Let us not forget the superiors to those scientists who pressure publication because a lot of times that is the only way they can be sure to get further funding / grants.
At least that is what I take away from a lot of it.
In my area at least, I can sub to Netflix, Prime and HBO and still be paying far less than I would for cable. This is saying a lot considering it is on demand content with no commercials. On top of that, if I find Netflix lacking at some point, I can stop the sub for x months and come back later where most cable packages lock you for a year or more.
I have the same concern, but I think ultimately I will be able to subscribe to exactly what I want and still come out cheaper and more convenient than cable will ever be.
It is also worth noting that according to their graph that the critical point to be made is that both rates of death have been on a decline since their starting point of 1990. Cars are indeed getting safer, but apparently something is being done right in the firearm area as well.
Gun ownership has been in decline for decades (along with hunting). In response, the industry shifted from hunting and home defense toward civilianized combat weaponry like the AR-15. There's a large accessory and customization market for these things. It's essentially a toy for military hobbyists and gadget-lovers.
I spent many years trying to navigate various job opportunities and met quite a few people and yes, you are right, if you meet the right person you can get lucky. But it is pretty much just that, luck.
I work for a state agency and the people around here still view a 4 year degree as an elite status and it drives me nuts. On top of that, the PhD holders get no respect, its as if no degree makes you nothing and the higher degrees were a waste. Its silly given the atmosphere (a lab). And as far as the agency hiring process goes, all applications are put in online. If they even hint at wanting a degree as a requirement for hiring (even if the position doesn't necessarily require a degree, not talking engineering here) they will ask a prelim about having a degree. Answer wrong and a human will never even know you applied, even if you told someone you did; EVEN if they told you to apply in the first place.
The problem with this "college is required" mentality going away is that it is ingrained in a generation. Today's 20 somethings, and tomorrows as well, will have to deal with this as long as the 40, 50 and 60 somethings are still doing the hiring. They were raised with black and white views of requirements to do a job it seems, only from personal experience. And even if they give you the time of day, if the decision comes down to guy with degree and guy without, often times the guy without is going to lose because he doesn't appear to be the best investment of time and energy.
As for me, I gave in. As humbly as possible I will say I saw through the bullshit since before I left high school. I could earn as high as marks as I wanted and knew I could do what I wanted, but the chances were high that without a degree I was going to have to have some luck in finding that one special position. Once leaving the private sector and finding myself in a gov job, as I said, I gave in. I am enrolled in school. I am doing as I figured I would, 4.0 blah blah, but still sort of lack direction. I have picked a path, am going to follow it and see where it goes really.
The reality I have found myself facing is that no matter what degree you have, a lot of times, a 4 year degree means you have a degree and that just makes you better somehow. It doesn't even have to be a relevant degree to the position in which you apply. Especially when a system such as this one counts each year of a degree as an equivalent to a year of experience. (BA required, or AA with 2 years exp, or HS with 4 years exp).
Anyway, I will end my wall of text here. I only wished to share a perspective of someone who tried without, and is in the process of what he ultimately considers concession to the pressure of societal norms.
While I agree with you, the illegal drug trade got these guys started and off the ground, I think at this point they would have other avenues to keep themselves in business. I hear the human trafficking business is quite lucrative and booming these days down their way.
Well, you can't really be a small cartel. Even if the other businesses are profitable, a cartel needs a certain size to pay for constant expenses like bribes, armed forces etc. Politicians and the police don't give you a discount because you're small and people still need to be just as intimidated even though you're doing less shit.
Just removing one illegal activity might knock the sum value of dangerous, illegal activities below the threshold where cartels can work.
Just to add some more. The legalization of pot hurts cartel's income. I read somewhere, that pot accounts for 60% of the cartel's profit in a multi-billion dollar industry! I mention this because of the recent trends in the US where states are beginning to legalize it. I'm sure they weren't too happy to hear that Oregon and Alaska legalize it as it only takes part of the profit away. Once the US is fully legalized, it won't be a hugely profitable business anymore so they will hurt. This means less profits, which means less power for them. With less power, then perhaps there will be less violence in Mexico?
What would stop the cartels from investing in legal storefronts and capturing profits regardless? (This certainly shouldn't be construed as an argument for the morass we have now, just an interesting aside.)
Nothing would stop them, but there would less of an incentive in such business considering the profits wouldn't be as enormous as they are now in the underground market. Profits are huge because the supply is low (and risky) and the demand is high. Legalization, I would think would bring up the supply, after all it would be legal to farm it in mass-production just like tobacco, dropping prices significantly.
Presumably nothing if the money they use to invest is considered legitimate.
Nevertheless, it really seems logical that as a society we should prefer that market competition occurs legally in a open and free market rather than violently in an illegal and black market. The difference between the two types of economic activity is tremendous.
Many of the states that have legalized marijuana require that no part of that trade cross state borders (including growing it, packaging it, investing in it, etc.) (This may be true of all the states that have legalized it, but I'm not sure.)
So the Mexican cartels can neither sell the stuff they grow in Mexico in the states nor own the storefronts legally. Doesn't mean they can't do it illegally (they seem to be good at hiding their illegal activity, after all) but they can't go legit.
My assertion is that, with the backing of enterprises raking in 12 figures annually, it's within their operational capability to obtain all the necessary parts to do exactly that.
To be fair, I think it's entirely possible that there are enough savvy businessmen in the cartel to realize that it's wisest to prepare for any number of likely outcomes of legalization. Just imagine Goldman Sachs with more beheadings.
According to this: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html, repealing alcohol prohibition "dramatically reduced crime, including organized crime, and corruption". While organized crime and "the mob" obviously still existed afterwards, they lost a lot.
That's what makes prohibition so ugly. It's like YCombinator for psychopaths.
Combine that with the psychological acclimatization that it offers and it gets even uglier. It creates this on-boarding process for hell. Dealing drugs really isn't wrong in most cases -- it's a voluntary activity. It only gets morally questionable when you start "pushing" and doing so with addictive substances. But it is illegal, and doing it lands you in a world of people who flout the law and commit other crimes as well. Once you're in that world you're apt to pick up a taste for other kinds of illegal activity that really does involve hurting people, especially if you are at all psychologically prone to amoral behavior. In some cases this can take people all the way to unspeakable evils like trafficking children for sex slavery or contract murder.
Prohibition is an unambiguous social evil. Anyone who still argues for it is either corrupt, ignorant, delusional, or simply hasn't thought about it very much.
The fight against the cartels seems to be more like a war than conventional police work. One of the main themes of any war is logistics. Anything you can do to disrupt the enemy's logistics is pretty much always good, even if it isn't a perfect solution. You rarely get to completely destroy the enemy at a stroke, but instead you have to keep chopping off bits until they are defeated and discredited.
Yeah, legalizing drugs won't make them vanish overnight, but it will remove a hugely profitable revenue source from their arsenal, and that's always worth doing.
Sure, if you are talking about smuggling illegal immigrants INTO the country. But immigration would have nothing to do with the kidnapped individuals that are being taken OUT of the US to be used in the sex, labor and (in this case) engineering trades.
It's insane that conservative Christian marketing and lobbying has made human trafficking synonymous with sex trafficking, which accounts for a miniscule portion of it.
The cartels completely control passage over the southern border, which I'm pretty sure is more lucrative than all of US prostitution combined (although I'd be happy to be corrected.)
I dont think it is synonymous at all. It just happens. I am not sure if it is an imbalance of where it occurs, if it is as high in Mexico, as say it is in Russia or Africa.
But just a quick search shows that even in 2010 the sex trafficking and crimes were on the rise in California-
I am the last person to be convinced by anything conservative or Christian for that matter. The trafficking situation just seems to have become more apparent to me over the last 5 years or so, whether or not the situation itself is actually worse.
I, for one, am always surprised yet impressed by the things the cartels do. All the while not being shocked at all.
They would be such an interesting psychological / sociological study if it didn't mean potential torture and beheading of researchers. I mean this level of organized crime makes Al Capone look like a petty pick pocket.
Want to be really impressed and horrified? See if you can dig out the 90s Wired article on the Colombians using an AS/400 to do analysis of copies of telco records. Whenever they found the logs showing cartel members calling numbers registered to police officers, they'd kill the cartel member.
Hoards of money and guns can lead to very powerful unchecked capabilities. That funding has to be cutoff, they are a terrorist organization being funded by policy, concentrating wealth to criminals.
My other suggestion to them was a good, required training on how to create passwords/phrases via different methods I have picked up along my way. I tend to keep up with password security theories from here and there, its a sort of a passion of mine considering how integral they are to our lives now days.
I have just always thought the forced changes were unnecessary if the password was strong enough to begin with, and managed in a proper/secure way on the server end. Because it doesnt matter if they password is one day, or 6 years old, the chances are that unless you are high priority, an attack on your password is a here and now event, not a prolonged attack (unless you are a direct target). Even in the event of prolonged attacks, there should be other measures in place to mitigate that avenue of exploit.
My only beef with non forced has been that over time, I feel the tendency for that particular password to be reused on multiple accounts would increase, therefore weakening it.
Like all theories though, I like to keep any open mind to all outlooks, I am by no means an expert. I just know that our policy's make me uncomfortable.
But $5 for a one time watch isn't too bad if you are only going to watch it once. Otherwise you buy it for $10-$15 and watch it once, and maaaybe come back to it later.
With kids movies on the other hand, kids tend to watch their movies more than once so the game changes a bit. $5 for 48 hrs vs 30 days vs $15 for perm access becomes a bit more complicated. I would feel bad for my parents if they had to pay for a TMNT movie each time I watched it :)
