Category: Rants

In which I go off on the stupidity of politics, politicians, world affairs, religion, and whatever else I deem to be screwed up.

FIOS, Is It Really Worth It?

Posted on by chappyshi

Verizon’s FIOS (fiber optics vice copper to the home) has been touted as God’s gift to digital TV and broadband Internet access.  (Disclaimer, my brother-in-law works for Verizon, does FIOS installs, and has FIOS TV and Internet.)  I have been resonably impressed with the TV service, usability, functionality, on-screen menus, DVR, and such.

However, if one had DirectTV and wanted only FIOS Internet access from Verizon, for example, they would have to pay five dollars per month more for the Internet access if they didn’t bundle IP phone service with the deal.  See it here.  To me this is close to a deal breaker and for posterity, it would be a deal breaker.  I haven’t had a land line for eight or ten years and surely wouldn’t get one to save five bucks a month on Internet access…which is probably what Verizon is betting on.

I understand that Verizon wants to make money and that bundling phone service with Internet access theoretically is a good deal for the consumer.  Realistically, it is only a good deal if you are still using a seriously outdated landline service that you should have bailed on years ago.  For me, ditching a landline pretty much paid for my Internet access.  Why should those of us who saw years ago how the telecom cards were going to fall be penalized for being early adopters?  Why would we want to pay for a service that we’ve given up and never missed?  Shouldn’t someone like the FCC be investigating these cheesy marketing practices?

Verizon generally has a good thing going with FIOS but the technology is the only thing that saved Verizon in the broadband wars with the cable companies.  FIOS I am sure was conceived as an alternative to DSL which could never compete with cable’s pricepoint speedwise.  From my experience DSL was much less reliable, and often harder to configure, than cable Internet access.  DSL was always, and still is, severely hampered by distance constraints.   If you are located more than 15,000 feet from the nearest  presence of your phone company, you’ll be lucky to get download speeds of .5 Mbps compared to the 15 Mbps for Verizon FIOS’ basic package.  Yet, even with the prevalence of FIOS, cable Internet access still  dominates  in rural areas.  It just isn’t cost effective yet for Verizon to roll out FIOS in rural and small town USA.

Now, I have Cox for Internet access and TV.  I pay for 5 Mbps downloads but often see download speeds similar to those promised by FIOS.  Go to DSL Reports to check your download and upload speeds.  I pay the same amount per month for my Internet access as I would for FIOS’ basic package.  I do not see much in the way of speed differences while web surfing at home as compared to web surfing at my brother-in-laws house.  I don’t know if watching TV and using the Internet at the same time is any different on FIOS than it is on cable.  I assume there are some Quality of Service (QOS) standards that ensure at least that your TV signal has the bandwidth that it needs, even at the expense of Internet access performance.

Nonetheless, at the rates that I get for what I pay,  I can, and do, stream music for hours every day while web surfing and downloading files to my heart’s content.  I can also watch movies on demand from Netflix without any problems.  I guess that what I am trying to say is that  I am not sure that Verizon FIOS is all that, especially if, to save five dollars, I would have to get phone service I’d never use.

Governor Sanford “and Sons”

Posted on by chappyshi

What a freaking cheese dick!  Let’s see if I could get away with this…   I  am the governor of a state in the US.  I tell my staff, I think, that I am going hiking on the Appalachian Trail  for five days and will be out of touch.  Not even my Lieutenant Governor knows how to contact  me or what the chain of command is should I be unreachable, which I have already said would be the case.

To start with, I am such a conservative freak that I refuse nearly $800 million in stimulus funds from the Federal government.  That should really endear me to my constituents!  Then what?  I am actually in Argentina with some woman I met on the Internet…  I must be some kind of God!!!

Out you freaking idiot and out those who must have had some  knowledge your indescretion.  You all make me sick.  I am struggling to find a job and you are just getting away with murder.  Read it and weep.

Inertial Idiocy: Hummingbird in a Car Crash

Posted on by chappyshi

This is kind of a “canary in a coal mine” comparison.  If a hummingbird is in a hover when a car slows down drastically, might it hit the dashboard?  If your head might do so, why wouldn’t the hummingbird?

Some moron in a Washington Post automotive column called “Click and Clack” actually posed the question.  Read more here: “Click and Clack: A Real Humdinger.”  Basic physics should show that the bird, as well as your head, will  keep traveling forward no matter that the car is coming to a sudden stop.

Change for the Worse

Posted on by chappyshi

I had a couple of beers  at my local watering hole, which I walk to, this evening.  My tab came to $10.50.  I gave the waitress $20 and she brought me back $9.00 in change.  This has happened to me before in the place…usually with a relatively new waitress…but never at the bar.  I called her back and asked her what the deal was.  She said it was quicker to not return any "coin" change.

I was so stunned at her statement that I didn’t even ask her about the fact that she was cheating me.  I did explain to her that I had planned on tipping her 2 dollars but since she had already cheated me out of 50 cents and since I personally had no change other than ones I was leaving her a dollar.  That left her with a $1.50 tip instead of $2.00.  In retrospect I probably should have just let her keep the 50 cents for her tip.

In the grand scheme of things that 50 cents is probably not significant to the waitress or to myself but where have people’s principles gone to?  Since it was not the first time it happened, I expect they think they can get away with it.  I complained to the manager about it on the way out.  Perhaps the problem will be addressed… or perhaps the waitress will spit in my beer the next time I go in.

Mileage Tax My Ass

Posted on by chappyshi

The Washington Post’s support of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s idea to tax  “vehicle miles” traveled is inane.  The article, “Mr. LaHood’s Good Idea,” dated 23 February, 2009,  purports that a mileage tax would be more fair and reap more tax dollars than an increase in the federal gasoline tax.

I look at it this way:  those individuals who commute further for  work each day are probably not doing it because they want to.  They are also probably driving more fuel efficient vehicles, because they have to.  So  they are taking jobs where they can, that they need to support their families and keep them in a home.

Those individuals who are driving gas hogs either don’t commute that far or can afford to keep filling them up.  Which person in these two scenarios is trying to conserve fuel and save money.  Which one doesn’t care about conserving fuel and saving money?  Which one should be taxed at a higher rate?  Do the math and “fig”ure it out, Newton.

Where is the evidence that the gas tax — which, we note here for the umpteenth time, should be raised — will be less effective in capturing revenue?  The gas tax, just like income and sales taxes indexed to target the wealthy, should target those individuals who have the disposable income to waste it, gas that is.

Why should a family struggling to make ends meet that finds a job 40 miles one way from their home have to pay higher taxes than a Hummer driver who can afford to live 10 miles away from their employer?

Of course figuring out how to record, track, and assess all those miles would be insane in the membrane.  The IRS is screwed already. Discussion of GPS’s and recording devices at gas stations comes up.  That’s going to work…  Who is going to take on this new function?  Seems like the gas  tax is the way to go.  We don’t even need  to skew it to the gas hogs.  They get hit just because the need more gas!

I am losing my faith in the Washington Post on this one.   I think that we should tax on consumption but the tax should not be  biased toward miles accumulated but toward miles per gallon.  There is a lot of gray area out there.  Is it more efficient to fly than to drive, should we take the slow boat to China, etc.

The bottom line for me is fuel efficiency.  The owners of the vehicles with the worst fuel efficiency should pay the most for their fuel.  Similarly, those individuals whose homes  are the least fuel  efficient  should pay the most for their fuel.  The only way to fairly apply that principle is via fuel taxes.

Economic Stimulus? Not If You Are Unemployed.

Posted on by chappyshi

I noticed that the Washington Post article “Congress Reaches Stimulus Accord,” dated 02/12/2009, description of  the “Economic Stimulus” plan says that the proposed tax break for families and individuals “…would be distributed mainly through reduced payroll tax withholding.”  What good does that do for the millions of unemployed out there who are on reduced or no payroll?  Where’s the love?  Screw the love! Show me the money!

Untitled for Days, Sir

Posted on by chappyshi

According to Al Kamen in the Washington Post article Speeches That Keep On Giving, dated February 6, 2009, the Department Of Homeland Security spent “$11,200 on a book of Secretary Chertoff’s ‘Select Speeches'” which it then distributed to hundreds of DHS employees.

Has DHS heard of this new-fangled thing called the World Wide Web on which those speeches could have been published at next to no cost to the taxpayer?  Apparently not…maybe DHS needs to take a tip or two from Al Qaeda’s publicity department.  A quick Google search indicates that many of those speeches are already available on the web.

$11,200 surely is peanuts to DHS but if this expenditure is any indication of how they manage their money then we as taxpayers are in trouble.  And it is not peanuts to me.  Oh, and since those speeches are presumably unclassified, they are most likely to be boring as hell.