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I would utterly destroy you if you attempted that shit in my neighborhood. Absolutely. Destroy.

I doubt that. You'd have to have numbers, or infinite luck.

The bad guys aren't numerous in most areas, and in most areas the good guys are all too willing to help me out. It's not terribly easy to root out small numbers of them from large populations, but it's doable.

In areas where bad guys are numerous, we switch from house to house picking and choosing to clearing the entire area. This is where war gets messy, but that's why it's war and not something we do for fun on weekends in the Hamptons.

If I bring force and stick to my plan of clearing an area and doing it righteously and keeping it clear, I win. This, on the other hand, is #fail: Insurgents bully bakeries in Marjah, Afghanistan Those guys should be dead, not hassling naan-flippers, or the story should be "U.S. Forces Kill Taliban Thugs Who Harassed Marjah Merchants". Petraeus needs to recognize this and fix what McChrystal didn't.

Medieval tactics are inferior to modern tactics in the same way that Unix is inferior to modern OSes like Windows.

That's cute, but it's wrong. I use both Unix and Windows, precisely because I know their where not to use either of them. Military tactics can be nullified by military strategy, so knowing when not to allow a tactic to come into play means it's me FTW. Like I said. If you're vulnerable to well-studied medieval tactics -- or worse, you're trying to use them on someone who's been through a war college and a few campaigns, then you're a stupid cunt, and he's an even stupider cunt if you succeed.

Other phrases:

- To call a spade a spade
- The pot calling the kettle black
- Black holes
- Water buffalo
- Tar baby

And this isn't just limited to racial slurs. Many "politically correct" euphemisms are there just to avoid a phrase that someone took offense at, even when the phrase was not originally offensive.

What this boils down to is people choosing to take offense. At that point, they're just making themselves look stupid and inviting further offense.

From another source:

Also on Friday, a forensic biologist testifying for the prosecution, Angela Fitzwater, reiterated for the jury what prosecutors said in opening statements: that Bess was a match for the DNA found inside Samota. The chances that someone else was the contributor to the DNA is one in 2.69 quadrillion Caucasians, Fitzwater said, far more than the population of Earth.

So there still seems to be some disagreement with some of what's being said here and what the experts are saying. Can somebody shed some light on how a supposed expert, under oath, can claim a DNA match that is all but unique in the world's population of Caucasians?

The tests they do have a 99.9% success rate (if it's gone up or that was too optimistic, let me know, but that's last I saw).

Knowing nothing about how DNA testing is done, how does the statement above reconcile with this case, in which an expert witness testified that the odds of a false positive "are 1 in 2.69 quadrillion"?

We're dealing with big oil. Conflicts of interest over oil companies are something we'd be idiots not to take seriously. Remember Joe Barton, on the House Energy and Commerce Committee? Actually apologized to BP a few days ago for them having to pay for the damage they caused? Should we assume that guy had public interest at heart?

More to the point, he was not going rogue here, he was repeating the point of view shared by all the other Republicans in his think tank. His gaffe was simply saying this out loud. He repeated a talking point in front of the wrong crowd, like a comedian accidentally bringing out his blue material on Carson.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/061910dntexbartonescrow.1fc6cdc.html

Cars don't scale. Mass transit scales better.

Not in the eighth-largest city in the US.

I would suspect other places as well are finding mass transit is not the panacea the environmentalists make it out to be.

Well, technically there is no basis for this myth of Texas having the right to secede from the rest of the Nation at will. It's not mentioned anywhere in the Texas constitution nor is there a provision for it in the US constitution. Now some folks would claim that because there is no mention of it, that doesn't mean it's not possible. Check to the FAQ at this site, which seems to promote the idea.
Snopes briefly mentions this myth as well in the last sentence of this page, and also mentions that there is no such clause in any official documentation.
More proof

Wrong.

The legal system has been used destructively, to extort large penalties from desperately poor people who are of course unable to either fight or pay. Once in violation of the law, and with no way to set things right, they can start on a downward spiral. They now have a criminal record which makes getting a job much, much harder. A few more petty crimes on the record suddenly doesn't matter too much, particularly when you're hungry.

This is why social safety nets are so important. "Soup kitchens" and homeless shelters provide enough that these unfortunates do not have to turn to crime. They can still be law abiding citizens. You might think these safety nets are for lazy bums, that it enables people to be ungrateful, undeserving slackers. That people in such dire straits have only themselves to blame. No. Even if some undoubtedly are bums, the safety nets are not just sops for bleeding hearts. They're also so you and I can go about our business without being attacked by starving mobs furious that we have to wealth to feed everyone but for some incomprehensible reason just won't. And even more furious that we have the arrogance and gall to rub salt in their wounds, blaming them for being victims, and asserting, most unconstructively, that it's because they're a bunch of whining, stupid, lazy losers. You know, like what Phil Gramm said in the last presidential election. The media can always find a whiner. But is such a person representative? Often not. There are many reasons why good citizens could end up homeless: natural disasters, ruined by medical expenses arising from an accident, robbed, unpaid because their employer cheated or went bankrupt, or simply studied the wrong subjects in high school.

It's damned mean and heartless to pass judgment on their competence, particularly in cases when it is our policies that have directly contributed to the problem! "Judge not, that ye be not judged" (Matthew 7:1). It doesn't help. As if having to crawl to a homeless shelter or apply for food stamps isn't shame enough, trying to further shame people into doing better presumes that they can, that the system isn't rigged against them. Blaming them is an all too convenient excuse not to fix problems with the system. It's big time hypocritical. And I know that it can happen to anyone. It could happen to you, or me. "There but for the grace of God go I". Maybe you're young enough that you've never been nailed with an unfair parking ticket or other petty violation. Or cheated out of your pay by an unscrupulous employer. Someday it'll happen, and then maybe you'll begin to understand, and you won't say outrageous stuff like "well, he should have known better" when it is obvious he couldn't have. You can't think of everything.

Periodically, the authorities realize that the worst of these sorts of laws are causing more problems than they're worth, and make changes, and perhaps declare an amnesty.

Lest you think what I'm saying is just so much hot air, here is an example. A few years ago, Texas thought to raise more revenue by attaching large fines to moving violations. This is the Driver Responsibility Program. Read about it here The governor supports it not because it makes our highways safer or is in the public interest, but because it supposedly generates more revenue for the state. Michigan is also trying a similar stunt. In Michigan, it's possible to lose your driver's license without you even being informed! You may find out about it only if you are stopped, and then you get nailed for driving without a license in addition to whatever else it was you allegedly did. Talk about dirty pool. What these laws have really done is turn a bunch of poor citizens into criminals. It's a stellar exhibit in the kind of "kick them when they're down" viciousness and damaging brutality that does more harm than good.

'I was about to write a press release to congratulate Cape Wind for getting their approval,' says Jim Suydam, press secretary of the Texas General Land Office, 'and let them know when they're done jumping through hoops up there they can come build off the Texas Coast.'

Is this really the best time to be bragging about lax regulation of offshore energy production in Texas?

Turns out it was an Act of God!

You think the drug cartels are just going to lay down and stop operating if marijuana is legalized? Haha, good one.

The simple fact of the matter is the drug war does far more to hurt more people than any amount of drugs themselves. You do know we are the highest incinerator on the planet, and aruund half our prisoners are non-violent drug offenders. Meanwhile, California is out of money, and is letting murderers out of jail instead of pot smokers, and the drug war led the charge at erasing civil rights, setting up the stage for the war on terror to continue. But hey. Blame it all on the substance. When police lie and set people up, something that happens every day, ignore the freedom that is taken away, and whine about the other bees in your hive not producing as much honey as you think they should. Your ignorance on the matter becomes more apparent with each passing comment. I suggest you catch up on the last 15 year's news, and maybe read the DRCNet weekly news letter for a decade.

You do realize over 20,000 people have been killed in the drug war in Mexico since Calderon took office. But hey! It's the drug's fault! Everyone knows drugs make you murder! Gosh!

I'm not going to take the time to make these clickable, because if you're not willing to copy and paste, you only prove my point that you are avoiding news reports about reality:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-arrest_24met.ART.State.Edition1.4c46a6a.html Gee, funny how they didn't get recorded.

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/10/04/22/2031222/Seattle-Hacker-Catches-Cops-Who-Hid-Arrest-Tapes?from=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Slashdot%2Fslashdot+(Slashdot)&utm_content=Google+Reader - yeah, camera didn't help him, did it?

Not directly related, but, uh, cops can lie, and this law is going to target pedestrians as much as drivers: http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20100409_11_A17_Aforme19933

Did a camera save this lady, even though the court admits she broke no law? http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/03/pregnant_woman_tasered/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+wired/index+(Wired:+Index+3+(Top+Stories+2))&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

Wake up, man. I got all these stories from the first 3 pages of my own link collection at http://delicious.com/clintjcl/abuseofauthority ... If I went through all 76 pages of my link collection, I'd have a litany of examples showing that your attitude is not at all realistic. If I expanded my search beyond those stories I've personally read, I'd have even more.

Go ahead and make an ad hominem attack about my comments on the links. It's kind of what I expect at this point.

Seriously, red-light cameras have nothing to do with safety and everything to do with money making.

Agreed. I hate to sound cynical, but I think almost all "traffic enforcement" in the U.S. has much more to do with revenue enhancement than it does with public safety. The ability of almost every sort of jurisdiction (city, county, state) to write traffic ordinances and collect fines from "offenders" represents a temptation that is difficult to resist—and usually isn't.

A couple of years ago, the city of Dallas installed a large number of cameras at intersections, allegedly to reduce the hazard posed by drivers who run red lights. After the cameras had been in operation for a while, it was revealed that about half of them had been shut down. The reason? They simply weren't generating enough revenue. You can read about it here. Note that the article says the cameras reduced red-light running by 50% at some intersections. Sadly, this meant that the cameras weren't paying their way; they became fiscally unproductive...and got shut down.

In a bit of bizarre humor, the mayor is quoted as denying that this means what it obviously does mean—that the purpose of the cameras was never to increase public safety, but to make money, and that their failure to run at a profit led to the decision to reduce the numbers of operating cameras. Never mind that more people will be injured and killed as a result of this decision; in the U.S., traffic "enforcement" must always be profitable. It's a way to make people feel good because something is being done for their "safety", when they are actually being taxed.

The same thing applies to speeding regulations. People have been persuaded that "speed kills", and that the agency that puts up signs with numbers on them know the precise speed that cannot be exceeded without leading to massive death and mayhem. Of course driving insanely fast is dangerous; but following too closely, weaving in and out of lanes, and driving drunk are far more dangerous. However, the greatest emphasis of "traffic enforcement" is speed. It's easy to measure, and because we know that "speed kills", anyone who exceeds the numbers on the sign is some kind of sociopath who must be heavily fined. And woe unto the traffic cop who doesn't have enough speeding tickets to his name when his annual performance review rolls around. Am I saying there are quotas for cops? Of course not...that would be illegal. But every cop knows what will get him promoted, and what will not; every traffic cop knows it's about the money. He has to pay his way, and to do that, he has to write as many tickets as possible. I feel sad every time I'm stopped for speeding—this cop was once a kid who wanted to grow up and be a peace officer, and do good for society. Instead, he's just a tax collector with a gun. That's why I'm always very polite to the officer. Well, that and the gun, of course.

Diesel is so 1890's. If you truly need availability, nuclear cogeneration is the way to go.

Then we get into the idea of the stimulus package being useless, even though economists have agreed that it has done some good, and conservatives are taking credit for the good it does. Or something as simple as jobs. Most of us in texas knows that if a person wants a job, they can get one. Millions of people from mexico sneak in and get jobs. So why legal americans? Yet the tea party wants us to believe that the government is steal jobs, and it is just not that people are too lazy to work. I am just saying, from a Texas point of view, only the lazy person cannot at least be a bar tender or cut grass.

That is a lot of cost. And even if you figure the initial cost is gone after the first year, you still have the cost of paying 1,000 people to watch cameras in order to solve 10 crimes. That is still a lot of cost. 1000 x annual wages or salary, to solve 10 crimes.

The same holds true here. Generally when shortening is discovered, it is rectified & generally costs the city a good hunk of change.

http://blog.motorists.org/6-cities-that-were-caught-shortening-yellow-light-times-for-profit/

Also, many cities are removing traffic cameras now, because people are driving safer which has led to a loss of revenue for the police dept. Which I think is hilarious, personally.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-redlights_15met.ART.North.Edition1.468120d.html

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2008/03/cities-removing/

Is favorable to both sides. It's especially favorable to the defendant if a preliminary injunction is issued.

I'm not a lawyer but there's an article from Sunday about Dallas firms specializing in 'tricky, rocky terrain' of patent litigation to be hired out in the Eastern Texas District Court ('Rocket Docket') cases listed in the report.

Now, pay attention to this part of the article

'Rocket docket'

The Eastern District, which includes Collin County and much of eastern Texas, has won a reputation as extremely plaintiff-friendly and a preferred venue to get patent claims through quickly.

Just getting a case into the Eastern District – known by some as the "rocket docket" because its comparative lack of criminal cases lets judges move civil patent cases swiftly – has prompted some companies to settle quickly.

Nguyen says the district's reputation as friendly to patent plaintiffs is widespread; whenever it's mentioned at law conferences around the country, she hears the same reaction.

A case against you that you found out about last week has just gone to trial in Eastern Texas and you need to be there to represent yourself even though you're based out of New York City. The reputation of the court is a bias toward the plaintiff and on top of that they have the Dallas firm that specializes in winning patent cases ... now, quickly, you need to decide to settle or fight this.

Sound fair to you?

Yes, dumb moderators, let's mod someone down for saying something that is supported by US Census Data. Politically correct ass clown.

Sadly, it does.

Most teachers are rather controlling with computers, most kids with their own computer could go more in depth with it. I don't know about anyone else, but generally on school computers I at least tried to do nothing more than what the teacher said, after all no use getting in trouble.

[citation needed]

"Most teachers"? "Most kids"? Do you have facts to support these assertions? No, I didn't think so. (So typical
of those who try to paint all teachers as technophobic curmudgeons.)

There are many school districts in the US, forward-thinking school districts that are equipping every student with a laptop, and the technical support to go with it. Some examples:

http://www.irvingisd.net/one2one/main.htm (Irving ISD, Texas)
http://etc.usf.edu/L4L/A-Review.html (Student laptop initiatives, mostly in Florida and California)
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/education/stories/092009dnmetnetbooks.388a677.html (More Texas school districts)

Technology in education is alive and well.

The anti-Israel hysteria here is appalling.

No kidding. Let's check out some other stories from the ME:

Insurgents kill 50 in car bombings in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq

Hmm, no outrage. Maybe if they listed the electronics also damaged, people would feel something.

Blast kills 33 near lawmaker's home in Pakistan

Well, Israel didn't do it, so apparently it's ok.

Iraq attacks kill more than 100...Insurgents strike in central Pakistan

Still no outrage... It's ok as long as Israel isn't killing them? Or is it that no laptop was involved?

Ok, one more:

Police shoot U.S. student's laptop upon entry to Israel

Wait, what? A story where an Israeli did something other than get blown up by a terrorist? OUTRAGE! Call out the nutjobs and crazies! Quick, before we read any details or facts!

Ok, maybe a tad dramatic. But these people flipping out because of this story really need to put this in perspective. If this story upsets you, and those others don't, you really ought to examine your priorities.

Such a convenient excuse (if true)... but still doesn't explain all of the fake jobs 'created or saved' in New Hampshire, Florida and Georgia, Ohio, Wisconsin, New Jersey, Virginia, Texas, Illinois, Colorado, Washington, Massachusetts, Arkansas, Connecticut, or Michigan.

Given the scope of the fakery going on... there are two options... even more errors, or a deliberate attempt to cook the books.

Giving the amazing failure of the stimulus... the latter is far more likely given the continued delusional claims that it saved us from the brink... instead it is setting us up for a double dip and massive inflation.

In regards to screen size, research is already being done to move user interaction away from screens in general. Think projection, direct retinal display, etc.

Just for your information :
See what I mean now ?

Cuz the legs on this thing do look a scary thing to have tugging away on your insides! I'm sure they've thought of that and it's actually fine, but still... look at it... eek! There's gotta be better ways of moving than that!

What part of PRIVATE EMAIL accounts do you not get?

As an AC posted here previously:

Here's another source:

http://aviationblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/10/consumer-activist-kate-hanni-a.html

Mr. Gaughan proceeded to show me on his computer monitor what appeared to be hacked and stolen email communications within the last six (6) months or more between Kate Hanni and me, me and Gary Stoller of USA Today, me and Susan Stellin, a freelance reporter, and Kate Hanni and a number of people concerning the Passenger Bill of Rights, excessive surface delays, and other private communications. It was clear that they had email transactions from both of my private email accounts: Hotmail (eckmaster12@msn.com) and Yahoo (eckmaster@mmi-gov.com). It was also clear that these emails were from Kate Hanni's private and personal email account (katcrew4@aol.com), as well as from Gary Stoller's (gstoller@usatoday.com) private USA Today account, and Susan Stellin's (stellin@earthlink.net) private and personal email account. There were no emails communications from Metron Aviation's email system only communications from information that I gave her as fuel for getting the Passenger Bill of Rights passed in Congress. He said that Delta Airlines sent this information to them.

Clear enough?

TFA isn't that in-depth. Here's another source

http://aviationblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/10/consumer-activist-kate-hanni-a.html

Mr. Gaughan proceeded to show me on his computer monitor what appeared to be hacked and stolen email communications within the last six (6) months or more between Kate Hanni and me, me and Gary Stoller of USA Today, me and Susan Stellin, a freelance reporter, and Kate Hanni and a number of people concerning the Passenger Bill of Rights, excessive surface delays, and other private communications. It was clear that they had email transactions from both of my private email accounts: Hotmail (eckmaster12@msn.com) and Yahoo (eckmaster@mmi-gov.com). It was also clear that these emails were from Kate Hanni's private and personal email account (katcrew4@aol.com), as well as from Gary Stoller's (gstoller@usatoday.com) private USA Today account, and Susan Stellin's (stellin@earthlink.net) private and personal email account. There were no emails communications from Metron Aviation's email system only communications from information that I gave her as fuel for getting the Passenger Bill of Rights passed in Congress. He said that Delta Airlines sent this information to them.

You want to improve things, fix your tort laws.

OK, I'm going to provide you with a link to a study by the CBO in 2004 that shows that medical liability costs have little to do with the cost of our healthcare, another study by the CBO in 2006 that shows that tort reform has almost no effect at all, and a smaller look at the result of tort reform in Texas where they have capped medical liability. You do realize that most medical liability cases are brought to state courts, there are 50 states, each has its own laws, and therefore we can actually LOOK at what the effects of 35 states having enacted various different tort reforms are, right? That being the case, can you find me something that has analyzed that data and found any real, significant (i.e. > 3%?) positive effect from tort reform? I'd like some actual statistical analysis here. I'm very skeptical it would help.

Then eliminate medicare, and stop giving away services to the rest of the world. I guarantee the figures will look much more balanced.

Balanced? I'm not even sure what you might mean by that.

the idea that Islam is a peaceful religion came from?

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/092409dnmetbombarrest.1b177db8b.html

Yet another camel jockey hell-bent on mass-murdering unsuspecting civilians. Do you towel heads really think that the American public is going to sit by helplessly if you succeed in another attack while our government tries to sooth us with false notions of diversity and harmony? No one who isn't a Muslim buys that shit. No one. Keep at it, fuckers, and just see what happens to you. The lot of you should be thrown into internment camps pending deportation to the 3rd-world shit-hole from whence you came.

From http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022208dnintdrugs.3a98bb0.html:

Of the $13.8 billion that Americans contributed to Mexican drug traffickers in 2004-05, about 62 percent, or $8.6 billion, comes from marijuana consumption.

So according to the article it's 62%, not 75%. Of course, 47.3% of statistics are made up on the spot.

I highly doubt anyone besides the drug pushers themselves knows exactly what the real percentage of profits from cannabis is, but there's no doubt it's significant, being the most popular illegal drug in the United States by far.

If someone is breaking into my home at 2am, they better hope they can run faster than buckshot. The call is for the cops or coroner to come clean up the mess.

And then the cop will arrest you for manslaughter. You do realize that self defense requires the application of only that amount of force necessary?

I live in Texas. If I fear for my life or am afraid for my property, pretty much I can use whatever force is necessary to make the bad man go away.

(Yes, some terrible abuses of castle laws have happened. Doesn't mean they don't exist)

As for street cameras:

- being caught speeding by one of these "electronic cops" is no different than being caught speeding by a human cop. Don't want to be ticketed? Than don't speed (or else change the law to eliminate speed limits). You do not have to right to break the laws on a public thoroughfare, and if got caught, then be a man and pay the fine.

It is different when
1. The cameras do not record the entire situation. In the 5 (U.S.) states I've lived in It is legal to be in an intersection on yellow and finish your turn (left/right) or go through straight as it turns to red. These ticket cameras record this action as running a red light and ticket it. A cop can reasonably let you go the camera does not.
2. City's have been caught messing with the yellow light timers too. Shorter yellows = increase revenue and increase risk of drivers.

citation: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-redlights_27met.ART.State.Edition1.5100182.html

Jabari, a 300-pound gorilla, escaped from his enclosure and went on an angry rampage through the zoo. Police shot and killed him on the zoo grounds, but not before he seriously injured Reichert, Heard and 3-year-old Rivers Heard.

The Dallas City Council, which oversees the zoo, is scheduled to approve a $500,000 financial settlement with Heard and Reichert during a special meeting Friday at City Hall. The money is meant to compensate the women and their children for their physical injuries and emotional trauma.

State law caps civil damage awards against a city government at $500,000.

So the RIAA gets nearly $2 Million, while these people with real physical and emotional injuries get 25% of that.

How many cats rescue injured people?

Less than the number of dogs that kill children.

So remember, if you want to break into someone's house do it in the UK and stay out of Texas. The law here, known as the Castle Law, is a bit different

No. Just because he got lucky doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.

The bad cop probably didn't want to escalate things further.

Cops have tasered people in their own homes (ironically after they call 911 for _help_).

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/localnews/investigates/stories/wfaa070606_mo_policetasering.20bcdeb9.html

Don't give them an excuse to screw up, and ruin their "unblemished X year service record".

They might lose their job, but you could lose your life first.

Was still blamed on the US government? Nope, sorry. In some circles, the US is still being blamed for HIV. It was created for the express purpose of killing black people, or so they claim.

Where is my ticket off of this planet? The people are crazy.

Makes me think of a similar poll "scandal" we had here in Dallas.

Lesson: Don't put a poll up on the internet if you're not ready to accept what Colbert or Scientology or /b/ might force on you. The wishy-washy appearance of changing your mind will backfire on you.

So I would think if the case was worth trying or pressing charges, then the crime did happen.

Prosecutors can be full of shit too. It was only recently that the Supreme Court ruled that if a prosecutor had evidence proving that the victim of their railroading was innocent, they had to turn it over to their defense. Not drop the case, just turn over the evidence.

And yet, even now we still have articles talking about how hard it is to find skilled people! I guess there's just no pleasing some employers. Hiring decisions are like market decisions. They seem like they should be rational, but they aren't.

Someone here in Texas is suing a couple of red-light camera operators, saying that they don't have private investigator licenses and thus don't have legal right to gather information for prosecutions. So far he's gotten one judge to agree.

Troll? Have you no sense of humor?

In case you missed it, I was alluding to the BS you will see here:

http://cityhallblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2008/07/dallas-county-meeting-turns-ra.html

It's so pathetic it's hilarious. Apparently some think that "black hole" is a racist term. If you modded me troll for this either you are oblivious to the news, or are like that politically correct moron Judge Thomas Jones.

The first sign that the words of neoconservatives differ markedly from their actions was the incident involving Creekstone Farms. In 2004, its management intended to perform mad-cow testing on 100% of the beef that it sold to consumers. Yet, the Bush administration blocked this comprehensive testing, interfering in the private business transaction between a private business and its customers. If a company wants to over-test its product, why does the government have a right to stop such testing?

The second sign that the words of neoconservatives differ markedly from their actions was the incident involving the troubled-asset-relief program (TARP) demanded by the Bush administration and authorized by Congress (at Bush's insistence). TARP is a program for using government money to buy toxic assets (and now to take an equity stake in banks) -- to rescue the people who deliberately and knowingly bought more house than they could afford and to rescue the fast-talking frauds who loaned the money to the house buyers.

The third sign that the words of neoconservatives differ markedly from their actions is the incident involving the allocation of $25 billion in government loans to the car companies. If they cannot build the cars that people want to buy, then they should be allowed to fail. That is how a free market works. The companies go into bankruptcy and possibly shutdown permanently. Why should the free-market advocating neoconservatives try to save these companies?

Why would neoconservatives act in this way? In case #1, the cattle industry regularly makes political donations to neoconservatives. In case #2, the financial industry regularly makes political donations to the neoconservatives. In case #3, the auto industry regularly makes political donations to the neoconservatives.

Case #3 is particularly egregious. Via collective bargaining, auto workers enjoy generous company-funded medical insurance. In order to maintain such private medical benefits, the same auto workers have opposed implementing federally guaranteed medical care (like that in Europe and Japan).

Here's the punch line. Let's condemn the neoconservatives for being liars. Let's condemn the auto workers for being hypocrites. Let's oppose any bailout for the auto companies, forcing them into bankruptcy and forcing millions of auto workers to lose their private medical insurance. The out-of-work auto workers can then "enjoy" the same lack of medical insurance that millions of unemployed workers have enjoyed in the absence of federally guaranteed medical care.

That sounds somehow familiar.

Speaking about PETA, check out this article from today's Dallas Morning News:
PETA asks Ben and Jerrys to use human breast milk in ice cream

PETA asks Ben & Jerry's to use human breast milk in ice cream

09:37 AM CDT on Thursday, September 25, 2008

Associated Press

MONTPELIER, Vt. -- Ice cream made from breast milk?

That's what the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals wants Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream to consider making.

The Virginia-based nonprofit group sent a letter to company co-founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield on Tuesday asking them to use human breast milk instead of cow's milk in their products.

PETA says the health of consumers and cows would benefit from the switch.

Ben & Jerry's spokesman Rob Michalak said the company applauds PETA's creative approach to bring attention to an issue, but believes that a mother's milk is best used by a child.

I was interested to read today exactly how DISD ended up with a surprise budget hole of $64 million:

[DISD Superintendent] Dr. Hinojosa said the deficit occurred because administrators miscalculated average teacher salaries and did not realize exactly how many positions had been added during the year.

This is coming from the same school district that gave staff district-backed credit cards with absolutely no auditing or oversight of what people spent money on. It's the same district where the IT director received large gifts from contractors who sell to DISD.

That, of course, just touches on some of the regular financial shockers. Academically, their solution to kids not doing homework is to make homework optional. And of course, they are following the same 50% grading rule described in the Pittsburgh article

Obviously if we had to evaluate the district administration, we would have to give them, wait for it, 50%. After all, we wouldn't want to say anything that might discourage them,

Dallas (Texas) Independent School District is doing the same thing.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/081508dnmetdisdgrades.48e6cc22.html

DISD is exceedingly dysfunctional (can't manage a budget, kick-backs, and so on). So this idiocy is small potatoes compared the the problems of the district as a whole.

Much like the current economic crisis, shouldn't failure be allowed? As some banks should be failing for bad investments, some students should fail to allow them to do-over.
I blew off a year of math and I went to summer school, once. I'm not proud, but it was a motivational experience. Summer school sucks.

SMU Dean David Chard In support of DISD's new grading policy

On a more frightening note, public education now seems to be king, in California at least. Homeschooling Banned in California

Does anyone else notice that things are going downhill? And they're speeding up?

If one were spending a lot of time on Digg last year, they were probably surprised by how poorly Ron Paul did.

Heck, not just digg. If you were paying any attention to the fundraising numbers you were probably surprised by how poorly he did.

Or, for that matter, if you saw the crowds he drew whenever he spoke, you were probably surprised by how poorly he did.

Heck, even if you counted yard signs or just talked to your local Republican-on-the-street, you were probably surprised by how poorly he did.

In fact, I'd bet only the people who get most of their news from corporate media knew how badly he would do at the polls, but most of them probably don't know why*.

--MarkusQ

* Diebold / Premiere finally admitted that their machines drop some votes. And they've previously admitted that they also add votes. And they've famously expressed strong preferences over who should when an election.

Ah yes, that's why small farmers can't compete. It doesn't have anything to do with economies of scale, no sir.

If economies of scale was all that mattered then large scale farms wouldn't need subsidies.

If they a get employment with a private company good for them. And with government out of medical and health care more jobs with private insurers will be created.

Again, the only way we'd end up with "more jobs" is if the system became less efficient as a result.

So what if private insurers didn't employ as many people as government run insurance, private is as you say more efficient. Employing more people to run insurance is just make work work, and taxpayers will have to pay those salaries. People complain about the expense of health care, employing less people, in insurance, reduces the cost. If you want to make more work then employ more medical people not more insurance people.

it's odd that you're championing a move toward inefficiency.

What's odd is that you first intimated private insurance would be more efficient, the only way we'd end up with "more jobs" is if the system became less efficient as a result, now you're saying the opposite. And no I don't champion inefficiency, I champion competition. and competition increases efficiency.

People already can do that. You know why they don't? Because HSAs are pointless unless you're either (1) healthy enough that you won't get sick before the account is full, or (2) wealthy enough that it doesn't matter.

But do they know that? I didn't find out until earlier this year when someone else posted about health saving accounts. I bet I can go out on the street and ask others if they know about them and many won't. But you are right in one thing, according to the Government Acconting Office, GAO, the average income of those who had HSAs in 2005 was $139,000 whereas the average for those without one was $57,000. But in the same report though it said lower income people are more wiling to gamble with their health. And as far as I'm concerned, you gamble you pay. You don't gamble then try to get out of it when you lose.

See, "bankrupt" means there's no money left to pay their obligations, but that's not going to happen any time soon

First, bankrupt means more than just not having enough money. It also means a person who is completely lacking in a particular desirable quality or attribute moral bankrupt[cy] or DISAPPROVING lacking in a particular quality, Onelook has more. Second I consider it morally bankrupt, see the first two definitions above, for anyone to be forced to work to pay for anyone they did not bring into the world themself, ie you are responsible to take care of all of the children you bring into the world but you have no responsibility to take care of anyone else.

As I don't want to keep going over this with you I'll just say one more thing then I'll end my part. You trust government more than business and I distrust business less than I do government. Government has caused more problems than any business, it has killed more people than any of them as well. And many of the problems business has made government allowed to happen.

Falcon