Toyota safety crisis prompts 'black box' plan for new cars and lorries
in [Cars]
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From: Matthew Russotto on 8 May 2010 19:56 In article <hrmh0a$fcb$1(a)news.eternal-september.org>, Brent <tetraethylleadREMOVETHIS(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >On 2010-05-03, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >> You can see this in action every time a WaWa or Sheetz moves in next >> to a mom/pop place and lowers the gasoline prices lower than the >> actual cost. The bigger companies can sustain the loss longer than the >> little guy can and as soon as he is gone - the prices not only rise - >> they go up even higher if there are no other nearby competitors. > >And when they jack up the prices afterwards nobody else moves in exactly >why? When they jack up the prices why don't customers just get gas >elsewhere? > >Can you even prove they are selling under their cost? Or is it >another issue of their costs being lower? (BTW, lots of gas stations >are just francises, and are ma and pa even though it looks like big oil, >and whatever WaWa or Sheetz is they can't be too big as I've never heard >of them) WaWa and Sheetz are convenience store chains in the East (mostly Pennsylvania for WaWa, mostly southeast for Sheetz). >The problem with undercutting competition by selling at a loss is that >after 'winning' the endurance contest they can never make up for it with >higher prices without inspiring new competition. Nor do they ever. WaWa, at least, has the gas stations to draw people to the attached convenience store. They maintain gas prices lower than others in the area, they don't drive others out and hike the prices up. Nor do they ever achieve anything like a monopoly. -- The problem with socialism is there's always someone with less ability and more need.
From: Brent on 9 May 2010 01:56 On 2010-05-09, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > People take nutrition labels for granted now days like they are > automatic but they're not - they are regulation. You cannot legally > buy many drugs over the county - that's regulation. When you get a > dental x-ray - the thing that keeps that machine from burning a hole > in your jaw is regulation. When you see a handicap spot - that's > regulation. automatic gasoline pump shutoffs... regulation... milk > that is homogenized - regulation. your tires - take a look on the > sidewalls - it says DOT and gives a load range. We all depend on it > but take it for granted except we now have a bunch of folks who have > gone viral on it.. All of which is generally inferior to existing private and market standards and/or something created/set for the benefit of connected businesses. If you examine how government regulation works, how it comes into play, it's very clear that our safety is just a BS excuse used to sell government control for the benefit of insiders. Lead in toys is a perfect recent example. Problem with Mattel toys made in China. So Mattel has its lobbiests get the regulation passed. Very costly to smaller toy companies. out-of-business damaging. Destroys the market for second hand toys. All very good for big toy companies that can afford the testing. After the law is in force for awhile mattel's lobbiests get it modified so that Mattel can do its own testing. That's how by and large the regulation works to 'keep us safe'. It is for creating higher prices and less competition for those with the best lobbiests.
From: Brent on 9 May 2010 22:41 On 2010-05-09, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On May 9, 1:50�am, Brent <tetraethylleadREMOVET...(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >> We are taught in government school that before government regulation >> companies could sprew at will. This is false. Companies were sued and >> the courts and government, influenced by those companies adopted a >> system of proving harm. That is the companies could spew at will and the >> victims had to prove harm. This was a huge benefit to the companies and >> they continued to spew at will. Government regulation came to satisify >> people when there was a big enough outcry. However, that regulation is >> even better for the big players because they can have the standards set >> such that they can afford it but their smaller competition can't. >> Government basically bettered the previously political based system but >> didn't cure the fundamental problem with it. Free market and property >> rights never got tried. > > " We are taught in government school that before government > regulation > companies could sprew at will. This is false. Companies were sued and > the courts and government, " > > Government? sued by the Govt? Do you mean the same govt that cannot > regulate correctly? Why are you cutting up my words when they are above? > tell me about the companies that were sued by citizens that dumped > kepone in the James river or killed thousands in Bopal .. or the kids > who were deformed by the toxins in Love Canal.... > we've tried to unregulated route Brent - from the time when this > country was created. The vast, vast majority of regulation was IN > RESPONSE to abuses ... not just dreamed up.... You don't get it do you. LOOK FURTHER BACK. Do you think that pollution cases just popped up in the late 1960s? They didn't. Ages before people knew the chemicals were harmful they didn't like neighboring companies spewing chemicals on them and dumping them in the water supply. The GOVERNMENT COURTS ruled that the victims had to prove harm. They ruled that the companies could spew at will UNTIL HARM WAS PROVEN. That means the government SIDED WITH THE POLLUTING COMPANIES that had influence. The reaction to huge public outcry decades later was to impose limits, a mere compromise that allows the favored companies who get government permission to spew only within limits but they ARE STILL ALLOWED TO DO IT, just less of it. A proper property rights decision a century or more ago wouldn't have permitted all the pollution. It would have made companies responsible not to allow their waste products to leave their property. But that's not what government did. It wasn't a lack of regulation, it was a lack of property rights for us ordinary people who don't purchase lobbiests and congressmen and judges and all sorts of others in the government. The old times were not unregulated, they were regulated in a different way. Companies got spew unlimited amounts of waste materials on their neighbors, into the air, and into the water and the neighbors had to just deal with it. That was the regulation. Do you think that just because it was 1910 that people who owned the property next to a clock face paint maker wouldn't complain about the run off? Of course they did and the government told them to go pound sand instead of doing their job to defend property rights. By the 1970s it simply became impossible for government to tell the people to pound sand anymore so we got the current compromise system since that quieted most of the people.
From: Brent on 10 May 2010 09:15 On 2010-05-10, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > I don't think you have a clue what government is - and what the govt > role is - as defined in our Constitution. It's you who doesn't understand. I understand it quite well. You are not allowed to poison someone else's property, yet your loving government allows those it favors to do exactly that. > your property rights end where they meet mine and govt is my > protection against you. Why does your loving government allow BP to poison Chicago's water supply?
From: Brent on 10 May 2010 09:33
On 2010-05-10, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > you need to go live in a place that does not have regulation for a few > days or months so you can be brought back to reality guy... regulation > sucks.. I agree.. it's does not prevent deaths and injuries; it is > full of loopholes and exclusions that unfairly benefit some at the > expense of others, it's dumb, redundant and ineffective - but it is > way the heck better than none which we know abundantly from experience > is much worse. You mean live in a place where the regulation allows those favored by government to do even worse things. Your government school / mainstream media use of unregulated is not what I propose at all. But what I propose is something that wouldn't allow favored buisnesses to poison me and you AT ALL. Your definition of "unregulated" is where favored businesses get to foul other people's property at will. That's not a lack of regulation, that's the government telling the people without political influence to go pound sand when their rights are violated. That's just a regulatory system more skewed for the political insiders than the present one in the US. > you just cannot reconcile the idea that nothing works perfectly as > intended ..therefore in your mind it means it's a failure .... It does work as intended, it's intent to is shut people up about their property rights being violated while those with the favor of government can spew at least some their toxins on their neighbors. > even your precious ideas of private things like UL, ANSI, ISO, DIN, > etc .. they FAIL also guy.. Can you deliberately miss my point any more than you are? Their 'failure' is that some company or companies find ways to greatly exceed the requirements. Then they up the requirements. That's the beauty of private requirements, they don't stifle the way government requirements do. Ferrari wanted to sell a car in the USA with nice racing harness. The US government made them remove it and replace it with a 3 point belt. Tell me, which is safer, the racing harness or the three point belt? > the truth is anything designed by a human ..will FAIL.. as well as > anything designed by nature... mutants (mistakes) happen.. that's > life.. the antidote to mutants is not - having life to start with > because mutants are part of the "experience". These aren't mistakes. These aren't failures. The regulatory system is DESIGNED politically for the insiders by the insiders. It's to create a false sense of safety for buyers of products, for those living near the pollution sources, for those drinking the water. I'm supposed to feel safe because BP dumps within the limits that the federal government sets. Which feels free to increase those limits for BP when it desires. I'm also suppose to pay for filtering out from the water I use most of the toxins BP dumps into the water supply that happened to be in when it was pulled from the lake. Why can't BP deal with waste in a more responsible manner and roll the cost of that up in their fuel price instead? Why does it get to dump tons upon tons of toxins into the lake when some regular guy can probably be busted if he tosses a beer bottle into the lake? |