly.

>> 	Wearing a painted leather jacket & ripped up blue jeans is NOT a
>> reason to get hauled off the street, searched and questioned.
>If it happened to you and you didn't file a harrassment complaint then you
>got what you deserved. If you don't use the system it won't work.

	Oh, they had an excuse, someone wearing blue jeans and a leather
jacket robbed a store--On the other side of town, and I was walking.

>Never happened to me or anyone I knew unless they were in particular places
>at particular times. If a cop busts people at a corner every nite for
>breaking the law it isn't the cops fault, it's the stupid people who keep

	It is when the law used has been thrown out of court every time
it's used, and citizens complain, but the cops still use it to harass
people.


>> 	Looking different is not illegal.
>> 	Thinking different is not illegal.
>Nobody said it was and it isn't. Now if you happen to fit the description of
>another perp well that's just too damn bad.

	The cops seem to think so.

>> 	With a bunch thrown in at the federal level. Federal Matching Funds
>> & etc.
>Oh, malarky (and stay away from my business books). It's obvious you never
>do accounting. The matching funds are for roads outside of the city or for

	There are quite a few roads in Chicago that are maintained by state
and federal funds.

>highways that transit cities. They are not supposed to be used for city
>street or FM or RM roads.

	Supposed to or not, that is what they get used for. LSD in Chicago
is maintained in part by federal funds, it is a (mostly) controled access
highway entirely within Chicago.

>> 	Then why do they keep building them?
>
>Because we still hav an Army whose job it is to defend this country you
>nit-wit. If we didn't keep fixing them and expanding the system as people

	Listen Fuckwad:
	(1) there are paved roads from one coast to the other, as well as
railways.
	(2) There hasn't been a war fought on CONUS since we attacked Mexico.
	(3) Most of the roads being built with federal funds are for
"congestion  relief", not roads to new places so troops can move.

	Most roads being built today are either for Suburbs, or for more
efficiently getting people to and from job centers. If you don't believe
that, you are a fool

	There hasn't been a military case for building superhighways since
the 1930's and 40's.


>move around and expand the Army might find it a tad hard to do their job
>when called to it. And yes, I know the Militia is the one who is supposed
>to be called in for that sort of stuff - that's a whole other topic.

	The Army. Marines, and National Guard are fully capable of getting
whereever they need to go with our without the current highway system, if
they weren't they'd be worthless.

	Also, it is just as easy for the OpFors to use the roads as it is
for the friendlies. I am not saying you are lying with this one, I just
can't believe that anyone was foolish enough to fall for it.

>> 	Promote does not mean "give away", it means "promote", do things
>> which incourage.
>
>Absolutely. While I agree that there are some particular issues that need
>fixing in a major way that is not the same (as you would have us believe) as
>saying as a result the whole system should be scrapped

	I, and others are saying that there is no way of building a system
that cannot, and indeed will not be abused.

>> 	They were the heads of the governments. The skills and abilities it
>> takes to get to that level insure that the people who get there have no
>> concern for those underneath them.
>Oh, you mean insanity, egotism, neurosis, etc.?

	Well, at least egotism, and a complete disregard for the truth.

>> 	So we agree that any government is doomed from the start, since
>> w/out people of honesty and integrity no system will work properly.
>
>No, *all* people are not such. Most people I know are honest and have
>integrity. What has to happen is a set of checks and balances, which we are

	Most people are honest--TO A POINT, and the integrity people have
is getting less and less.

	If everyone you know is honest and has integrity, then you must not
know very many people. None of your friends cheat on their taxes (cheating
is dishonest, refusing to pay would show integrity, if AND ONLY IF it
follows from a belief that the system has no right to demand your labor)
etc?

>admittedly short of at the moment. The system isn't perfect, never claimed
>to be (read the 1st paragraph if the Constitution), and if it remains so
>then it's *OUR* fault and not the systems.

	Any system is flawed, and I will repeat myself:

	(a)Any system will work if enough of the people in that system are
honest, have integrity, believe in the system and want it to work. Any
system.

	(b)No system will work if a large enough number of people within
that system try to cheat, coopt, or otherwise "get over" on that system.

	Given the above, anarchy will work just as well as any other system
in the long run because the world more closely resembles (b) than (a),
hence any system will fail.

>> 	No, that face that stares back from the mirror makes every effort
>> to be as honest and forthright as it can. It causes grief sometimes, but
>> it's the principle.
>You claim to be honest yet promote a system that allows slavery, murder,
>theft, and other horrendous crimes against man....

	No, no, I promote anarchy, you are promoting governments which do
those things.

--
"To sum up: The entire structure of antitrust statutes in this country is a
jumble of economic irrationality and ignorance. It is a product: (a) of a
gross misinterpretation of history, and (b) of rather na�ve, and certainly
unrealistic, economic theories." Alan Greenspan, "Anti-trust"
http://www.ecosystems.net/mgering/antitrust.html

Petro::E-Commerce Adminstrator::Playboy Ent. Inc.::petro@playboy.com