Scantlings

Ad Blockers on Apple mobile gear.

I have just gotten around to turning on Add blocking on my iPad. I was amazed. Everything runs a LOT faster and reading things like the Wall St Journal is so much better, it's just text!! And the photos that are in the article. It's the way the web was when we first built it. Such fond memories.

The main reason I did this is that when I'm offshore the bandwidth use up by the Adds is really burning up my battery.

But.... And there is a but. This means that all those folks who built businesses based on Adds online are SOL.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. Everyone from the starving author, and most authors starve, to Google survives on selling on-line adds. Are we wrecking the world's greatest system by doing this??

I'm pondering, sitting in my cockpit reading an Add free internet and enjoying it emensley.

I'm using one and like it, for the most part--it does make Safari a big wonky. As for the guilt part, nytimes.com is the only site I use extensively that has ads and I already pay them a few bucks a month for my electronic subscription. Anyway, I have enduring faith in the ability of commerce to find ways to hawk stuff to us.

Beau,

I thinks its a bit of a reaction to all encompassing ads and more invasive acts by folks like google.

Most reasonable folks accept ads as the cost of admission but a lot of sites, and now providers are making them more obtrusive and invasive. A bit of a stimulus-response situation. Make the ads obnoxious and I'll get an ad blocker so you'll make them more obnoxious. I really like Google's products but the banner ads across web content and invasive mining of my data is starting to push me away from them. A lot of "free" news sites are so cluttered with ads that the sites are becoming unusable. That drives ad blocker software and that drives even more obtrusive ads. Is it wrecking the "world's greatest system" or is it consumer pushback against overly aggressive providers?

Even Apple is now pimping the next iPad software upgrade a couple of times per day with poop ups. I guess the flag on the settings menu icon isn't enough.

I've always had the impression that teams who write operating systems and large applications do so in closed environments on latest generation hardware. If there is a performance issue, they comfort themselves with the notion that by the time the product gets to the field, the user will have an even faster machine. But we (the users) don't, and we normal folks live forever in world of software too big and fancy for our equipment.

I think this may be an especially big problem over the web. Sites can be built and tested hard-wired to server. When it gets to us, it's stalled because the ad server (in some tax haven overseas) takes 5 seconds to deliver each ad.

I've also had pop-up that can't be cleared from by Nexus tablet because of size or format reasons. I've dropped some web sites because of it.

Or maybe, they just don't care as long as the ads get served and the checks clear.

SemiSalt wrote:I

Or maybe, they just don't care as long as the ads get served and the checks clear.

I think that's the truth, at least for now. It would seem very hard to close the feedback loop and I doubt anyone has an accurate or sensitive enough system to measure the effect of ad blockers.

Orestes Munn wrote:

SemiSalt wrote:I

Or maybe, they just don't care as long as the ads get served and the checks clear.

I think that's the truth, at least for now. It would seem very hard to close the feedback loop and I doubt anyone has an accurate or sensitive enough system to measure the effect of ad blockers.

OM, the folks who serve up the ads measure everything very very carefully. They even know if you moved your mouse or selected another window while you were waiting for the ad to load. It's the most highly instrumented part of the entire computer.

BeauV wrote:

Orestes Munn wrote:

SemiSalt wrote:I

Or maybe, they just don't care as long as the ads get served and the checks clear.

I think that's the truth, at least for now. It would seem very hard to close the feedback loop and I doubt anyone has an accurate or sensitive enough system to measure the effect of ad blockers.

OM, the folks who serve up the ads measure everything very very carefully. They even know if you moved your mouse or selected another window while you were waiting for the ad to load. It's the most highly instrumented part of the entire computer.

But does the merchant know how much the blocker changed my likelihood of buying their product?

SemiSalt wrote:Or maybe, they just don't care as long as the ads get served and the checks clear.

By George, I think he's got it!

Thought about this thread when I got pimped a few minutes ago to download Google's latest iPad ap and looked at the reviews. Most call out the ap for being primarily about pushing more and more obtrusive ads and being slow and buggy. Sort of sounds like Windows ME.

Forbes attributes 65% of Google value on ads but notes cost (revenue) per click is down from previous years and profitability for the last year lagged revenue growth by 3%. Maybe the ad lockers are reflecting a user population getting tired of paying for access and data so we can be force fed more and more blatant ads to the detriment of content.

Beau may be right. The ad money grab drove the innovation but users are jaded to simple, non obtrusive ads and resistant to the in your face stuff being pushed now.

The really weird thing about all this is that I use Giigle all the time (Google but my finger slipped) and I would actually PAY to find the thing I want. For someone who is looking for a new car a car comparison article is HELP not an ADD.

So the question is: What is the biz model that let's you pay $X for a version of Giigle that has NO ADDS and you pay a flat rate or per search or something that ties to you actual use??

BeauV wrote:The really weird thing about all this is that I use Giigle all the time (Google but my finger slipped) and I would actually PAY to find the thing I want. For someone who is looking for a new car a car comparison article is HELP not an ADD.

So the question is: What is the biz model that let's you pay $X for a version of Giigle that has NO ADDS and you pay a flat rate or per search or something that ties to you actual use??

Tough question since Google's (and Facebook and increasingly MS) business model seems to be to sell targeted advertising based on the usage data they collect from your use via searches of your email, contacts and search/browsing habits. Allowing a user to "opt out" undermines that approach, reduces credible user exposure that drives rates, etc.

I use Adblocker Plus and it gets rid of enough junk that I'm not too put off by the remaining ads. It's when I'm on limited bandwidth that they really annoy me.

For limited bandwidth situations there is an App for the Mac that is called TripMode. It throttles the worst if the bandwidth hogs.

I'm sure there is something like it for phones and pads.

Yahoo's mail service, which I've used since 1998 has an option to pay for no ads. I've always used it.

I actually read the privacy policies and adjusted settings for google and yahoo recently, including the paid Giigle email service we use for my business. It was horrifying. We agreed to be tracked even when not logged into email, which we pay for. It's a simple, cheap service to provide for them. An expectation that we're not being spied on is more than reasonable.

Curiously, Google Chrome works really well with AdBlock Plus. Even those annoying video ads go away with no new annoyances. Eric, I've had the same fluky behavior with Safari on my Mac.

Semi, mobile devices have created a huge benefit against bloatware. Speed but especially battery life has brought efficiency back into the mix.

Think of those magazines we get for free with all ads and practically nothing else. That shit on the web will go away but content will stay that people are willing to pay for. Maybe.

Eric, is there any evidence that advertising warps our brains, makes us materialistic, even fat by watching food commercials that incite an insulin response? My guess is it's a greater effect than bacon on the obesity epidemic. 80 million people, out of 300 million, that are at great risk of type II diabetes? We're fucked.

kdh wrote:
Eric, is there any evidence that advertising warps our brains, makes us materialistic, even fat by watching food commercials that incite an insulin response? My guess is it's a greater effect than bacon on the obesity epidemic. 80 million people, out of 300 million, that are at great risk of type II diabetes? We're fucked.

My God, we are such geeks! Here's the off the top my head response: I think for that visual insulin response not to extinguish over serial exposures, it would have to be associated with a sugar load pretty often.

On the fucked question? Definitely. If not for this, then for a myriad of other reasons!

Orestes Munn wrote:

kdh wrote:
Eric, is there any evidence that advertising warps our brains, makes us materialistic, even fat by watching food commercials that incite an insulin response? My guess is it's a greater effect than bacon on the obesity epidemic. 80 million people, out of 300 million, that are at great risk of type II diabetes? We're fucked.

My God, we are such geeks! Here's the off the top my head response: I think for that visual insulin response not to extinguish over serial exposures, it would have to be associated with a sugar load pretty often.

On the fucked question? Definitely. If not for this, then for a myriad of other reasons!

Safe bicycle pathways, that's what we need.

Olaf Hart wrote:

Orestes Munn wrote:

kdh wrote:
Eric, is there any evidence that advertising warps our brains, makes us materialistic, even fat by watching food commercials that incite an insulin response? My guess is it's a greater effect than bacon on the obesity epidemic. 80 million people, out of 300 million, that are at great risk of type II diabetes? We're fucked.

My God, we are such geeks! Here's the off the top my head response: I think for that visual insulin response not to extinguish over serial exposures, it would have to be associated with a sugar load pretty often.

On the fucked question? Definitely. If not for this, then for a myriad of other reasons!

Safe bicycle pathways, that's what we need.

With a requirement that you have a person carry a lantern at least 20 feet in front of you, shouting "BICYCLE" at the top of their lungs.

Lately I picked up a class teaching basic HTML/CSS and a little frontend stuff (Javascript, Responsive Design, etc). At the end of class one eve I looked around the lab at all the computers sitting on the desk each with a fairly large monitor. Large enough that each student is blocked out. The monitor, the cpu, the keyboard - all are ANCIENT paradigms in technology.

What does that have to do with this topic? It has to do with IoT (Internet of Things). Making money via the internet from ad revenue is a blip. Revenues are declining because it is the beginning of the end. It was necessary to bootstrap us to our current level, but this is all still in its infancy. At some point (and I doubt any of us - even Alx - will see it come to fruition) all of 'this' will be gone. This generalization of technology. QWERTY was invented in 1893. We still use it today to interface with computers. Why? I'm sure someone has the answer to that.

Point is, if I were thinking really long term, I'd try to pursue something like BV mentioned. How to make a business model around IoT. What can be done with ubicomp (Ubiquitous Computing) as a revenue stream? When the act of sitting down at a keyboard and monitor goes the way of telegraph, what then?

Ish wrote:

Olaf Hart wrote:

Orestes Munn wrote:

kdh wrote:
Eric, is there any evidence that advertising warps our brains, makes us materialistic, even fat by watching food commercials that incite an insulin response? My guess is it's a greater effect than bacon on the obesity epidemic. 80 million people, out of 300 million, that are at great risk of type II diabetes? We're fucked.

My God, we are such geeks! Here's the off the top my head response: I think for that visual insulin response not to extinguish over serial exposures, it would have to be associated with a sugar load pretty often.

On the fucked question? Definitely. If not for this, then for a myriad of other reasons!

Safe bicycle pathways, that's what we need.

With a requirement that you have a person carry a lantern at least 20 feet in front of you, shouting "BICYCLE" at the top of their lungs.

Behind is better.

Interesting topic. At lunch with a couple of friends today, one remarked that Facebook, with 130 million users is still not making money, yet it is valued at $50 billion. Does that make sense? If I were selling 130 million tubes of toothpaste and not making money, I doubt I would have a market cap of $50 billion. I understand Facebook is a platform for ads and a source of personal data to be mined and used, but really.

Uber and Airbnb, while problematic in some ways, at least provide a real service, i.e. bringing two parties together in a transaction.

Bull City wrote:Interesting topic. At lunch with a couple of friends today, one remarked that Facebook, with 130 million users is still not making money, yet it is valued at $50 billion. Does that make sense? If I were selling 130 million tubes of toothpaste and not making money, I doubt I would have a market cap of $50 billion. I understand Facebook is a platform for ads and a source of personal data to be mined and used, but really.

Uber and Airbnb, while problematic in some ways, at least provide a real service, i.e. bringing two parties together in a transaction.

I think you should look at FB as a company that is busy establishing one of THE major platforms in the entire computer biz. Keep in mind that Amazon still doesn't make money and never has, but clearly could if Jeff ever slowed the growth rate down for a bit. For example, the Amazon Web Services (AWS) division is growing at 78% per year and amazingly profitable. All that profit, and then some, gets put into building a bigger and bigger market controlling enterprise. FB is much more like Amazon than like Uber. Another way to look at it is that FB Messenger has gone from zero to the second largest messenger (to Twitter I believe) in only two years. These sorts of messaging businesses have started to destroy the lethargic phone company SMS businesses; which represented billions in revenue.

Finally, in my industry, the customers like to choose a "winner" and only buy from that winner. They effectively create monopolies for a time that are then overturned by the next wave of new technology. Thus Intel and Microsoft are overturned by mobile devices (basically Apple), Twitter and FB Messenger overturn SMS, and the beat goes on and on and on. Because of this consumer behavior, it is critically important to become the "winner" in your market. Every other competitor will die when you do that. Given this, it's idiotic to try to be profitable when you can run for a few years of looses and then close the jaws on the market and become a Microsoft, Intel, Google, Facebook, etc....

BeauV wrote:

Bull City wrote:Interesting topic. At lunch with a couple of friends today, one remarked that Facebook, with 130 million users is still not making money, yet it is valued at $50 billion. Does that make sense? If I were selling 130 million tubes of toothpaste and not making money, I doubt I would have a market cap of $50 billion. I understand Facebook is a platform for ads and a source of personal data to be mined and used, but really.

Uber and Airbnb, while problematic in some ways, at least provide a real service, i.e. bringing two parties together in a transaction.

I think you should look at FB as a company that is busy establishing one of THE major platforms in the entire computer biz. Keep in mind that Amazon still doesn't make money and never has, but clearly could if Jeff ever slowed the growth rate down for a bit. For example, the Amazon Web Services (AWS) division is growing at 78% per year and amazingly profitable. All that profit, and then some, gets put into building a bigger and bigger market controlling enterprise. FB is much more like Amazon than like Uber. Another way to look at it is that FB Messenger has gone from zero to the second largest messenger (to Twitter I believe) in only two years. These sorts of messaging businesses have started to destroy the lethargic phone company SMS businesses; which represented billions in revenue.

Finally, in my industry, the customers like to choose a "winner" and only buy from that winner. They effectively create monopolies for a time that are then overturned by the next wave of new technology. Thus Intel and Microsoft are overturned by mobile devices (basically Apple), Twitter and FB Messenger overturn SMS, and the beat goes on and on and on. Because of this consumer behavior, it is critically important to become the "winner" in your market. Every other competitor will die when you do that. Given this, it's idiotic to try to be profitable when you can run for a few years of looses and then close the jaws on the market and become a Microsoft, Intel, Google, Facebook, etc....

Beau, my reference to platform is platform as in an ad billboard - nothing special. I think you're referring to something more.

I don't see anything special in FB other than a sandbox that caters to the Narcissism in each of us. I guess if it causes people to freely give up oodles of personal information that FB can sell for oodles of money (provided they don't seriously alienate their users) that's genius.

Aside from developing the Kindle, and while I some some things from them, Amazon is kind of disturbing. I think they will run afoul of anti-trust laws, if they haven't already. I recall a NYT piece about the company several weeks ago. You had to wonder whether such things as minor reductions delivery times were worth the madness that was described. Bezos seems to be something between a driven visionary and a megalomaniac.

- Old Fogey

Bull City wrote:

BeauV wrote:

Bull City wrote:Interesting topic. At lunch with a couple of friends today, one remarked that Facebook, with 130 million users is still not making money, yet it is valued at $50 billion. Does that make sense? If I were selling 130 million tubes of toothpaste and not making money, I doubt I would have a market cap of $50 billion. I understand Facebook is a platform for ads and a source of personal data to be mined and used, but really.

Uber and Airbnb, while problematic in some ways, at least provide a real service, i.e. bringing two parties together in a transaction.

I think you should look at FB as a company that is busy establishing one of THE major platforms in the entire computer biz. Keep in mind that Amazon still doesn't make money and never has, but clearly could if Jeff ever slowed the growth rate down for a bit. For example, the Amazon Web Services (AWS) division is growing at 78% per year and amazingly profitable. All that profit, and then some, gets put into building a bigger and bigger market controlling enterprise. FB is much more like Amazon than like Uber. Another way to look at it is that FB Messenger has gone from zero to the second largest messenger (to Twitter I believe) in only two years. These sorts of messaging businesses have started to destroy the lethargic phone company SMS businesses; which represented billions in revenue.

Finally, in my industry, the customers like to choose a "winner" and only buy from that winner. They effectively create monopolies for a time that are then overturned by the next wave of new technology. Thus Intel and Microsoft are overturned by mobile devices (basically Apple), Twitter and FB Messenger overturn SMS, and the beat goes on and on and on. Because of this consumer behavior, it is critically important to become the "winner" in your market. Every other competitor will die when you do that. Given this, it's idiotic to try to be profitable when you can run for a few years of looses and then close the jaws on the market and become a Microsoft, Intel, Google, Facebook, etc....

Beau, my reference to platform is platform as in an ad billboard - nothing special. I think you're referring to something more.

I don't see anything special in FB other than a sandbox that caters to the Narcissism in each of us. I guess if it causes people to freely give up oodles of personal information that FB can sell for oodles of money (provided they don't seriously alienate their users) that's genius.

Aside from developing the Kindle, and while I some some things from them, Amazon is kind of disturbing. I think they will run afoul of anti-trust laws, if they haven't already. I recall a NYT piece about the company several weeks ago. You had to wonder whether such things as minor reductions delivery times were worth the madness that was described. Bezos seems to be something between a driven visionary and a megalomaniac.

- Old Fogey

Yes, in the software biz a Platform is a bunch of software that people build other software on top of. FB is a "platform" in the sense of putting up a billboard for ads. But that is a very very very small part of their "Value" as a company. FB's value is based upon all the things that you can do with the data that FB has (as you say freely provided by FB users - who pay nothing for FB's service) and the tools that they provide that lets a company understand their customers.

You're certainly entitled to your opinion of what FB does or doesn't do, but those buying the company's stock clearly don't agree with your view that they are nothing "special". FB has become the #1 way for people to communicate, with many days in which over one billion people are simultaneously communicating. Your position is roughly analogous to saying that the telephone is just a tool that is used to gossip on and people should go back to writing letters. You might be right but it doesn't matter. Each new technology is disliked by we older folks, and what we think doesn't really matter because we are neither the target market for the new technology nor do we usually understand how younger people really use it.

As to Amazon, the board game is called "Monopoly" for a reason. Every CEO in the world is attempting to create a monopoly for her company, or at least as close as they can legally get. Amazon has actually got a much smaller monopoly that companies like Standard Oil and Microsoft. If you're taking about the NY Times article about the working conditions at Amazon, I think that folks should get a lot thicker skin. I personally worked at a boat yard, 12 hours per day when there was work, with a 10 lb grinder over my head sanding bottom paint, and with a crazy Italian guy screaming at me. I have very very little sympathy for someone who sits at their nice comfortable clean desk and cries because someone spoke harshly to them. Given me a break. As they say where I used to work in NY City: "Want a friend, get a dog."

These companies have made billions of dollars for their shareholders and they've done so without the pollution and personal injuries of industries like oil, and coal, and fishing, and timber, and the list goes on and on. The workers at Amazon who don't like their working conditions should try a week in a Kentucky coal mine.

Ghostery (don't enable Ghostrank) uBlock, ScriptSafe, Facebook Disconnect.

I use all of these extension whenever browsing. My cash and history are set to clear each time I close my browser - no saved passwords. Many times, and ever increasing frequently, these extension break websites. Also, I'm sure these apps are leaking my information to some degree as well.

Cry me a river if they don't make as much money off of me. Programs I support, I support directly.

BeauV wrote:Yes, in the software biz a Platform is a bunch of software that people build other software on top of. FB is a "platform" in the sense of putting up a billboard for ads. But that is a very very very small part of their "Value" as a company. FB's value is based upon all the things that you can do with the data that FB has (as you say freely provided by FB users - who pay nothing for FB's service) and the tools that they provide that lets a company understand their customers.

You're certainly entitled to your opinion of what FB does or doesn't do, but those buying the company's stock clearly don't agree with your view that they are nothing "special". FB has become the #1 way for people to communicate, with many days in which over one billion people are simultaneously communicating. Your position is roughly analogous to saying that the telephone is just a tool that is used to gossip on and people should go back to writing letters. You might be right but it doesn't matter. Each new technology is disliked by we older folks, and what we think doesn't really matter because we are neither the target market for the new technology nor do we usually understand how younger people really use it.

As to Amazon, the board game is called "Monopoly" for a reason. Every CEO in the world is attempting to create a monopoly for her company, or at least as close as they can legally get. Amazon has actually got a much smaller monopoly that companies like Standard Oil and Microsoft. If you're taking about the NY Times article about the working conditions at Amazon, I think that folks should get a lot thicker skin. I personally worked at a boat yard, 12 hours per day when there was work, with a 10 lb grinder over my head sanding bottom paint, and with a crazy Italian guy screaming at me. I have very very little sympathy for someone who sits at their nice comfortable clean desk and cries because someone spoke harshly to them. Given me a break. As they say where I used to work in NY City: "Want a friend, get a dog."

These companies have made billions of dollars for their shareholders and they've done so without the pollution and personal injuries of industries like oil, and coal, and fishing, and timber, and the list goes on and on. The workers at Amazon who don't like their working conditions should try a week in a Kentucky coal mine.

You make very good points, and you know more about the tech industry than most, certainly more than me. It still seems that FB is basically an entertainment venue/sandbox that has enticed people to spill their guts, call it communicating if you prefer. The market cap is a mystery to me. I'm an old-fashioned, former commercial banker who looked for earnings and cash flow.

On Amazon, we've all had shitty, dirty jobs. When you were finished at the boatyard, you could have a beer and forget about it until the next day. That doesn't seem to be the case at Amazon. I think it was more than being spoken to harshly; there was some mental abuse and games being played as I recall. If you have capable, hardworking people, that's no way to get the best from them. Just my opinion. Glad I'm retired.

Bull,

I'm sorry if I sounded harsh, but I have a lot of folks working in my industry who have the backbone of a cooked spaghetti noodle. So, when folks whine about Amazon, given I actually know a bunch of folks at Amazon, I'm not impressed. Yes, a lot of us had tough physically demanding jobs when we were young; and that seem to be what is entirely missing in many folks today (here I'm sounding like the old fart I am). There is an expectation that somehow things should be easy, polite, gentile, and kind when the world is rarely any of those things.

I am still in the middle of the food fight that is high tech. It is a cut throat business that crushes a lot of folks and rewards the winners with millions. There is very very little sympathy in my business.

Again, sorry if I sound overly hard; I'm not really a harsh person. But in my industry there is very room for people who aren't tough.

BV

Beau, you were being honest and frank. I respect that. Underlying my view of Amazon, is the fact that in a lot of the "professional" jobs today, people are expected to be on call 24/7. Between email, cell phones and other devices, bosses have the ability to do this. I don't think it's a good thing, but perhaps in a global economy we have no choice.

Bull City wrote:Beau, you were being honest and frank. I respect that. Underlying my view of Amazon, is the fact that in a lot of the "professional" jobs today, people are expected to be on call 24/7. Between email, cell phones and other devices, bosses have the ability to do this. I don't think it's a good thing, but perhaps in a global economy we have no choice.

I couldn't agree more - that many folks abuse others with overwork. No doubt about it.

In my view this is but one aspect of the domination of capital vs labor in the age old battle. Labor has to put up with it because so much of the monetary power has accrued to capital. Right now, in the software segment of technology, the roles are reversed. We have a serious shortage of labor skilled in what we need. That means that over the last 10 years the average salary of a software engineer in our sector has gone from about $60k to well over $100k. In other segments of the economy, where there the supply/demand curve has trended the other way, real-wage labor has seen their earnings plummet.

Many folks don't want to accept that many of our national policies have been very very very good for capital and middling to bad for labor of most types, but the worst for unskilled labor or labor that is loosing out to automation. At Amazon, to return to the specific, we have both types. They are paying well over $100k per year for programmers and paying extremely low wages for warehouse workers. These long term policy shifts in our government are the real cause of the 1% wealth concentration that folks complain about. It has been designed into our tax codes and the very structure of our commercial activity, many times as an unintended consequence of some benighted policy that is supposed to create jobs for labor.

A few simple examples:
- The profit I make on investments of capital are taxed at a much lower rate than the profit I make on my labor. Why?

- I get a subsidy for borrowing up to $1,100,000 to buy a house in the form of an income tax deduction, but someone who rents see nothing of the kind.

- Despite massive rhetoric and complaints (not from businesses) we have never "secured our borders" to reduce the supply of labor.

- Most states in the US provide subsidies to get businesses to move there, claiming job growth. But a Harvard study has pointed out that the actual resulting job growth that has accrued from those subsidies can be measured as about 1 job for every $300,000 per year in subsidies. Obviously, it would be far easier to just give labor the money.

My point is that we businesses, and you're hearing this from a lifetime CEO and investor, have managed to carefully construct a myth that many things create jobs and help labor which do not actually do anything of the kind. But our Congress, and to an even greater degree our state legislatures, are easily manipulated and have been manipulated for decades at the hands of those with capital.

This is hardly new. The founding fathers of our country only allowed white male land owners to vote. At that time, land ownership was the chosen asset owned by capital. On the other hand slavery and indentured servitude (no to mention happily accepting convicts from Europe) were used to swamp the marketplace with labor and cut its negotiating power.

Ok, I'll shut up once I say that every time you look at regulations and laws that limit the supply of labor or support the deployment of capital profitably you're seeing the root cause of the abuses at the low end of Amazon's employee base. Every time a State has won a new factory or job growth has been "encouraged" by a lower tax on capital you're seeing the root cause of the problem.

^^Amen, amen, amen. Well said. Tax revenues as a % of GDP are at or near post-war lows, we have been fighting wars for 12 years, infrastructure is crumbling, schools and universities are being cut, funds for basic research are drying up, and people at the top are whining about their taxes. What have I missed?

BEAU FOR PREZ!

Yeah, I would vote for Beau! We seem to share many common views.

I'd give him 30 seconds in the ring with Trudeau.