Slashdot Mirror

When compared with a defense budget of $480 billion and $140 billion more for the war on terror, I'm not entirely sure earmarks are the most pressing case of fiscal irresponsibility. For the 2008 budget, they comprised only $17 billion out of $2.9 trillion. As far as the present discussion goes, it's worth considering that it is McCain who is most adamant about keeping us in Iraq, a war which has cost half a trillion dollars already, and an estimated $3 trillion before it's all done.

I do sometimes wonder how we're going to pay for all of this...

Yes, the 9-11 Commission was actually very informative and thorough. You can read all their findings here.

If only the federal government would puclish the Code of Federal Regulations and United States Code.

Of course, they would have to live by them, instead of making shit up when they put someone on trial, which is why the federal laws will never be published.

They claim the laws are online at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/ but a search will show that 80% of the CFR and USC are actually missing. This way, a poor schlub is accused of breaking a non-existent law by a para-military storm trooper who is too ignorant to know what the Constitution says. The poor schlub protests his innocence, and is knocked to the floor by the bailiff. A few kicks later, he still protests his innocence. If he's lucky enough to be liked by the gestapo, he'll get a trial. (90% of us who ask for a trial are falsely entered as guilt pleas.) During the show trial, he's refused his right to know what he's accused of. All the defense evidence is suppressed, while the prosecutor grand-stands. (Remember, the prosecutor's office is paying the public defenders. Guess what happens to the ones that actually defend someone.) 90% of jurys convict at this point, but the ones that don't (who will never be called for jury duty again) ask for the law. The prosecutor and judge spend a few days whipping up bullshit to sound like a law, and present it to the jury.

At least this was my experience with the courts in the earl 1990's.

So you see, the CFR & USC will NEVER be published by the federal government.

Andy

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/constitution/index.html

I believe this is the same thing. Slightly less conveniently packaged (multiple PDFs), but slightly less $15.00, for the casual viewer on a budget.

This all depends on your definition of "something bad." If you really want to have your stomach turned, read the FDA regulations (Title 21, Chapter 1 of the Code of Federal Regulations, available from http://www.gpoaccess.gov/cfr/index.html) on how many insect parts are allowed in your daily bread (or crackers or cookies). After reading those regs for a while, a few paint chips will seem innocuous.

It is not nearly so simple. The design standards for transport category aircraft require that the engines and engine installations be designed so that single failures do not cause all engines to stop. For example, each engine would have its own separate Full Authority Digital Engine Control (somewhat like electronic fuel injection on your car), with each FADEC connected to separate sensors. A failure in one FADEC or one sensor would not affect both engines. See FAR 25.901(c)

67.103 Eye.

Eye standards for a first-class airman medical certificate are:

(a) Distant visual acuity of 20/20 or better in each eye separately, with or without corrective lenses. If corrective lenses (spectacles or contact lenses) are necessary for 20/20 vision, the person may be eligible only on the condition that corrective lenses are worn while exercising the privileges of an airman certificate.

(b) Near vision of 20/40 or better, Snellen equivalent, at 16 inches in each eye separately, with or without corrective lenses. If age 50 or older, near vision of 20/40 or better, Snellen equivalent, at both 16 inches and 32 inches in each eye separately, with or without corrective lenses.

(c) Ability to perceive those colors necessary for the safe performance of airman duties.

(d) Normal fields of vision.

(e) No acute or chronic pathological condition of either eye or adnexa that interferes with the proper function of an eye, that may reasonably be expected to progress to that degree, or that may reasonably be expected to be aggravated by flying.

(f) Bifoveal fixation and vergence-phoria relationship sufficient to prevent a break in fusion under conditions that may reasonably be expected to occur in performing airman duties. Tests for the factors named in this paragraph are not required except for persons found to have more than 1 prism diopter of hyperphoria, 6 prism diopters of esophoria, or 6 prism diopters of exophoria. If any of these values are exceeded, the Federal Air Surgeon may require the person to be examined by a qualified eye specialist to determine if there is bifoveal fixation and an adequate vergence-phoria relationship. However, if otherwise eligible, the person is issued a medical certificate pending the results of the examination.

No offense intended, but your Google skills must need work. Wikipedia for starters:

$586.1 billion (+7.0%) - Social Security
$394.5 billion (+12.4%) - Medicare
$367.0 billion (+2.0%) - Unemployment and welfare
$276.4 billion (+2.9%) - Medicaid and other health related
Total: $1.623T
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget,_2007

More:

White House: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/
Office of the President: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/browse.html
Congressional Budget Office: http://www.cbo.gov/

I think that is sufficient to back up my point.

I downloaded the 2008 budget just yesterday from here, http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy08/browse.html Ooh, maybe they mean this is the first time the *2009* budget is available just like it is a first every year each time it's posted.

Let's only consider official US military spending, leaving off, say, war supplimentals, nuclear weapons (they're in the DOE), veterans benefits, interest on accumulated war debt, and so on. Percent of world GDP spent on military: 2.5%. Percent of US PPP GDP ($13.3 trillion) spent on the military (direct, official spending only: $548.9 billion): 4.1%. Percent of world military expenses from the US: 48%.

Let's fact check your other numbers, shall we? Note that we're using nominal GDP and nominal military expenditures.

China: GDP, 2.68 trillion. Official military budget, ~$30B. Some China hawks speculate as much as 70B, although if you're going to allow for that, you need to allow for all of the US's hidden expenditures as well. Either way, that's 1.1-2.6%.

Russia: GDP, $979B. Official military budget, $32B. 1.8%.

Saudi Arabia: GDP, $446B. Official military budget, 31.255B. 7.0%.

India: GDP, $1.0T. Official military budget, $32.35B. 3.2%.

Iran: GDP, $212.4B. Official military budget, $6.3B. 3.0%.

Greece: GDP, $356.258B. Official military budget, $7.648B. 2.1%.

Congo: GDP, $7.094B. Official military budget, $93.5M. 1.3% (perhaps your way-off numbers were including private spending on paramilitary forces?).

Singapore: GDP, $132.155B. Official military budget, $10.58B. 8.0%.

North Korea: GDP, ~$40B (est). Official military budget, $5.2174B (2002 est). 13%.

Now, these are your hand-picked nations. We've already covered the US, China, Russia, and India. Let's cover the other large economies of the world, shall we? Let's complete the top ten:

Japan: GDP, $4.366T. Official military budget, $44.3B. 1.0%.

Germany: GDP, $2.915T. Official military budget, $38.5B. 1.3%.

UK: GDP, $2.399T. Official military budget, $69.8B. 2.9%.

France: GDP, $2.252T. Official military budget, $65.0B. 2.9%.

Italy: GDP, $1.853T. Official military budget, $34B. 1.8%.

Canada: GDP, $1.275T. Official military budget, $17B. 1.3%.

Spain: GDP, $1.232T. Official military budget, $15.7B. 1.3%.

Brazil: GDP, $1.068T. Official military budget, $9.9B. 0.9%.

Remember, when looking at these numbers, that the US's % is 4.1%. We're half of the world's military expenditures with only a quarter of the world's economy and twentieth of it's people. These are the facts.

"COPYRIGHTS AND PATENTS"

"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

Where has this gone wrong? Happy Birthday is under copyright?? This is blatant abuse, for financial gain of course, of what is legitimate protection for innovation.

FAR 91.119

There is an exception, though. Certain special people, such as ex-Presidents, get Prohibited Areas over their houses which prohibits overflying them at less than (typically) 18,000 MSL. So, run for President, win, fix things up a bit, don't get whacked or impeached, and then you can have your home legally protected from overflights!

Assuming that the operators of the UAVs will obey the law, of course. I'm sure someone reputable will be watching the watchers, since you would take care of that problem when you were the Prez, right? ;)

This is not a minor philosophical point.

Agreed, it's a trivial semantic one. The only right you naturally have is to starve, freeze, or be eaten by a bear. Nasty, brutish & short aren't a firm of attorneys.

So if your "point" is that requiring showing of a valid RealID compliant ID won't make anyone more safe, you are ignoring the protection it provides against alteration of validly obtained passports.

On a side note, I'm really disappointed in the slashkos community. The misrepresentation and overreaction to this particular issue is astounding. RealID has nothing to do with establishing a federal ID. All it does is establish standards for state-issued IDs such that they can be used for federal purposes (in lieu of a passport or other federal ID). In addition, states are required to share their identity databases with other states. Of all the "pissing on the constitution" that the slashkos'ers have been complaining about - this one seems like a slam dunk thanks to the commerce clause.

That's more than an implication. That's as close as you get to saying "He did it!" without having to show evidence.

I must disagree.

Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of al-Qaeda.

This doesn't say, implicitly or explicitly, that Saddam was responsible for 9/11, only that "Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of al-Qaeda," which was an accurate and reasonable statement.

Before 11 September 2001, many in the world believed that Saddam Hussein could be contained.

Again, this doesn't mean, at all, that Saddam was responsible for 9/11. It means that before 9/11, we had a different policy toward people like Saddam and Iraq's government. Not because Saddam was responsible for 9/11, but because after 9/11, we weren't willing to continue containment. People seem to think that if Iraq and 9/11 are mentioned in the same sentence, that somehow implies that Iraq was responsible for 9/11. No one ever said that, or even implied it. What they "implied" was that the environment and political landscape in the Mideast is incompatible with preventing future events like 9/11 if action isn't taken to change the face of the Mideast. Before 9/11, we had a policy of containment toward Iraq. After 9/11, we no longer did, again, not because Iraq was responsible for 9/11.

From a policy perspective, yes, Iraq and 9/11 were related, but not because Iraq executed 9/11. Also, the US found evidence that persons associated with Iraq may have aided persons associated with al Qaeda. This is extensively treated in the July 4, 2004 "Report on the US Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessment on Iraq" from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence:

XII. Iraq's Links to Terrorism
XIII. Intelligence Community Collection Activities Against Iraq's Links to Terrorism
XIV. Pressure on Intelligence Community Analysts Regarding Iraq's Links to Terrorism

I *strongly* recommend reading at least the above sections. The rest of the report also provides detailed reasoning for WMD justifications and so on, as does the WMD Report.

Now, I fully expect the government to come in and regulate these guys. At least put in some real NASA-level safety precautions. NASA isnt perfect but their safety record and procedures are pretty good. I think this is the beginning of the end for the "wild west" approach to space exploration. Now the responsible adults need to step in and protect the worker and protect the customers. We've seen a milliom times in america. From little children working at the looms losing fingers to men losing their hands in meat packing. Some new industry comes up and safety is the last concern. No more, thanks.

They're pretty well-regulated already today, you want more regulation?

If you want to shoot off anything bigger than a bottle rocket these days, you can bet your anatomy that you'll be hip-deep in Feds and the weight of the paperwork will exceed the weight of the bird. After all, they don't want anybody other than government contractors building WMDs, now, do they? Even indulging in high-powered rocketry on an amatuer basis takes a license. They don't just put them in Cracker Jack boxes. You need to be TRA AND NAR Level One certified to light off a big one. And bonded. Don't show up for your certification run with a six-pack of anything other than soda, they'll never even let you set up.

As far as man-rated vehicles go, you couldn't afford the paperwork for them on an amatuer basis. And that's just to build one. To launch it is a whole 'nuther set of paperwork. "Wild wild West" approach to space exploration? Only in Hollyweird.

Here's what the FAA says about model rockets: http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ec fr&sid=a327e61307f208ad26c413bc89920ba6&rgn=div5&v iew=text&node=14:2.0.1.3.15&idno=14#14:2.0.1.3.15. 3. Finding the sections on man-rated rockets is left as an exercise for the curious, as those who just want to shrug off private-sector space travel as 'unlicensed and unregulated, send in the Feds' won't bother to look, they'll just post here demanding 'Something Be Done'.

tjstork, it's hard to believe that you actually think the Left in America is more like the Royalists of 1776. After all, of the Left and Right in America, who is more inclined to support an authoritarian administration? Who is more inclined to allow government intrusion into the privacy of Americans? Who has more ties to a corporate kleptocracy? Tom Paine

By far, leftists support a totalitarian government more. New laws required by the left to support its causes, from supposed civil rights and workers rights, to the environment, have made the government by definition more totalitarian than any conservative administration. On a whole, if you look at all the deregulation Bush has done, versus the few laws he's added, you would find that the USA is now MORE free under Bush than before. Just start with tax cuts and the relegalization of so-called "assault" weapons, and already, you've made millions of people more free. The moral of the story, just because your totalitarian government has been in favor of your causes does not make it any less totalitarian.

I see you say "corporate kleptocracy", as if, charging money for a good is a form of theft. Hey, I have news for you. If you do not want a good, then do not buy it. No one is stealing from you. If someone is charging more for the good than you want, you STILL do not have to buy it. The reality is that those who would replace private property with public property are really talking about a return to feudalism by any other name, with the same catastrophic economic results.

That comment is so stunningly stupid that I feel obliged to repeat it here, just to give readers some idea of the quality of your "facts", in case they ever encounter another of your posts.

Hey, I just go by historical facts, unlike you.

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy05/hist.html Table 1.1, shows that the US government ran a surplus from the inception the Constitution in 1789 up until around 1849.

Finally, I would think that some of the founding fathers would find their way right on the bombastic world of today's talk radio. I quote Patrick Henry:

"Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper use of the means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. Three millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us.

The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable -- and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come!

It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, "Peace! Peace!" -- but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!"

Because it would be impossible for the people who pass laws to 'completely understand' every single thing they legislate about.

Here is part 85.6 of the Code of Federal Regulations. It concerns itself with the Interstate movement of pseudorabies vaccinate swine, except swine from qualified negative gene-altered vaccinated herds, not known to be infected with or exposed to pseudorabies. It has 500 words or so and it is the 6th part of a 13 part section specifically about Pseudorabies, all of which is a small part of subchapter that makes up Title 9, which is specifically about Animals and Animal Products and has somewhere around 70 of the previously described parts organized into something like 15 subchapters.

And these are just the Federal regs for animal related adventures. States, municipalities, and whatever else we've organized ourselves into also have regs about animals and animal products. We have a lot of seats to fill in the governmental machine and I doubt we're going to find enough animal experts who will show up on the right day to go over all this stuff.

The idea that legislators or judges or whomever should be experts, or even more familiar than the average person, with a subject in front of them is just not viable. Turn on CSPAN. See if you can watch that crap for 8 hours a day or however long legislative sessions last, and pay attention the whole time. The only reason I can imagine a human being voluntarily subjecting themselves to a lifetime of that would be because they see an opportunity to rob us all blind in the process. And people like that really aren't motivated to understand what a routing table is unless there is a pot of gold at the end of the routing table rainbow and they can't figure another way to get hold of it.

There is a tremendous amount of money to be made by making people afraid. The internet is just one of the many angles on that and we've hired the best professionals money can buy to legislate that fear into existence.

Indeed, since copyright is a violation of Laissez-faire economics by being a coercive monopoly (specifically a government-granted monopoly), it is obviously anti-capitalist. It may be fruitful to contrast your opinion of copyright as "anti-capitalist" with the Copyright Act of 1790, which begins with the introductory words "An Act for the Encouragement of Learning". Its motivation was stated in the Copyright Clause of the US Constitution, but looking at the rationale (see Senate Report No. 104-315) for its extension (see Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act) from the original total of 28 years to today's 95 years (corporate ownership), "the continued economic benefits of a healthy surplus balance of trade", there is an obvious shift towards a economic mindset. Actually, there is a complete shift I would rather say. When devised, copyright was never intended as a direct instrument of economics, so its effect as "anti-capitalist" would have been subordinate to its original goal of being an instrument "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts". Instead, what we see today is rather bizarre. For a truly eerie prospect of what to expect, consider this statement by Mary Bono (see Congressional Record No 139, pages H9951 and H9952):

Actually, Sonny wanted the term of copyright protection to last forever. I am informed of by staff that such a change would violate the Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is also Jack Valenti's proposal for term to last forever less one day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress.

(Yes, the evidence is there, despite denials). In plain english, and for all practical purposes, there is no limit to copyright protection anymore - by 2018, both houses of the United States Congress will pass a new act to further extend copyright, as a formality. How one concludes that "securing for limited Times" should mean "forever less one day" rather than a reasonable amount of time, as in reasonably within ones life-time, or more meaningfully as in reasonably useful within ones life-time (such as, say, 6 years for software), is beyond me. The economic reasoning behind perpetual copyright is explained by professor Neil W. Netanel (see Copyright and a Democratic Civil Society):

This "neoclassicist" approach posits that, far from simply inducing the creation and dissemination of new expression, copyright serves as a vehicle for directing investment in existing works. Neoclassicists would accordingly treat literary and artistic works as "vendible commodities," best made subject to broad proprietary rights that extend to every conceivable valued use. In this manner, neoclassicists contend, market pricing can direct resource allocation for the marketing and development of existing creative expression in an optimally efficient manner.

I would be inclined to conclude that, in a world of conglomarates, market forces replace Learning as the "optimally efficient manner" by which creative expression can be developed. Obviously, this is utter nonsense, but I would say it captures the essence of what proponents of perpetual copyright would have us believe. The true and unstated objective is, of course, to preserve existing monopolies. As pointed out by Timothy R. Phillips, "The framers assumed, as did Adam Smith, th

For comparison, I see no draconian restrictions on the Congressional Record.

Taxes on activities carried out in the Real World (tm) are taxes because those activities depend on certain services which are funded by tax monies.

On the other hand I think one of the things that is very broken about out tax system is that it is far too complicated. A cynic would say that this is intentional, so as to hide from us just how much the take is (well, I would say that too, do you know how much a head of lettuce would cost if there were no taxes added on to all goods and services involved in its production?)

Almost all taxation has easily spotted disadvantages so I won't go into inequities I find in property taxes, gas taxes and other "special purpose" taxes that in some cases *do* fit the description in the GP post. But sales taxes or transfer taxes are really sneaky, and in some cases can be almost impossible for the individual to keep track of. More disturbing that the erroneous statem in the GP is this opinion from TFA:

How should transactions within Second Life be taxed? My view is that, from a policy perspective, the right result is to tax commercial activity within virtual worlds but not game play.

How about this instead: If the person or group making a profit in SL are "nice people" then they shouldn't be taxed. If they are "not nice people" then they should be taxed out of existence. We could have a special board, of which I would be the head, to establish who is nice and who is not. Maybe there is a Santa Claus after all!

Two falacies represented by the quotes above are that (1) All taxes go to good use so we should never complain that we are being taxed too much, but rather just try and get out of paying as many of them ourselves as possible (tax avoidance as a way of life) and (2) that the actual mechanics of the tax are not important as long as the right (evil) people are paying it.

Unfortunately, we are all often dependent on those same "evil" people for goods and services and so we are indirectly paying those taxes in the costs of those things.

It rightfully irks the GP that he/she might pay taxes on something that isn't real. Let's say there is a really (by real world standards) low virtual sales tax of one percent. I build a cube, which takes about 3 seconds (I'm slow) and sell it to you for $100 (lets leave the conversions to and from L$ out of it), then you sell it back to be for $99 (the residual cost after the $1 has been taken out) and then I sell it back to you for whatever the residual cost is again. We can of course do this until the value of the object is too low to be representable in the interface. We've now given the government $100 or as close to that as we care to go and kept nothing for ourselves, and at the same time generated several hundred database records for Linden Labs and the Federal government to audit all to hell for errors. Other than the belief that "all taxes go to good use" where is the value in such a system? I could go broke just debugging a script to process such transactions.

There have been a number of efforts to "tax the Internet" and as far as I know they have all been stopped at some point. Yes, If I order from Amazon I'm going to pay a sales tax, as the Internet allows us to do *many* things that are directly analogous to "brick and mortar" business.

If we are going to tax SL and WoW, why not just "tax the Internet" instead? Tax your ISP (oh wait I bet that's already being done on their profits) and the companies that own the buried cables (ditto) and all the vendors that buy and sell real goods, like Amazon (ditto) and ads on Google pages (ditto) and all the monitors and PCs and mice used to access it (ditto).

I just wish more time were spent, on, well, how it is spent: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/

Unfortunately they don't give a lot of details, and

Well, it does seem to come out online, and in plaintext format, too.
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/index.html

There seems to be a way on that site, although I don't really want to try it myself, to sign up to receive the daily Table of Contents via email. That's about as close to `tail -f` as you can get to it, I think.

The other problem is that I'm not sure the Federal Register carries much that would help you track particular bills as they make their way through the Belly of the Beast -- for that, you'd need to be looking at the Congressional Record, which seems to be online here:
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/crecord/

It seems to also have daily updates. However -- there's a catch: the Record doesn't contain verbatim texts of everything that goes on in the Debates in Congress, even though it would be technically possible (bordering on trivial) for them to do this, if they wanted to. Instead, it's more of a heavily-edited Minutes, where various people can go in and edit what they said ex post facto (although WP claims they now print these edits in a different typeface). But even it doesn't, I don't think anyway, give you copies of draft legislation as it goes through Committee, or if it was voted on but never read on the floor; I think it would just contain the record of the vote itself.

But there's certainly the infrastructure there. All that you would need to do, would be to specify that the Congressional Record would need to contain more information -- like all the floor speeches, draft legislation, and text of bills regardless of whether they were read on the floor or not -- and then make sure that the output was in some type of standardized, machine-parsable format, with a lot of metadata. Plain text would be fine as long as you did the metadata consistently.

Then, the GPO could just expose the raw records, and let other people do the work of producing fancy frontends to manipulate the data and track particular pieces of legislation across the lifecycle.

Well, it does seem to come out online, and in plaintext format, too.
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/index.html

There seems to be a way on that site, although I don't really want to try it myself, to sign up to receive the daily Table of Contents via email. That's about as close to `tail -f` as you can get to it, I think.

The other problem is that I'm not sure the Federal Register carries much that would help you track particular bills as they make their way through the Belly of the Beast -- for that, you'd need to be looking at the Congressional Record, which seems to be online here:
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/crecord/

It seems to also have daily updates. However -- there's a catch: the Record doesn't contain verbatim texts of everything that goes on in the Debates in Congress, even though it would be technically possible (bordering on trivial) for them to do this, if they wanted to. Instead, it's more of a heavily-edited Minutes, where various people can go in and edit what they said ex post facto (although WP claims they now print these edits in a different typeface). But even it doesn't, I don't think anyway, give you copies of draft legislation as it goes through Committee, or if it was voted on but never read on the floor; I think it would just contain the record of the vote itself.

But there's certainly the infrastructure there. All that you would need to do, would be to specify that the Congressional Record would need to contain more information -- like all the floor speeches, draft legislation, and text of bills regardless of whether they were read on the floor or not -- and then make sure that the output was in some type of standardized, machine-parsable format, with a lot of metadata. Plain text would be fine as long as you did the metadata consistently.

Then, the GPO could just expose the raw records, and let other people do the work of producing fancy frontends to manipulate the data and track particular pieces of legislation across the lifecycle.

There is something that deals with legislation: the Congressional Record (wiki article, the actual thing). It provides a record of floor speeches, bills, and more! Of course, it would still have to be read...

Let's try this part. The government's budget for 2005 amounted to 16.6% of GDP. Add another 3.3% of GDP for off-budget items (both these figures from the appropriate documents found at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy06/hist.html). 19.9% of GDP. Which includes Health Care, Social Security, and Public Education.

In order to have ~50% of GDP be spent on war, we'd need to be spending 2.5 times as much as the admitted on/off budget items. Which amounts to ~5 trillion dollars per year. Or $25 trillion over the last five years. Oddly enough, our public debt (not deficit! that's a different thing entirely) is ~$8.7 trillion as of the beginning of the year. Do you have some evidence other than your idle speculations as to the nature of reality to support the opinion that the US Federal debt is really ~$30 trillion rather than the $8.7 trillion that is admitted to. Which latter is based on things like total value of T-Bills outstanding....

I should also note that we didn't spend 50% of our GDP on World War 2, the last war we were really serious about fighting.

As to the "embarrassingly gutted" Health Care, Social Security, and Public Education. I take it you are unaware that these items have NEVER had their budgets reduced. Not once. Not even under Bush (senior or junior).

Our public Health Care budget was increased rather dramatically under Bush for Medicare Part D.

Our Public Education budgets (yes, budgets - public education is mostly dealt with at local and State levels, with minor input at the Federal level, so there are thousands of public education budgets in the USA) are the highest in the world, on a per student basis ($7552 per student, plus more for "special education" students). With a growth rate over twice as high as inflation - 6% per year.

Social Security didn't get any major new largess under Bush (or at all under any President since they started adjusting Social Security for Cost of Living back in the seventies). But it didn't suffer, either. It wasn't reduced, either on a per person basis or as a lump sum. It didn't grow at rates less than inflation - rather more, in fact.

So, just where did you get the idea that these items had been "embarrassingly gutted"?

Sure, here you go:
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ overview.pdf (PDF Warning)
http://www.bankrate.com/brm/itax/news/taxguide/200 6taxrates.asp

Under what authority does the Treasury Department claim to be able to pass a regulation which is a penal statute? I am not saying agencies/departments of the executive branch cannot promulgate regulations. For example, the DEA can, with approval of the attorney general, decide to make a substance a controlled substance, which would then be illegall to possess, etc. But I do not see any statute that lets the Treasury Department (in which the Mint resides) decide that doing something with coins will be punishable by up to 5 years in prison. Where is the enabling statute? Such a broad declaration sure seems like a separation of powers issue; it is for Congress to decide that people can't melt down coins. In addition, I cannot find this proposed regulation anywhere. Not in the federal register http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/index.html or at regulations.gov. Can anyone find the text of this proposal? It will say under what authority the TD claims to ban melting.

A significant number of rich people are rich because they got up off their butts, worked hard, maybe got educated, and bettered themselves. They remain rich (or get richer) because they CONTINUE to work hard and better themselves. Of course there exists "influence peddling, crony-ism, threats and corruption", in the rich people and poor people. Lets not lambaste a certain segment of the population for the failings of the whole.

Personally, I have never been a fan of government, I believe its a wasteful institution. Just a FYI, the bills addressed by the Congress in recent years: Congressional Bills.

You do realize that the US Defense budget:

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

Back in the 90's when I toured NASA they told us that "less than one half of a penny out of every dollar that goes to DC gets marked for NASA". I am sure that has changed a bit now.

Don't believe me? Check this out:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]

You do realize that the US Defense budget:

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

Back in the 90's when I toured NASA they told us that "less than one half of a penny out of every dollar that goes to DC gets marked for NASA". I am sure that has changed a bit now.

Don't believe me? Check this out:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]

You do realize that the US Defense budget:

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

Back in the 90's when I toured NASA they told us that "less than one half of a penny out of every dollar that goes to DC gets marked for NASA". I am sure that has changed a bit now.

Don't believe me? Check this out:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf [gpoaccess.gov]

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/911/pdf/fullreport.pdf On page 3 it says that one of the hijackers did not have any ID - it didn't say whether or not the others were valid. On page 169 though, it appears that they did have an organization affiliated with Al-Queda that did facilitate the production of fake IDs. Other sources: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5594385/ Say that "many" of the hijackers used fake IDs.

Again, we are not a democracy, however we are acting like an authoritarian statist society. If the public was not apathetic and did not elect people with zero integrity into office, then we wouldn't be in the position we are in now.

Regarding the budget you are going to be proven wrong right here:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

You should do a little resarch before you talk out of your ass. It will make you look less ignorant.

Again, we are not a democracy, however we are acting like an authoritarian statist society. If the public was not apathetic and did not elect people with zero integrity into office, then we wouldn't be in the position we are in now.

Regarding the budget you are going to be proven wrong right here:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

You should do a little resarch before you talk out of your ass. It will make you look less ignorant.

Again, we are not a democracy, however we are acting like an authoritarian statist society. If the public was not apathetic and did not elect people with zero integrity into office, then we wouldn't be in the position we are in now.

Regarding the budget you are going to be proven wrong right here:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ defense.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ hhs.pdf
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ ssa.pdf

Defense: 474 Billion in 2005
Health and Human Services: 579 Billion in 2005
Social Security: 563 Billion in 2005

Those two programs are almost 3 times as much as defense! I didn't even look at the other social programs like HUD, education, and labor.

You should do a little resarch before you talk out of your ass. It will make you look less ignorant.

Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt could easily obtain reactors from the U.S. given their allied status and being favored trading partners.

Maybe you missed the memo.. but Saudi Arabia is NOT considered an ally anymore! 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers were Saudi Arabian- the operation was financed by Saudi Arabians, and members of the Saudi Arabian government knew about 9/11 and were very uncooperative in helping the United States investigate 9/11 in the aftermath (mostly to cover up their involvement). Furthermore- Saudi Arabia was one of few countries to recognize the Taliban government of Afghanistan and they were actually a major source of FUNDING for them!

The Joint Inquiry into Intelligence Community Activities before and after the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001 said point blank that the September 11 attacks could have been prevented but for the Saudi Arabian government's lack of cooperation with US investigations during the lead up to 9/11. The reason for their lack of cooperation? Because they were involved!

The main leaders of the government of Saudi Arabia may want to be allies, but they are basically under tremendous internal strife with other powers in Saudi Arabia who are anti-US, and in the end their policies are tempered by this strife to our detriment.

They were our allies before, and because of this we gave them preferential treatment, overlooking transgressions and suspect citizens visiting the US, etc ... this preferential treatment was also cited as something that could have prevented 9/11!

Here are some choice quotes from Joint Inquiry into Intelligence Community Activities before and after the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001 for your consideration below.

Looks like this guys article is coming true...

quotes:

"According to a U. S. Government official, it was clear from about 1996 that the Saudi Government would not cooperate with the United States on matters relating to Usama Bin Ladin. **REDACTED**, reemphasized the lack of Saudi cooperation and stated that there was little prospect of future cooperation regarding Bin Ladin. **REDACTED** told the Joint Inquiry that he believed the U.S. Government's hope of eventually obtaining Saudi cooperation was unrealistic because Saudi assistance to the U.S. Government on this matter is contrary to Saudi national interests. "

"The Treasury Department General Counsel testified at the July 23, 2002 hearing about the lack of Saudi cooperation: There is an almost intuitive sense, however, that things are not being volunteered. So I want to fully inform you about it, that we have to ask and we have to seek and we have to strive. I will give you one-and-a-half examples. The first is, after some period, the Saudis have agreed to the designation of a man named Julaydin, who is notoriously involved in all of this; and his designation will be public within the next 10 days. They came forward to us two weeks ago and said, okay, we think we should go forward with the designation and a freeze order against Mr. Julaydin. We asked, what do you have on him? Because they certainly know what we have on him, because we shared it as we tried to convince them that they ought to join us. The answer back was, nothing new. . . . . . . . I think that taxes credulity, or there is another motive we are not being told. "

"A number of U. S. Government officials complained to the Joint Inquiry about a lack of Saudi cooperation in terrorism investigations both before and after the September 11 attacks.**REDACTED**. A high-level U. S. Government officer cited greater Saudi cooperation when asked how the September 11 attacks might have been prevented. In May 2001, the U.S. Government became aware that an individual in Saudi Arabia was in contact with a senior al-Qa'ida operative and was most likely aware of an upcoming al- Qa'ida o

(d) No person or entity shall initiate any call for telemarketing purposes to a residential telephone subscriber unless such person or entity has instituted procedures for maintaining a list of persons who request not to receive telemarketing calls made by or on behalf of that person or entity. The procedures instituted must meet the following minimum standards:

(1) Written policy. Persons or entities making calls for telemarketing purposes must have a written policy, available upon demand, for maintaining a do-not-call list.

(2) Training of personnel engaged in telemarketing. Personnel engaged in any aspect of telemarketing must be informed and trained in the existence and use of the do-not-call list.

(3) Recording, disclosure of do-not-call requests. If a person or entity making a call for telemarketing purposes (or on whose behalf such a call is made) receives a request from a residential telephone subscriber not to receive calls from that person or entity, the person or entity must record the request and place the subscriber's name, if provided, and telephone number on the do-not-call list at the time the request is made. Persons or entities making calls for telemarketing purposes (or on whose behalf such calls are made) must honor a residential subscriber's do-not-call request within a reasonable time from the date such request is made. This period may not exceed thirty days from the date of such request. If such requests are recorded or maintained by a party other than the person or entity on whose behalf the telemarketing call is made, the person or entity on whose behalf the telemarketing call is made will be liable for any failures to honor the do-not-call request. A person or entity making a call for telemarketing purposes must obtain a consumer's prior express permission to share or forward the consumer's request not to be called to a party other than the person or entity on whose behalf a telemarketing call is made or an affiliated entity.

(4) Identification of sellers and telemarketers. A person or entity making a call for telemarketing purposes must provide the called party with the name of the individual caller, the name of the person or entity on whose behalf the call is being made, and a telephone number or address at which the person or entity may be contacted. The telephone number provided may not be a 900 number or any other number for which charges exceed local or long distance transmission charges.

(5) Affiliated persons or entities. In the absence of a specific request by the subscriber to the contrary, a residential subscriber's do-not-call request shall apply to the particular business entity making the call (or on whose behalf a call is made), and will not apply to affiliated entities unless the consumer reasonably would expect them to be included given the identification of the caller and the product being advertised.

(6) Maintenance of do-not-call lists. A person or entity making calls for telemarketing purposes must maintain a record of a consumer's request not to receive further telemarketing calls. A do-not-call request must be honored for 5 years from the time the request is made.

(7) Tax-exempt nonprofit organizations are not required to comply with 64.1200(d).

If you are going to try to sue someone, I wouldn't rely on legal advice from someone who is apparently a non-lawyer and puts out a guide to suing on a federal law claim in small claims court that tries to make it seem open-and-shut simple. First, if you are going to sue in small claims court, and don't want to pay an attorney, you need to research the law governing the and procedures applicable to small claims court in your state: either going directly to the law, or (more friendly), one of the guides from reputable self-help legal publishers.

Second, I'd look into a better reference on the applicable law (again, you can go directly to the law, but if you are going to take someone else's word on interpretation without hiring a lawyer, again, go to a reputable source.) Its worth noting that if you check the official site, the regulations cited (47 CFR 64.1200) do not match the material quoted.

Its also important to note that the requirement for a the required identification and phone number is "during or after the message": if you want to do this, you've got to first listen to the whole message, and if they complied with the rules, there is nothing you can do to get back the time you wasted listening to the message.

Also, quite a few election-year messages are delivered by entities that exist and are created for the election, which may not have any remaining resources after the election, and may even be disbanded shortly afterward. While if you have a major claim against such an entity it might be worthwhile to do the work needed to try to attack the sponsors behind it, trying to do that to enforce a liability that (even with the triple award for "willful and knowing" violations) is only at most $1,500 (if you can't prove actual damages of over $500) is, well, likely to be a headache.

Its probably easier to report violations to your state authorities: state attorneys-general also have the right to bring actions, and if more people report violations, there is more they can do. And state attorneys-general have a lot more resources to conduct investigations, can claim the statutory damages for all violations by the targets of their suits, not just the one that was made to you—and because they can aggregate the claims, it makes the cost of litigation a lot more bearable for them. Get your tax moneys worth out of your state government, let them do the heavy lifting.

That being said, this message should serve as a good reminder that you do have the power for do-it-yourself enforcement here, though I wouldn't rely on this as a guide to how.

Has anyone actually read this new bill? Both the Govtrack.us and towardsfreedom.com links above seem to be broken, but I found (thanks Google, Wikipedia) Senator Leahy's comments and what I think is the bill in question (National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 Report to Accompany H.R. 5122 ). I can't find the part that the good (as in good witch, bad witch) Senator mentions that amends the Insurrection Act. Does anyone else have a clue that could help us judge for ourselves exactly what's changed in the law from a first-hand source?

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/pdf/budget/ tables.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_spending

The U.S. spends much more on Defense (a little less than half of the budget) than on education, "health and human services", energy, and science combined. I don't think most 1st world countries spend half of their budget on the military. North Korea is the best example of another country that does that, that comes to mind. Thus, there is data to back up such "fanatical" statements. We are also free to try to change things for the better.

What you say about transportation of explosive materials is incomlete and misleading. Rocket propellants used in hobby rocketry are not 1.1 explosives (like dynamite). Many Hobby rocket motors are classified as 1.4S or 1.4C explosives and can be transported by ordinary people in quantities up to 1000 lbs without a commercial drivers license or placarding requirements. See 49CFR172.503(b) . Some hobby rocket motors aren't classified as explosives at all, rather as "flamable solids." Which makes much more sense.

The federal budget has been online for a long time.

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/legislative.html

For the budget just browse through the thousands of bills passed each session, then read through the thousands of pages in the annual budget published every year. This databse sounds like a waste of time. All it will give people is a list of payments to particular companies which won't mean too much. 1/3 goes to Boeing, Lockheed, Northrup Grumman, and United Technologies. 1/3 goes to employees. The other 1/3 is for useless computer systems that they can't get to work, the consultants that tell administrators what to buy, and to a variety of contractors that help build things (probably the best spent money in the government). Now of course they won't release any detail on the first 1/3 since its all classified. The employee pay checks are already public record. The wastes on computer systems are brought up by 20/20, 60 minutes, and Dateline every time the projects fall behind schedule or don't work.

I am interested in better accountability, but it starts with the congress that just keeps passing pork. I wonder how many riders were attached to the bill authorizing this database, it probably included projects like a tropical rainforst in Nome Alaska, a desert research station in Alabama, and a study to figure out how many government employees it takes to screw in a light bulb.

"The law calls for the Web site to go online by Jan. 1, 2008. It will list federal grants and contracts greater than $25,000, except for those classified for national security reasons."

So it doesn't contain all the budget details, but it is a good start.

For more information on the Federal budget, Google turns up this site.

1. falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;
2. makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or
3. makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry;

Being noticed and "practically screaming about it" are not the same.

"The power to forego all local laws, the power to extradite the citizens of a state or even locallity to the federal union."

Article VI already states that Federal law overrides any state law. A very lengthy discussion of this can be found at (pdf file): http://www.gpoaccess.gov/constitution/pdf2002/016. pdf

I don't quite see what the 14th amendment has to do with this; it just reaffirms Article VI in stating that state law may not contradict Federal or constitutional law.

Please quote a source for your numbers
My sources tell a different story:

National Defense $423,098
Education, Training, Employment and Social Services $91,817

From budget 2005:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_budget_ process#Structure_of_the_Budget
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy05/browse.html

If you want something authoratative, then try Oxford University's Oxford guide to style or the United States Government Printing Office's Style Manual 2000. The USGPO Sylem Manual is available online in PDF fomat here. Look at Chapter 8, units 8.3 through to 8.22 on apostrophe usage.