Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - DJTorrente

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 13
1
Spin Zone / This Is Why We Don't Have Flying Cars
« on: August 07, 2023, 07:39:59 AM »
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeremybogaisky/2023/08/07/meet-the-billionaire-who-built-a-fortune-price-gouging-customers-like-the-pentagon/?sh=656e0dd91658

Federal regulation. Full stop. The age of a typical GenAv flight line is enough to make a Havana parking lot snicker "Okay, Boomer."

Forbes thinks this is a story about a greedy corporate raider price gouging the government. It's really about the rules that make the "price gouging" possible.

Quote
The company takes advantage of peculiarities in the highly regulated nature of the aviation industry. Every part on a commercial aircraft, and the methods for manufacturing it, must be certified as safe and reliable by the Federal Aviation Administration. It’s a time-consuming and expensive process, and even with huge price hikes, most of TransDigm’s products remain a small part of the overall cost of an aircraft, mitigating the incentive for customers to seek out less expensive alternatives.

Don't hate the player, hate the game.


2
Spin Zone / Re: Franken resigns in disgrace
« on: December 12, 2017, 06:25:41 AM »
Yup.  We've a woman molester as President

Assumes facts not in evidence - but since when has the left cared about evidence?

It continues to amaze me how much tighter the left gets their panties in a knot over what Trump SAID, vs. what so many of the left's leading figures DID.

TDS is real.

3
Pilot Zone / Re: My (former) Plane is Down
« on: December 09, 2017, 07:24:00 AM »
Good to see the pilot survived, regardless of the cause. Bummer about the plane's new avionics. If it survived the crash, couldn't the electronics be salvaged?

Yes, but they are now the property of the insurance company; they don't necessarily benefit the owner, who gets a check for the agreed hull value.

....2 years ago!

Do you have any thoughts or premonitions about tonight's Powerball numbers?  :D  As I usually say, we can joke because no one was seriously hurt.

4
Spin Zone / Re: Worst President in History
« on: October 11, 2017, 03:37:56 PM »
I guess since you assume I’m a dirty progressive liberal, I march blindly lockstep with Obama no matter what, right?

No, that was Chris (2112).  ;D

5
Spin Zone / Re: Join or Die
« on: July 04, 2017, 08:39:08 AM »
Ha ha!  That was the subject line of a message I got from Black Rifle Coffee company.  I placed an order and now they are inviting me to join the "coffee club" and get regular shipments. I guess if I was an easily triggered snowflake I would take that as a death threat.  I love this company.

The ad was definitely not targeted (oops, can I say that without sending another Bernie Bro on a killing spree?)  at the historically illiterate.

6
Spin Zone / Re: Handel wins in Georgia
« on: June 21, 2017, 08:14:24 AM »
Don't you understand?  It was Russia (again)!  Putin told some underling "Go take care of things in Georgia."  The underling (or his travel agent) merely got confused.

7
Spin Zone / Re: WTF, they're shooting our representatives now........
« on: June 17, 2017, 09:29:50 AM »
Now they are talking about needing security for members of congress.   
How much is that going to cost waste to have a protection detail for all members of both houses?

Multiples more than Trump's golf that they've been whining about.

8
Spin Zone / Re: WTF, they're shooting our representatives now........
« on: June 14, 2017, 09:32:49 AM »
I'm glad nobody was killed and the Rep will be OK.  I wonder, since it was a Republican, if the media will play the "more gun control" card like they usually do?  DC already has draconian gun control laws.   

Too late.  The blood was still wet on the ballfield when VA Gov. & Clinton protege Terry McAuliffe had already called for more strict gun control.  He cited the statistic that 93 million people a day are killed by guns. O_o

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/06/14/mcauliffe_calls_for_gun_control_after_republican_shooting_we_lose_93_million_people_a_day.html

P.S., The shooting took place in Alexandria, VA.

9
Maybe they should have separate water fountains too.  And while we're at it, separate dining halls...

The inevitable end of leftist identity politics; things have come full circle. I'm no Trudeau fan, but even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

It is a grainy image, but the best available. The bottom row of panels reads:

“I don’t get it, Campbell. The Black students now have separate dorms, fraternities, cafeteria tables, student center, studies program and graduation. After 25 years of intensive, progressive action in pursuit of racial justice at this college, we’ve managed to produce a fully segregated campus.

*sigh* What a legacy I’ve created. And to think I marched with Dr. King in Selma.”

“So what is it now?”

“Um…the kids want their own water fountains.” (http://bit.ly/2qejLIv)

10
Spin Zone / Re: Universal Income?
« on: May 26, 2017, 01:17:13 PM »
This isn't a new idea.  More like three-day old fish.  Zuck is new to get behind it, to my knowledge.

What Zuck has done is a completely rational response to living among the elite in this country.  The only way to survive as among the truly wealthiest people in America is to advocate giving other people's money away.  Like Buffett. 

Not that it is the least bit effective.  I live in NJ.  A few years back, Zuck gave $100 MM dollars to the Newark school system.  Results?  He might as well have spent it on hookers and blow, except fewer public school unions and 'consultants' would have benefited directly.

Contrast what happened to Zuck's co-founder Saverin; he renounced his US citizenship to avoid paying more in taxes on his IPO cash out than a million of us plebes might pay in a lifetime (but not so much that the US government couldn't piss it away in a day or two) -- he was called out and pilloried on the floor of the Senate by Dem leader Chuckie Schumer as being "un-American".

11
Spin Zone / Re: Why we can't trust peer review
« on: May 25, 2017, 08:22:32 AM »
The point made is well taken, but it is worth noting that the particular journal involved in this case was a "Pay to Publish" model, where the author/sponsor of the piece pays for placement.  If you know anything about vanity press of old (since overcome by Amazon digital publishing, I'd imagine), they were not known to have any particular content discrimination standards.  This situation is slightly different than those, since the journal claims to be peer-reviewed, but apparently not by much. 

Also, the endeavor was largely a gender studies spoof; the global warming point was tangential. 

They took down a soft target.

12
Spin Zone / Re: Your 4th Amendment Right........
« on: May 25, 2017, 07:02:32 AM »
The government likes to keep you frightened.  The media likes it too, sells cars and breakfast cereals.  Fact of the matter is you are far more lily to die of a plethora of mundane causes than be harmed by a terrorist. I say this having had a terrorist attack at my home institution.  Freedom is more important than security.

O_o  Fascinating.  I agree.  TSA delnda est.

13
Spin Zone / Re: Obama's sex secrets laid bare
« on: May 19, 2017, 08:06:20 AM »
Human sexuality is a really complex thing.  I suspect that sexual proclivities follow a bell curve.  Perhaps the peak of the curve are heterosexuals who might consider a homosexual experience if the situation was right.  On one end you have homosexuals who would never consider a heterosexual relationship.  On the other perhaps you have folks who cringe at the thought of a homosexual relationship.

Much more likely a one-tailed Poisson distribution.  There are far more militant homosexuals than militant anti-homosexuals (media coverage notwithstanding).  I'd estimate the peak of the distribution is indifference to homosexual activity; moving left is disaffection for a homosexual relationship, moving right is affection.  One would think that practicing homosexuals are quite a bit to the right of peak.  Then there are those under the right side of the curve who might be 'malleable', who have no counterpart on the left side.

14
Spin Zone / Re: ESPN - the impact of promoting far left ideology
« on: April 28, 2017, 05:44:48 AM »
What I don't understand is why a sports-oriented media outlet would purposely alienate half their audience with a political agenda.  They would have many more viewers if they stayed out of politics entirely.   Pushing an agenda doesn't increase their audience of the same mindset and won't change the minds of those with a different mindset.  It just doesn't make economic sense to lean one way or the other in what should be a fairly neutral subject.

I don't disagree with any of that, but I would take it one step further.  I suspect it is more than half their audience being alienated.  I'll admit this is a stereotype and generalization, and surely there are counter-examples, but on the main, I'd suspect the average NFL viewer is more likely to have been a Trump voter from "flyover country" than an urban effete sipping on their chardonnay during halftime who cried for Hillary on election night. 

15
I don't know what WoW is, nor have I ever heard of Leroy Jenkins.  Wasn't he in the movie "I'm gonna git you sucka!?"  :)

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/leeroy-jenkins

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 13