The answer is localization and allowing people to make choices for themselves rather than those choices being made by some huge monolithic uncaring entity. When one person messes up, it affects a few. When Government messes up, if affects millions.

Yes, the government picks winners and appropriates the wealth of others to apportion to its favorites. This is an argument for reduced government, not more.

I was assuming sane objectives

You'd get the most from it if you pondered on it by yourself for a while.

I disagree. People in general realize education is important and will go out of their way to obtain it for their children (There is historical evidence for this by the way). And being discerning consumers and not the money firehose that is the government, they will ensure they obtain value for money.

If you want to argue that there are some (very) few people who would lose out and would benefit from a safety net, I'll give you that.

Indeed. Mine was actually pretty good compared to many. The question really is whether it necessary for the government to fund them (given the way they obtain those funds) and the quality of education obtained vs that money spent elsewhere (or, conversely, whether a similar level of education can be obtained by spending/taking less money).

However, many people live in areas with bad schools. And they can't go private because the government is confiscating too much of their income and they can't move to a better catchment area because the government is confiscating too much of their income.

Good question to start with. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

The mess that is the American education system that mmitech is decrying is also the fault of the government.

This is worth a read http://mises.org/daily/1425

Politics will never be far from Bitcoin.

That's a whole 'nother discussion but college is becoming so expensive because it's subsidized and oversubscribed and prices rise to accommodate that. Arguably there are too many people going to college anyway as a college degree is now required for any tuppenny-hapenny job and we are losing skilled manual workers as they are chasing a piece of paper instead of learning a trade.

I wish I'd have dropped out and pursued what I was good at. Instead I missed out several years of experience which had to be caught up. I had a lot of fun on the taxpayer's dime five pence piece but was it good value for money?* (And this was not some humanities nonsense). I also did not really appreciate what I was being given at the time cause someone else was paying for it. (UK back when they still had full grants).

As to education as a right? I think we should just agree to disagree there (and you probably already know why).

*Definitely not for the UK tax payer. The US gets my income tax.

So not free. Good. Let's actually acknowledge those people who are going out there and working day after day to pay for this stuff and realize that this stuff doesn't just fall from the sky.

OTOH, Amazon now has a perfect petri dish to study Bitcoin transactions in action.

Free education? How do the teachers feed and house themselves?

Interesting point. Perhaps addresses could be signed in some way similar to SSL certs for websites.

With the thread that Chartbuddy was posting in being locked by an administrator, I'm concerned that if I started another thread for him, it would just end up locked again.

I just started a poll here. Vote if you want Chartbuddy back (or if you don't).

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=756202.0

(Alternatively, if Adam wants him back (or not), it's his thread).

A visit to shadowstats is worthwhile. It looks like 3% is just the worst they are willing to admit to and can game the calculations enough to produce.

Generally true. But requires good information on the part of both parties. With short-term speculation, two people with conflicting information are trading. One is correct, one not.

This is not true for all trades, of course. Someone who believes the price is about to go up may trade with someone who has a better use for the money (rent, electricity, other investments) and a net gain in value is realized but out there on the frontlines, it's red vs black at the roulette table.

Now, to address TA specifically, it doubtless potentially has some value. But that only against others who are trading with bad TA or using other methods that produce poor trading (trading on emotions). However it's not infallible (as I'm sure many TA traders know) and you may be using bad TA (which can only be borne out by time) so there is a real risk of big losses if it's relied on too heavily. And if everyone uses "good" TA, you're sunk (fairly unlikely though).

However, from having monitored this thread for nearly a couple of years now, I have to say, if anyone has good TA, they're mostly keeping it to themselves.

Oh, and if the market's being manipulated and that manipulator knows what will trick most TA, good luck.

I decided to let this run for a bit to see how it would work. I know some people were wanting Chartbuddy in his own thread when he first started posting. Might stick with it and have Chartbuddy start his own thread at some point.

To be honest, he's getting to be a bit more trouble than he's worth.

I heard it was some kinda Ponzi plan.

Bi-polar bear?