Posts by constance szeflinski 11 posts • joined 12 Oct 2007
The states of Washington and Oregon will join California - and maybe Nevada too. I would wish they'd like to have Colorado as a nom-contiguous member and perhaps New Mexico too. That configuration would have a decent chance of surviving. Self sufficiency is not required, just the means to make enough money to be successful globally - you can trade for things you don't make/grow yourself.
Hillary won the popular vote by more than Kennedy or Nixon (or Gore, another sad tale of the electoral college anacrhonism). So there are more "blue" people than "red" people and the "blue" people are more affluent. Do you really think that will change in any way except where the "blue" people actually get richer and the "red" people get poorer. I don't think that's the result any of them are looking for but it is what it is. If they drive the "illegals" out then they can come and mow my lawn and clean my toilet or pick fruit because those are the "good jobs" those "illegals" are taking away from them. There is no way the high paying assembly line jobs are ever coming back - they are gone for good because a robot can do the job better and cheaper than a human being. The upside may be for older tech workers who have recently been replaced with lower paid H1-B folks. There will be jobs for those ready to retire, should they want to keep working. Age discrimination may slow a bit because there definitely are not enough properly educated young folks to step in to all the jobs now held by foreigners.
Yes, our education system is so awful that over 70% of those foreign employees were educated at US colleges. There are plenty of great people available for employment right here the problem is they know how much money they should be making and companies are loathe to pay them what they are worth. The funny thing is that I've never seen a development project come in on time or at budget using these cheap workers - in general when things get in real trouble they hire some very expensive old fart consultants (all US originals) to fix the problems the in the outsourced/foreign contractor code for more than it would have cost to do it right in the first place. Executives only see "I get x number of people for y number of dollars" - they never see that the x number of people just muck things up when fewer better people could bring the project in for fewer dollars in the end. Throwing more and cheaper people at a development project generally does more harm than good - but I've never met an executive that accepts that fact.
It is not the good people who want to come to the USA that are the problem - the problem is greedy employers who see those good people as a way to pay less for the job. "I can get a foreigner to do the same job as a US citizen and only pay them two thirds of what the citizen will cost - sign me up."
It is unfair to the US citizens who had to pay their way through college only to find that their jobs are being taken by foreigners willing to work for less than it takes to live (how they do it is beyond me - no college graduate should be forced to live like a poor starving student their entire working career - they are entitled to be paid what the job they trained for is worth - not get by on what someone who will do just about anything to live in the US is willing to put up with.
The way to make all these different devices compatible ic through a VDI (virtual desktop interface) accessed through a VPN (virtual private network) with strong security. You can then open an excel spreadsheet on an iPad or any other supported device - it's the wave of the future. The data security is pretty impressive (for anything even partially exposed on the internet, of course if you want real security you need a closed network and no internet connection at all but we're not talking about that here). Anyhow, VDI is the wave of the future and it allows maximum flexibility in device selection but total control of the virtual machines by IT - it really is the best of both worlds (no, I'm not a shill for any VDI related company just a happy employee who actually enjoys the virtual environment and the ability to connect to it in so many different ways).
You know, it depends on who you want to keep the data from. There are data forensic experts who can read through several layers of "destruction" done using various programs. The only way to be absolutely sure that no one can ever recover any date from a drive is to destroy the platters. That's simply a fact. Of course if you're just trying to hide from a casual user without access to a lab, software destruction will probably work.
Oh Nick - you are the definition of the Ugly American. As long as folks like you speak out, the truly good people here in the US will continue to be suspect. And we are basically good. Our government is out of control and in the hands of some astonishingly evil people - both of the Republican and Democratic variety. I hope we can implement some type of peaceful revolution to return to our brilliant constitution. Barring that - I would seriously consider a move north. I'm not giving up yet,but every time I read crap like Nick's I begin to wonder if the forces of good can win back the heart of America.
Sorry for the over the top prose - I'm pretty disgusted by what my government is doing in my name and I just want the rest of the world to know we're not all like that.
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