On Seattle's nwjobs.com employment website I spotted an advertisement for Verizon Wireless. It seems that they want to hire a few people, so I initiated the application process. http://www22.verizon.com/jobs/ is their corporate page for employment. I had followed a link provided by nwjobs.com, and I note that the verizon page doesn't list any positions in my state of WA, but several are listed on the Seattle Times job page. I follow through the application steps, and the LAST step which is REQUIRED by Verizon is permission to run a thorough credit check. This is not the background check permission which I'd already filled out and signed. A separate page dedicated to the infamous "credit check."
I say infamous, because creditworthiness was used as a method of discrimination against women and ethnic minorities historically, and continues to be used that way to this day. Banks, and only Financial Institutions, have any reason at all to consider your financial history before hiring you. Everyone else = racial and sexual discrimination. The reason for this is that women typically have lower credit, less income, and less opportunity than men. Also, ethnic minorities often abhor credit and refuse to maintain a credit score. I am one of those minorities. I'm Jewish, and I do not participate in the credit system as it is against my beliefs.
So, Verizon is openly, wantonly, and without cause, engaging in a clear violation of human rights and civil rights by requiring a credit check. It discriminates against women, against race, and against religion. Verizon is not a bank, a lender, nor a financial institution, and has no excuse for requiring a credit check upon an initial application.
If they were hiring me for an executive position, it could be excused as a request made AFTER THE INTERVIEW, because executives are held to be financially responsible, and the same goes for CFOs, CPAs, and other actuaries. NONE of the positions advertised by Verizon were such, and even those do not warrant a credit check UP FRONT. First-contact credit checks are 100% discriminatory under any discrimination law that I'm familiar with in all 50 states.
I'm shocked, because I've loved and enjoyed my Verizon service. I'm a customer that until now has been delighted with higher quality service at Verizon than I've obtained from Tmobile or ATT. I can't see how better service arrives from requiring credit checks. Many of the people I currently work with have degrees and a long history of good credit, but are now suffering from credit problems thanks simply to the economy. We're all employed, not bums, but I've sat in the lunchroom enough to hear that more than half the 250 people there have some credit issues that they are struggling with, and one of my co-workers has lost her house despite having been employed over the last two years.
It's a rough time, and that makes it all the more onerous that Verizon insists in engaging in a discriminatory practice. Good credit does not equate to better people. Most of the worst thieves I've ever seen were driving a Mercedes or wearing fashion designer clothing, and worked as executives. My family has rented businesses and houses, and it's the rich ones who don't pay, the privileged who do the most damage, and they're the ones attempting to smuggle millions offshore to avoid taxes. Middle class people pay their bills.
Bad news, Verizon. You're a bigot.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
A Final Blog About Aliens (UFO, Dimensional Craft, et al)
People love to believe in things. I won't get into religion because that's well, just way too easy. Point is, belief doesn't make it so. Read Epicuris, Socrates, or any of the B.C.E. philosophers who routinely struck down such talk as "thought candy."
In other words, it tastes good, but it's really not very good for you. At all.
Premise: UFOs are aliens from other planets/times/universes.
Conclusion: False.
Bias: OMG so false, it's just loony to even consider... stop, you're hurting me... oh it hurts to laugh so hard.
WHY? Please read for a VERY SIMPLE REASON why UFOs are just aircraft or other Earthly things. Oh, there's not just ONE, but several extremely good reasons why aliens would not fly here or time-travel here.
Theory and Clarification (grouped):
A;
Aliens are gods/godlike beings, from other times, universes, dimensions, or other undiscovered reality.
Okay, now I have to disprove godhood. For f**k sake... fine.
DISproof -
If they're godlike, they are far superior to us, and we'd have no ability to keep them secret, stop them, or even understand them. We'd be like ants to them. So, why are we not inundated with aliens walking around poking us with sticks, tagging us with collars, and so on? There's nothing stopping them from doing as they wish, and at least some of them presumably could want to do bad things to us - or at least things that we wouldn't understand.
There is no evidence anywhere on Earth of our societies having been tampered with in any way. If they're THAT GOOD, then they ARE gods, and we get back into a theology debate - not an argument about aliens.
B1;
Aliens/Humans/things visit from other planets, but are not godlike.
DISproof-
Just traveling to MARS takes a YEAR. Do you want to know how long it would take to get to just the nearest star IN our galaxy? At least 20 years, assuming we could get to half the speed of light in 5 years, and then slow down to orbit a planet.
Those aliens from Alpha Centauri better live to be at least 300 or 400 years old just to be able to GET here. Aliens from the other side of the Milky Way would need to live for 10,000 years to arrive on Earth.
B2;
But, they have FTL! They can go all Star Trek(tm) on us and be here fast!
DISproof-
Why aren't we seeing energy traces, radiation, or any output at all anywhere in the galaxy like that? It'd be pretty d*mn glaring, because intergalactic objects can only travel in straight lines. The first thing to take a corner or do a course adjustment would get the entire 10-million-strong Astronomy group's attention in a heartbeat. And, NOTHING in space is shown to travel anywhere near that fast.
B3;
But, they can travel interdimensional! You can't see 'em!
DISproof-
We'd still see them blinking in and out of existence when they get where they're going. And, frankly, it takes more energy to hide than to not-hide. They wouldn't always hide if they aren't fighting.
B4;
But...
DISproof-
No, we're only talking about ALIENS visiting EARTH. We'd see activity around our own darn planet. There may be silent-FTL ships out there happily dashing between the M-31 nebula and Omicron Eridani, but we'd never see it, and if they aren't coming here it doesn't matter.
C;
Aliens visited Earth in the past, but aren't now.
DISproof-
No, there's no evidence of any sort indicating this. It'd be impossible to keep it a secret if there were. How do you control a technology you don't understand? How do you keep everyone from talking about it, and why would you? Most religious zealots would seize upon it as evidence of divinity, to say the least. We can't assume a LACK of evidence is PROOF. It is only DISproof.
D;
Aliens have always run the world, and we are they. We've forgotten or devolved. We aren't invited to the Clambake.
DISproof-
What? There's no evidence of this or anything like this. Not even remotely close. Our DNA closely matches much of the life that's evolved on this planet and there is no record of any sudden bursts of newly coded life in the geological, archeological, or written record. If we were a seed colony, how would we know? Would we even be aliens? No. This is a circular argument to say the least.
In other words, it tastes good, but it's really not very good for you. At all.
Premise: UFOs are aliens from other planets/times/universes.
Conclusion: False.
Bias: OMG so false, it's just loony to even consider... stop, you're hurting me... oh it hurts to laugh so hard.
WHY? Please read for a VERY SIMPLE REASON why UFOs are just aircraft or other Earthly things. Oh, there's not just ONE, but several extremely good reasons why aliens would not fly here or time-travel here.
Theory and Clarification (grouped):
A;
Aliens are gods/godlike beings, from other times, universes, dimensions, or other undiscovered reality.
Okay, now I have to disprove godhood. For f**k sake... fine.
DISproof -
If they're godlike, they are far superior to us, and we'd have no ability to keep them secret, stop them, or even understand them. We'd be like ants to them. So, why are we not inundated with aliens walking around poking us with sticks, tagging us with collars, and so on? There's nothing stopping them from doing as they wish, and at least some of them presumably could want to do bad things to us - or at least things that we wouldn't understand.
There is no evidence anywhere on Earth of our societies having been tampered with in any way. If they're THAT GOOD, then they ARE gods, and we get back into a theology debate - not an argument about aliens.
B1;
Aliens/Humans/things visit from other planets, but are not godlike.
DISproof-
Just traveling to MARS takes a YEAR. Do you want to know how long it would take to get to just the nearest star IN our galaxy? At least 20 years, assuming we could get to half the speed of light in 5 years, and then slow down to orbit a planet.
Those aliens from Alpha Centauri better live to be at least 300 or 400 years old just to be able to GET here. Aliens from the other side of the Milky Way would need to live for 10,000 years to arrive on Earth.
B2;
But, they have FTL! They can go all Star Trek(tm) on us and be here fast!
DISproof-
Why aren't we seeing energy traces, radiation, or any output at all anywhere in the galaxy like that? It'd be pretty d*mn glaring, because intergalactic objects can only travel in straight lines. The first thing to take a corner or do a course adjustment would get the entire 10-million-strong Astronomy group's attention in a heartbeat. And, NOTHING in space is shown to travel anywhere near that fast.
B3;
But, they can travel interdimensional! You can't see 'em!
DISproof-
We'd still see them blinking in and out of existence when they get where they're going. And, frankly, it takes more energy to hide than to not-hide. They wouldn't always hide if they aren't fighting.
B4;
But...
DISproof-
No, we're only talking about ALIENS visiting EARTH. We'd see activity around our own darn planet. There may be silent-FTL ships out there happily dashing between the M-31 nebula and Omicron Eridani, but we'd never see it, and if they aren't coming here it doesn't matter.
C;
Aliens visited Earth in the past, but aren't now.
DISproof-
No, there's no evidence of any sort indicating this. It'd be impossible to keep it a secret if there were. How do you control a technology you don't understand? How do you keep everyone from talking about it, and why would you? Most religious zealots would seize upon it as evidence of divinity, to say the least. We can't assume a LACK of evidence is PROOF. It is only DISproof.
D;
Aliens have always run the world, and we are they. We've forgotten or devolved. We aren't invited to the Clambake.
DISproof-
What? There's no evidence of this or anything like this. Not even remotely close. Our DNA closely matches much of the life that's evolved on this planet and there is no record of any sudden bursts of newly coded life in the geological, archeological, or written record. If we were a seed colony, how would we know? Would we even be aliens? No. This is a circular argument to say the least.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Top 29 cities by "AskMen.com" - Were they paid to write this trash?
It reads more like a list of cities that paid advertising to Conde Nast [which owns about 80% of ALL magazines in the world.]
This is a piss-poor piece of work, not even journalism but thinly veiled advertising. AskMen.com is an abomination on the same order as Maxim, another excruciatingly sexist magazine. Are men really only interested in which cities have the most single women? Come on, even swingers are home-owners too, and want to be able to work in the same city. Only an irresponsible wastrel would be more concerned about dating than employment, or is their entire audience 15 years old?
Articles like this remind me of my experiences in journalism, and what I view as the death of journalism in print media - of which the article is a prime example. Corporations have utterly absorbed all communication in the Western world. Governments and Institutions have surrendered all their responsibilities to the board room. The first thing that happened thereafter is that ALL newsrooms eliminated the laboratories, laid off investigative workers, and closed down smaller local offices.
Not every activity HAS to be a 1500% profit model. There are some businesses where a 10% profit model is not only acceptable, but DESIRED. The news is a public service, or it was. Now it's corporate media. Sure, with electronics you can expect a thousand percent, but that's not going to work in hospitals, universities, and news - because those businesses are NOT BUSINESSES.
A hospital is an INSTITUTION. There's an incredibly huge difference, and attempting to monetize an institution gets you where we are now: FAILURE. Education in America is 50th out of 50 top nations. Medicine in America is 29th out of 50 nations. We have the dumbest, and sickest, rich people in the world.
Way to go, Capitalism. Nobody believed Ayn Rand 40 years ago when she began her drivel and nobody believes her now, yet we've inexplicably got Capitalism everywhere - even where it SHOULD NOT BE.
America is A REPUBLIC. We are not a pure Democracy, and that's intentional. Our founding fathers knew that Democracies are inherently unstable and degenerate into mob rule, eventually becoming Fascist states worse than the original state overcome by Democracy! Thus the Republic was born. When we try to make America too much of a Democracy, the corporations take over because they are so good at mind-washing the masses. If only corporations could be regulated! Oh, that's right, they WERE...
And it was when that regulation was STOPPED that all our problems began. It's hard to feel sorry for America. We did it to ourselves.
This is a piss-poor piece of work, not even journalism but thinly veiled advertising. AskMen.com is an abomination on the same order as Maxim, another excruciatingly sexist magazine. Are men really only interested in which cities have the most single women? Come on, even swingers are home-owners too, and want to be able to work in the same city. Only an irresponsible wastrel would be more concerned about dating than employment, or is their entire audience 15 years old?
Articles like this remind me of my experiences in journalism, and what I view as the death of journalism in print media - of which the article is a prime example. Corporations have utterly absorbed all communication in the Western world. Governments and Institutions have surrendered all their responsibilities to the board room. The first thing that happened thereafter is that ALL newsrooms eliminated the laboratories, laid off investigative workers, and closed down smaller local offices.
Not every activity HAS to be a 1500% profit model. There are some businesses where a 10% profit model is not only acceptable, but DESIRED. The news is a public service, or it was. Now it's corporate media. Sure, with electronics you can expect a thousand percent, but that's not going to work in hospitals, universities, and news - because those businesses are NOT BUSINESSES.
A hospital is an INSTITUTION. There's an incredibly huge difference, and attempting to monetize an institution gets you where we are now: FAILURE. Education in America is 50th out of 50 top nations. Medicine in America is 29th out of 50 nations. We have the dumbest, and sickest, rich people in the world.
Way to go, Capitalism. Nobody believed Ayn Rand 40 years ago when she began her drivel and nobody believes her now, yet we've inexplicably got Capitalism everywhere - even where it SHOULD NOT BE.
America is A REPUBLIC. We are not a pure Democracy, and that's intentional. Our founding fathers knew that Democracies are inherently unstable and degenerate into mob rule, eventually becoming Fascist states worse than the original state overcome by Democracy! Thus the Republic was born. When we try to make America too much of a Democracy, the corporations take over because they are so good at mind-washing the masses. If only corporations could be regulated! Oh, that's right, they WERE...
And it was when that regulation was STOPPED that all our problems began. It's hard to feel sorry for America. We did it to ourselves.
Monday, May 24, 2010
irresponsibility - not just limited to kids and fools.
Ubuntu has a serious problem, that of a set of persons operating the distribution who are remorselessly rude, beyond arrogant, and prone to throwing blame when people ask for help. Welcome back to IRC.
Most recently, the great Ubuntu team hosed up the distribution for yet another release, sending untested code out into the public. 10.04 is broken, and after you reboot, you won't have any more internet for a while. IF you manage to figure out how to disable IPV6, you MIGHT be able to get online, but then at a cost of losing IPV6.
Rolling back to 9.10 was never intended to be allowed, and rather than admit the mistake on either case, the forums are filled with arrogant and condescending vitriole directed at people asking for help.
I've had enough. I was never a huge fan of Debian based linux versions due to the arrogance of THAT team, and it seems to be contagious. I'm busily converting my servers over to SuSE. Those guys at Debian made me miss Slackware. The ubuntu crowd reminds me of the people on IRC who ban people who ask questions, and thus the failure of IRC to ever be very popular. It's hard to attract people to an environment controlled by trolls. Ubuntu could gain some popularity by learning how to be professional, and never releasing a beta version on the public again.
Re:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?s=c4b086bbd4963079ab0b7bc1f085572d&t=1418208&page=1
Most recently, the great Ubuntu team hosed up the distribution for yet another release, sending untested code out into the public. 10.04 is broken, and after you reboot, you won't have any more internet for a while. IF you manage to figure out how to disable IPV6, you MIGHT be able to get online, but then at a cost of losing IPV6.
Rolling back to 9.10 was never intended to be allowed, and rather than admit the mistake on either case, the forums are filled with arrogant and condescending vitriole directed at people asking for help.
I've had enough. I was never a huge fan of Debian based linux versions due to the arrogance of THAT team, and it seems to be contagious. I'm busily converting my servers over to SuSE. Those guys at Debian made me miss Slackware. The ubuntu crowd reminds me of the people on IRC who ban people who ask questions, and thus the failure of IRC to ever be very popular. It's hard to attract people to an environment controlled by trolls. Ubuntu could gain some popularity by learning how to be professional, and never releasing a beta version on the public again.
Re:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?s=c4b086bbd4963079ab0b7bc1f085572d&t=1418208&page=1
Thursday, May 20, 2010
ACSD, another acronym for failure.
One of the worst aspects of dealing with government is the total failure of any sort of management, accountability, performance, efficiency, and the combined inability to prove ANYTHING because the system is designed to DEFLECT responsibility.
LIFE long government employees are some of the worst people on Earth, not just ineffective and officious, but self-aggrandizing, power hungry, pious, malicious, and mule-stubborn. That's not even mentioning the techno-fear, and aversion to both change and accountability. The last thing any of these white-collar managers want is a system that actually tracks their performance because then people would find out how bad they are at their jobs.
Government employees who stay in for life are bad for two obvious reasons: First, the pay is terrible. A masters degree will barely earn survivable wages in the US Government, just over 50K a year. If you have kids and a mortgage, that wage would put you below the poverty line. Any master's degree-holding employee can get close to six figures in almost any line of work outside the government. Second, government employees are legendary for their self-righteousness, and this is because the actual job requirements include little tid-bits like 'Community Service' - a euphemism for Church membership, 'Project Management' - a euphemism for nepotism and cronyism, and finally we come to the worst of the worst, the acronyms. People with experience in lots of systems that have acronyms look good on a resume, regardless of how flawed, nonexistent, or broken those systems are. Oh, you've used BSD? That's great! Is that a payroll system? ... Yeah, sure.
There are three non-obvious reasons why government employees in the good old USA suck dirt: First, good people leave as rapidly as possible. Why would anyone who LIKES to be productive willingly remain buried in an invisible system that is designed not to work? It's hell! I hate it. I can't wait for my rapidly-approaching end date, and I'm considering just QUITTING before it gets here and forfeiting my unemployment! Why? IT SUCKS. I hate never being able to do anything effectively because every avenue that leads to production is blocked. All I can do is circulate paperwork and try to feel like I'm not a hypocrite for working here.
Second, the system promotes not merely MEDIOCRITY, but actually promotes people who are dangerously incompetent. How does that work? TWO WORDS: SARAH PALIN. How did such a monumental idiot make Governor? Easy, she works in a system that promotes idiots. The dumber you are, the higher you go. Excessive and inappropriate religion, patriotism, and posturing will get you further in the government than a PhD.
Finally, the worst problem of US government, and it's not the idiots, it's not the bankers - and they're slimy idiots, and it's not the military - the brass leadership of which is absolutely neanderthal. No, the worst aspect of the US government is CONGRESS. It's congress which approves of all this stupidity, and in fact writes laws requiring most of it.
The dumbest people on the face of the Earth are also the most powerful: Senators. People who believe in flat Earth, made in six days, also are responsible for anything and everything that happens in America.
Is it any wonder that I want to leave?
LIFE long government employees are some of the worst people on Earth, not just ineffective and officious, but self-aggrandizing, power hungry, pious, malicious, and mule-stubborn. That's not even mentioning the techno-fear, and aversion to both change and accountability. The last thing any of these white-collar managers want is a system that actually tracks their performance because then people would find out how bad they are at their jobs.
Government employees who stay in for life are bad for two obvious reasons: First, the pay is terrible. A masters degree will barely earn survivable wages in the US Government, just over 50K a year. If you have kids and a mortgage, that wage would put you below the poverty line. Any master's degree-holding employee can get close to six figures in almost any line of work outside the government. Second, government employees are legendary for their self-righteousness, and this is because the actual job requirements include little tid-bits like 'Community Service' - a euphemism for Church membership, 'Project Management' - a euphemism for nepotism and cronyism, and finally we come to the worst of the worst, the acronyms. People with experience in lots of systems that have acronyms look good on a resume, regardless of how flawed, nonexistent, or broken those systems are. Oh, you've used BSD? That's great! Is that a payroll system? ... Yeah, sure.
There are three non-obvious reasons why government employees in the good old USA suck dirt: First, good people leave as rapidly as possible. Why would anyone who LIKES to be productive willingly remain buried in an invisible system that is designed not to work? It's hell! I hate it. I can't wait for my rapidly-approaching end date, and I'm considering just QUITTING before it gets here and forfeiting my unemployment! Why? IT SUCKS. I hate never being able to do anything effectively because every avenue that leads to production is blocked. All I can do is circulate paperwork and try to feel like I'm not a hypocrite for working here.
Second, the system promotes not merely MEDIOCRITY, but actually promotes people who are dangerously incompetent. How does that work? TWO WORDS: SARAH PALIN. How did such a monumental idiot make Governor? Easy, she works in a system that promotes idiots. The dumber you are, the higher you go. Excessive and inappropriate religion, patriotism, and posturing will get you further in the government than a PhD.
Finally, the worst problem of US government, and it's not the idiots, it's not the bankers - and they're slimy idiots, and it's not the military - the brass leadership of which is absolutely neanderthal. No, the worst aspect of the US government is CONGRESS. It's congress which approves of all this stupidity, and in fact writes laws requiring most of it.
The dumbest people on the face of the Earth are also the most powerful: Senators. People who believe in flat Earth, made in six days, also are responsible for anything and everything that happens in America.
Is it any wonder that I want to leave?
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
America might be guilty of Assassination
America may have been directly involved in an Assassination plot of foreign leaders. The captured assassin Rigi has stated unequivocably that either or both Israel and the United States were paying for "hits."
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=126963§ionid=351020101
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=126963§ionid=351020101
Friday, April 30, 2010
Internet Awards
There are a few types, the validity of which I'll leave up to you. Of course, the high-profile and highly visible "award" sites are commercially driven corporate efforts - as most Awards are, even the Oscars. Other, more specific awards, are driven by standards, performance, and achievements in the genre. The truest awards, in my not so humble opinion, is the cash award handed out by an anonymous individual, which is based upon a published criteria.
With that in mind, perhaps the greatest award with the highest transparency is "The Beacon". However, upon a quick read of that site one notices the very limited audience and participation. This is more of a "my home town" award.
The COOLEST award with any transparency at all, and with the HIGHEST participation of the public is The FWA.
http://www.thefwa.com/
After all, how many award sites would prominently display websites with F-bombs on them? This site is chock-full of humor, and on-target criticism of websites in general, and there are no sacred cows.
I've yet to see a better award site, even from commercial and wealthy sponsors, than the FWA. RECOMMENDED.
RE: (a sampling of random internet awards based on google ranking.)
Webby Awards are closed-source private-tallying awards handed out by a commercial entity.
http://www.webbyawards.com
The SXSW is an obvious commercial award site I'd never even heard of:
http://www.sxsw.com
Britain has its own Webby:
http://www.ispaawards.org.uk
Advertising Awards:
http://www.advertisingcompetition.org
With that in mind, perhaps the greatest award with the highest transparency is "The Beacon". However, upon a quick read of that site one notices the very limited audience and participation. This is more of a "my home town" award.
The COOLEST award with any transparency at all, and with the HIGHEST participation of the public is The FWA.
http://www.thefwa.com/
After all, how many award sites would prominently display websites with F-bombs on them? This site is chock-full of humor, and on-target criticism of websites in general, and there are no sacred cows.
I've yet to see a better award site, even from commercial and wealthy sponsors, than the FWA. RECOMMENDED.
RE: (a sampling of random internet awards based on google ranking.)
Webby Awards are closed-source private-tallying awards handed out by a commercial entity.
http://www.webbyawards.com
The SXSW is an obvious commercial award site I'd never even heard of:
http://www.sxsw.com
Britain has its own Webby:
http://www.ispaawards.org.uk
Advertising Awards:
http://www.advertisingcompetition.org
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)