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GMO? Bring them on. With reasonable safety testing. Because guess what: I like citrus fruits. However, citrus fruits are going extinct thanks to citrus greening.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

It's spreading worldwide, affecting Asia, Israel, and Florida (29% reduced production), and other places. There is no good way to cure citrus greening (you can give a tree antibiotics, but that only works for a while and costs a lot. I'm not a fan of abusing antibiotics in this way, either!)

However, there's a GMO technique for making citrus resistant to citrus greening. No natural citrus plant is resistant. Splicing in some genes from spinach does the trick:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

So pretty soon, it's going to be GMO citrus or no citrus.

Also, it turns out naturally occurring compounds in NATURAL citrus contributes to skin cancer:

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/s...

GMO citrus could have those compounds removed and be HEALTHIER (less likely to cause cancer) than natural citrus.

Bottom line, I'm for GMO citrus. It beats "no citrus". Also, it'd be nice if the GMO citrus was less risky for skin cancer too.

Most decidedly unnatural, and most decidedly better--with proper safety testing, I'm all for it.

Furthermore, a deadly fact: our industrial farming monoculture is increasingly vulnerable to this sort of worldwide wipe-out. The banana variety common in USA stores is also going extinct due to a disease. No replacement banana has been bred yet. Coffee and chocolate are going extinct, also due disease, with climate change contributing. There are credible threats to wheat. I'm very afraid that just to feed everyone we're going to need GMO to keep ahead of disease, and also to expand usable farmland via inserted genes for salt and drought tolerance.

I think before too much longer, for many people, it's going to be GMO food or no food.

--PeterM

Here is where I first read about the case with video of the expert witness creating false evidence. It references the video links but no longer seems to be hosting the video. HuffPo has a clip from the video still up.

This was a death penalty case, and the video of the examination was not unearthed until after the defendant was sentenced to death.

A bit of searching turned of this 13 broken promises

Because the Daily Caller would never do that!

Because the Daily Caller would never do that!

Oh, cry me a river. Drone operators no longer have an unlimited right to invade people's privacy and endanger their safety. Sorry dude, but the airspace is common property and it's sensible to regulate its use for the common good. Either that, or we can have drone wars, where people who don't want your drones in the skies fly their own to take them down.

Chris Langdon has created a new strain of the weed which looks like a translucent red lettuce. An excellent source of minerals, vitamins and antioxidants, the "superfood" contains up to 16 per cent protein in dry weight. ... It has twice the nutritional value of kale." Langdon says, "When you fry it, which I have done, it tastes like bacon, not seaweed. And it's a pretty strong bacon flavor."

It's people. Translucent Red is made out of people. They're making our food out of people. That's why it tastes like bacon - we taste like pork. Next thing, they'll be breeding us like cattle for food. You've gotta tell them. You've gotta tell them! You tell everybody. Listen to me. Hatcher. You've gotta tell 'em! TRANSLUCENT RED IS PEOPLE! We gotta stop them! Somehow! Listen! Listen to me... PLEASE!!!

Its long term effects are not known. I should know what I'm putting in my mouth and then I can vote with my wallet.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

What's the deal with this?

That's so ignorant it hurts. Workers work at Foxconn because it's a good job and they make more money there than at some crappy family-owned factory. Let me guess, you were influenced by Mike Daisey's story on "This American Life" about horrid conditions at Foxconn? Turns out that was a total lie. Evidently he had the story written before he ever visited, and simply wrote what he wished was true. For example, he said armed guards patrolled the Foxconn perimeter looking for escaping workers, while in China only police and military can have firearms. His fraud dissolved easily with a simple Google search.

Let me guess: 1) you never heard about this, or 2) you considered it fake but accurate. The narrative was right but the facts were wrong. Those pesky facts, always getting in the way of a good story that agrees with our pre-existing political biases.

"In 2010 and 2012, Greece accepted bailout deals from European creditors totaling hundreds of billions of euros in order to prevent the collapse of the Greek banking system. The funds kept Greece from a potential default that would force it out of the eurozone, but most of the enormous sum of money involved in the bailouts ultimately didn't end up funding public services or directly going to the Greek people." ref

even though [climate change deniers on Fox and in congress are] not scientists, to use some of their words

"I'm not a scientist" is the new defensive crouch of deniers.

Stephen Colbert had a great piece about it awhile ago. The linked video is almost 5 minutes long, but worth the time to watch.

No. They often as not write puff pieces for the administration. I mean do I need to show you the emasculated press in a kindergarten pen at a Hillary rally?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

They're not the bureau of sabotage. The Bureau would do something so horrible if a politician tried that that they would never try such a thing again. I mean... I don't even know what they would do... but that would be a declaration of fucking war. The bureau amongst other things had additional rights under the law so they were shielded from a lot of consequences if they screwed something up for another branch. They could whistle blow for example without being in any danger of prosecution.

You have to keep in mind they would doctor records just to fuck with other people in government. They were this organization consistently maintaining a fixed ratio of urine in the lobster bisque.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Sorry you fail to see your own binary logic. How can you support more kids with less money? How can you claim our social programs are a loss, and what "Chicago event" are you referring to?

Welfare success stories: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
https://www.nytimes.com/books/...
http://occupywallst.org/forum/...

There are plenty more.

Here's something completely different to consider...

1. Someone finds a website (of someone they don't like)
2. Get the persons details from the WHOIS report
3. Load up Tor and falsely accuse the person of being a child molester
4. Wait for mob mentality to kick in and the person gets murdered as a result

And I live in the UK, a country that has a general "kill first, ask questions later" mentality when it comes to people accused of being pedophiles and child molesters.

So, yeah, this is pretty fucking bad.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

It doesn't help that Greece was forced into an austerity plan in their last bailout. Essentially that kicked off a death spiral. Austerity has already been well discredited (see here, here, and here. Original paper here) yet it keeps being foisted off on citizens everywhere.

I'm not suggesting that Greece should spend money like a drunken sailor on leave, but following a faith based economic theory even after it has been disproven (even to the satisfaction of the writers of the original paper) is not the answer.

Are you saying Pluto is a model of something?

Is a pygmy owl still an owl?

Sharks usually kill a dozen or so people every year. Meanwhile Humans kill around 100 million sharks per year . Shark scientists are researching the question, "WTF, humans?" Some sharks speculate that it's because humans are assholes.

I cited many examples of people talking about poll inaccuracy.

I don't give the smallest fuck over your many irrelevant citations. I'm simply telling you that your claim about how election polls "very rarely match up with the actual election" is complete horseshit.

Election polls in the US have a long track record of accuracy going back DECADES. The fact that you refuse to recognize this - even when you're pimp-slapped with actual data - just shows how utterly out of touch you are with reality.

As to opinion polls, actually the topic is about Pew Opinion poll.

No you pinhead, the topic at hand is your statement:

...look election polls prior to the election. They very rarely match up with the actual election. Why is that?

Why do you have to constantly be reminded of your dimwitted remark? I guess if I were you, I would want to forget about it too. After all, the only thing dumber than saying it would be defending it...oh wait.

Kill yourself. No really. Put down the keyboard. Get up. And stop wasting oxygen.

What a childish little twat you are.

As to ignorance regarding poll participation... You really did zero research in your short life didn't you?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

Yes, poll response rates are falling. Yes, declining rates can introduce selection bias. I guess it's a good thing I didn't claim otherwise.

But declining response rates don't automatically cause a poll to be inaccurate. How do I know that? Because the SECOND FUCKING PARAGRAPH of your huffpo article reads:

"Yet the study also finds evidence that on most of the wide variety of measures tested, the declining response rates alone are not causing surveys to yield inaccurate results."

Talk about doing ZERO research. Protip: read through an article BEFORE claiming it supports your position.

What a pitiful display. Your ability to embarrass yourself with a constant flow of ignorant, self-contradictory statements is simply breathtaking. And your multiple sorry ass attempts to move the discussion away from your original statement isn't going well for you. Apparently you are oblivious to that fact.

The world is better place now that you're gone. There is one less moron. :D

I'm not going anywhere, nimrod. I've got lots of free time to help you continue to humiliate yourself.

I cited many examples of people talking about poll inaccuracy. And really the entire issue is common knowledge. I'm not going to debate whether or not the Sun is hot with you. I've already cited more than I needed to cite.

As to opinion polls, actually the topic is about Pew Opinion poll. Kill yourself. No really. Put down the keyboard. Get up. And stop wasting oxygen.

I'll continue answering questions for posterity but we should assume that the poster has done the honorable thing and committed suicide.

As to ignorance regarding poll participation... You really did zero research in your short life didn't you?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

What you can see there is that according to Pew... the same organization that did this poll that created this topic says... is that the response rate in 2012 was NINE PERCENT of people contacted. And from the previous years we can see a clear trend line DOWN.

Now when only 9 percent even respond to the call and that 9 percent is not randomly selected but in fact SELF selects that could very easily bias the results.

If someone has an opinion but doesn't want to talk to you for some reason then you won't record their opinion.

The world is better place now that you're gone. There is one less moron. :D

Same thing: shop class

Hmmm, this story http://www.huffingtonpost.com/... would make it seem otherwise.

I think the maternity leave period duration is because of their location: Spain(Europe...)

This graphic shows the breakdown by country
As we can see, Americans prefer a social darwinism form of maternity leave.

the military impose rules of engagement requiring positive ID of the bad guy before you shoot

What, you think we have to ID those journalists and harmless regular folks (kids no exception) before blasting 'em off the map? STOP THAT UN-AMERICAN TREASONOUS BULLSHIT.

You're not say that Obama has no conscience, are you?

At least he isn't sending them to Gitmo, like Bush. Obama is doing them all a favor by killing them remotely (and any innocents that might be around.)

It's also a giant government waste issue, to the tune of $40 billion a year.

What law gives the government the right to destroy sacred land?

From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

The project "is predicated on this idea that we have some permission to take over these spaces and use them for scientific research," Adam Burgasser, an associate professor of astrophysics at the University of California, San Diego, told BuzzFeed. "Even though I benefit greatly from that professionally, I don't think we can make that assumption that we have rights to this mountain," he added.

It's about damn time.

Time? No, it is long overdue. Now it is time for incest.

There is no argument for making acceptance of gay marriage mandatory, that would not also apply to making sex between and marriage of parent and (adult) child or between siblings legal. "Troll" my foot — do try to come up with one...

This is hardly news — and some legal professionals have said so. And the fight for Full Marriage Equality is already ongoing. All over.

Oh, and before you say "Think of the (malformed) children of such unions!" — sorry, that's not enough. First of all, they don't have to have children with each other — like gay couples, they can adopt. Second, most of the existing laws banning incest make no difference between actual close blood-relatives "in laws" — it is equally illegal for a step-father to marry his adopted daughter (Woody Allen got away with it, because he never formally adopted his wife's child).

And third, the courts have ruled for years (here is a "1948 decision for example!), that any concerns for the health of the offspring are not sufficient grounds for denying the right to marry.

Within a generation the term "motherfucker" will become a disparaging sign of bigoted microaggression — which is, of course, much worse than the actual bona-fide aggression it manifests in our parochial times.

The Americas, yes, not the United States of America, which is what we're talking about.

Are we? I thought, we are talking about eating vs. not eating fats and sugars.

But, fine, let's talk about Mexico — the actual source of tomatoes (actually, that may have been in modern-day Ohio), chili peppers, and chocolate. Their obesity levels are even higher than the US'... You were saying?

Me and Rush Limbaugh are both wondering, just how is the American flag any better? It, likewise, flew over slavery, the subsequent racism, and was (still is!) used in imperialist wars. It covered — still does at times — sexism and parochial bigotry.

Whatever you can say against the Confederate flag, can also be said about the American. Yeah, the latter may have been used for some good, but the sheer period of its usage (over 2 centuries and counting), makes it much worse than the former, whose country only existed for what, four years? Five?

Can it get any worse? Yes it can! A recent study has shown, that simply seeing the flag can cause a hitherto innocent victim to vote Republican! And even a single exposure can last for up to 8 months!

As soon as we are done with KKKonfederate rag, we must turn our energies onto the AmeriKKKan one.

In fact, why wait? Let's act NOW!! .

Maybe, those misunderstood ISIS warriors destroying the symbols of defunct states that practiced slave-ownership are onto something, huh? I for one have always doubted Pythagorean Theorem — what can a long-dead White slave-owner possibly know about any hypotenuse?

Courts in the UK looked at many questions, including would the allegation against Assange constitute rape in the UK, and did the prosecutor have the authority to issue the EAW. Here are extracts from the magistrate's ruling:

City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court
(Sitting at Belmarsh Magistrates’ Court)

The judicial authority in Sweden -v- Julian Paul Assange

Findings of facts and reasons

I make the following findings of fact from the evidence I have heard: ...

2. In Sweden, a person interrogated for rape is normally detained and held incommunicado during the process. These decisions are taken by a court.

....I heard live evidence from a recently retired Swedish prosecutor. Mr Alhem told me in there is nothing wrong with the EAW in this case. Similarly Brita Sundberg-Weitman said that Ms Ny is entitled to issue an EAW, although not on the facts as she understood them to be. Mr Hurtig is a Swedish lawyer. He may not be an expert on extradition but nevertheless he must have been well placed to discover whether Ms Ny had the appropriate authority, and he has not suggested otherwise. Ms Ny herself has made a statement saying she has the appropriate authority. .... I was also taken to original documents, including the Swedish Code of Statutes. Section 3 says, with reference to the EAW: “A Swedish arrest warrant for the purpose of criminal prosecution is issued by a prosecutor. ... Ms Ny’s details are provided and she signed the warrant. Even without the SOCA certification I have no doubt that Marianne Ny issued the warrant and is a “judicial authority which has the function of issuing arrest warrants”. ...

Assange: would the rape allegation also be rape under English law?

The Magistrates’ Court ruled (emphasis added):

The position with offence 4 is different. This is an allegation of rape. The framework list is ticked for rape. The defence accepts that normally the ticking of a framework list offence box on an EAW would require very little analysis by the court. However they then developed a sophisticated argument that the conduct alleged here would not amount to rape in most European countries. However, what is alleged here is that Mr Assange “deliberately consummated sexual intercourse with her by improperly exploiting that she, due to sleep, was in a helpless state”. In this country that would amount to rape.

----------

No, this doesn't work for you since you want him to be guilty before he's even moved.

No, I don't. I just think the question should be answered in court if the allegations are strong enough to support a trial.

If you are thoughtful, you may see some irony in this:

Sweden Angered By Julian Assange Fight, Says It Won't Extradite Him If He Faces Death Penalty

The rape allegation is the most serious and if proven in court could lead to up to four years in jail.

The lawyer for the two women stood by the allegations and criticised Assange for not coming back to be questioned.

"It's an abuse of the asylum instrument, the purpose of which is to protect people from persecution and torture ... It's not about that here," Claes Borgstrom told Reuters.

"He doesn't risk being handed over to the United States for torture or death penalty. He should be brought to justice in Sweden. This is completely absurd."

At the same time, Assange might not have that much to worry about, said

So you don't contest that there were three prosecutors, two of which thought that the charges should be investigated, and now the attempt is actually being made? That's a start.

Many people will jettison logic and equality before the law to defend Assange.

Sweden has a long history of independence with regard to the US and the Soviet Union (and now Russia). Calling Sweden a "lapdog" of the United States is ludicrous. Sweden declined US requests to extradite deserters during and after Vietnam, for example. Almost 1,000 Americans fled there after desertion.

The few (what was it, 2?) that Sweden surrendered to the US for rendition we believed to be involved in terrorism, they were not known to be innocent. (A lie of yours?) Sweden is not inclined to support further renditions, and Assange isn't believed to be involved with terrorism. Or are you prepared to make a revelation about previously unknown links between Assange and ISIS or al Qaeda?

Assange is wanted in Sweden for crimes committed in Sweden. Suggestions that it would be easier to extradite him from Sweden where both the UK and Sweden would have to agree instead of just extraditing him from the UK where only the UK has to agree are sheer fantasy and a flimsy excuse for Assange not facing justice. It is as simple as that.

Sweden Angered By Julian Assange Fight, Says It Won't Extradite Him If He Faces Death Penalty

A lot of countries work longer hours:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

The US doesn't even make the top 10. Whoever wrote that article decided to (whether deliberately or not) cherry pick and say "ok, let's just filter among the largest grossing economies" and not necessarily the highest GDP per capita or even population. I don't know what number the US is, but I have a feeling we aren't even top 15, because I know Japan and China should probably fit somewhere closely after 10th.

In fact China may very well be higher ranked than all of these, just it's hard to tell because a lot of Chinese workers like to work very long hours for a year or two and save their money the whole time, and after that is done they'll live off of their savings for an extended period (up to a year.) These are usually people who live in rural areas and get factory jobs far away from home, and then go back home once they've had enough. They'll do something like 16 hours a day for a year solid, with very few days off. A lot of the ultraleft union types call it worker abuse, but it's not, the laborers actually like doing it this way, and it actually pisses the laborers off when western media puts pressure on them to not do what they want to do. The way they circumvent that is to help their employer conceal how many hours they actually work to the western companies that ask, which makes getting actual useful data about it practically impossible.

A church almost by definition cannot be truly pro-science.

It certainly can be — faith operates in a different plane, so to speak. It neither contradicts nor supports science, nor is it contradicted nor supported by science in return.

do not readily accept questioning of that faith even in the face of overwhelming evidence

The Lord's ways are neither known, nor even knowable — in the very principle, there can be no "evidence" supporting nor denying His existence and power. Unlike Science, Religion does not need to offer predictions nor make falsifiable statements. Some ancient bishop is on record with the famous "Credo quia absurdum" — whether the sentiment is beautiful or stupid in your opinion, it is decidedly not scientific, nor purports to be.

I think science and faith of the sort espoused by organized religion are irreconcilable to one another.

True that — in the way "yellow" is irreconcilable with "soft". The two are from completely orthogonal domains.

The interesting bit here — and what the down-modded OP was, probably, hinting at, is that "Climate Science" is, in fact, a religion now. Unable to come up with any materialized predictions, and all of their falsifiable statements ending up getting falsified indeed, the proponents of the idea, that humanity is guilty and must right its ways or be punished (with extinction) sound more and more like the preachers and less like scientists.

That's Communism not Socialism.

There is no difference. Communism is simply the "platonic ideal" of Socialism — that's what I was told every week in school for ten years, while growing up in the USSR.

capitalism [...] can be just as brutal as Communism if under a dictatorship

No, it can not be. Nowhere close. You are, obviously, hinting at Pinochet — just compare his death toll with that of Khmer Rouge. Meanwhile today's Chile is Latin America's TOP economy — thanks to Capitalism.

"because North Korea"

How about "because Venezuela"? Under the rule of Chavez — a guest of honor at "World Social Forum" — the murder rate quadrupled . You think, whooping cough prevention (even if it really did require Socialism) justifies that?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

> They'll make sure to have an opt-out clause just for congress critters.
> As always.

Anyone thinks that just invective should check out the TSA's program. Yes, 'anybody' can opt-out too for money and hassle with a chance of being refused. Congress doesn't have to worry, they get it automatically.

While you shouldn't necessary pick a major based on the hottest job, you definitely need to pick something in consideration with how you will use it. And you sure as heck should go to college to learn and make yourself better--not just to receive a piece of paper. Racking up 5 or 6 figures of debt without learning anything of value is a terrible idea. Unfortunately, we haven't given students the tools or perspectives to understand the consequences of the decisions they are making. Everyone is always warning athletes coming into college "the chances of you making it as a pro are extremely rare". And yet, the chances of someone making it as a tenured history professor at a major university are probably just as rare. At least the athletes aren't going into massive debt.

Add onto the fact that we have massively watered down many majors to the point of uselessness. The reason liberal arts majors get a bad rap isn't that it is a useless subject. If people came out as hard working critical thinkers they would be valuable contributors. Unfortunately, it is filled with people who just want a piece of papers and do the minimum to get by. This is a generalization, of course, but I believe is backed up by stats on plagiarism http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...). And the courses are watered down to be worthless. For example you can graduate from Yale with an English without having a Shakespeare course (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2015/04/23/skipping-shakespeare-yes-english-majors-can-often-bypass-the-bard/). So in 4 years of education in English, you don't have to actually take a course in the most influential English writer in history. But, you know, he is challenging to read and understand. As an alternative you can take a course in Literature for Young People http://english.yale.edu/course... which includes J. K. Rowling and Dr. Seuss.

At least with Engineering/Math/Hard Science you have to demonstrate via projects and tests that you have actually learned something.

Which ones would that be moron? Perhaps you're discussing Apple, who has a board made of 100% Democrats and doesn't pay it's fair share. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

Heck, WMD were found: http://www.defense.gov/News/Ne... [defense.gov] http://www.nytimes.com/interac... [nytimes.com]

You're embarrassing yourself.

So I guess Saddam gassing all the Kurds didn't really happen, and we should have never gone in there to put a stop to the systematic genocide Saddam was up to...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H... [wikipedia.org]

Saddam gassed the Kurds with the gas that you gave him. And later Rumsfeld dropped by to shake his hand.

Don't expect to be given the moral high ground over Saddam. During their mercifully brief but incredibly bloody reign, Rumsfeld/Cheney killed more Iraqis than he did during any period of the same length.

That gas was expired long before the lying started: the best the Iraqi Air Force could have done with it would be to hurl it from the plane and hope to hit someone in the head with the canister.

But IMHO you are entitled to be as wrong as you wish...

Too bad the baker and the pizza maker didn't have your attitude.

You know who doesn't have any problem getting a cake or a pizza? Dennis Hastert or Josh Duggar. Because molesting kids is just fine, but those two ladies wanting to get married is just beyond the pale.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

I'm so glad you cleared that up for us.

He did find employment.
He is a successful writer and could have easily paid his debts but chose not to.
His article is BS from top to bottom.

Also, it appears that his hagiographic Wiki article was written by his grandma.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...

Here's something else he wrote.Guess his socio-econmic bracket.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

So says the unimpeachable source of all truth.

You can read the whole article (and you should), but here are some nice excerpts.

FTA: On the electric car front, the Chevy Volt is the most significant U.S. competitor to Musk's Tesla Model S...

Meanwhile, Volt was developed during Uncle Sam's bailout of "Government Motors" with $30 billion. That's more than six times the number that got Mr. Hirsch so worked up! Though GM touts that they've "repaid" the government, Treasury reports that the government lost more than $11 billion on that dubious deal.

The Model S is not comparable to the Volt. The Volt is a plug-in hybrid (not an EV) cludge to meet the requirements of a bail out. The Nissan Leaf is a better comparison and it blows the Model S out of the water in its effects on the market. But, the author wants to hamstring a stronger comparison by requiring that the company be American.

Additionally, a bail out deal and subsidy are not comparable. A bail out deal your mom throwing you a few hundred bucks because your business failed, rent needs to be paid, and you have to go visit her to pick up the check. A subsidy is your mom throwing you a few hundred bucks to start up or expand your business. One's there to save your as with some nominal requirements and the other is there to help you profit. Musk has taken both for Tesla.

FTA: The most polite response I can offer to the critics is: Get over it. Find something more productive to do than condemning success. If you insist on continuing to carp, do your research first and hit the right targets. Otherwise you will continue to sound jealous and misinformed.

Wow, internet tough guy, huh?

Oh, and this isn't the only time this guy has white-knighted for Musk. He's actually a bit of a fanboy, so don't let his professorship lull you into a false sense of academic separation:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/... "Disclosure: Dr. Autry currently owns Tesla stock."
https://twitter.com/gregwautry
https://www.facebook.com/gregw...
http://www.forbes.com/sites/re...

Well, this is what you get when the govt. is fully *bought* and paid for by interests other than the "people".

And this is why we absolutely must through BushCo and the rest of RethugliKKKans out and elect a decent, well-educated, sophisticated, and peace-loving man like Barack Obama.

Mmm, excuse me, I just imagined him in my shower and now my limbs are thrilling...

The Chamber is not overtly taking a pro-bribery position. Rather, its lobbying blitz couches the proposed changes as tune-ups, a few safeguards needed to protect against overzealous prosecutors.

"Our proposals are aimed at preserving existing law enforcement tools so that the government can pursue the bad actors while ensuring that the good actors have clarity and more certainty under the law, which is clearly lacking today," said Harold Kim, a senior vice president at the Chamber's Institute for Legal Reform, in a statement to The Huffington Post.

But the Chamber's list of demands boils down to this: It wants four loopholes that companies could use to escape criminal liability -- and it wants the government to make a clearer demarcation between foreign officials they are not allowed to bribe and those they are.

This might be related to the fact that Chamber board members we in companies involved in bribery scandals when they were advocating these changes.

The Institute for Legal Reform has been leading a powerful and unprecedented lobbying campaign to persuade Congress to rewrite key provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a 35-year-old statute that criminalizes bribes to foreign officials, on the grounds that prosecutors have been enforcing it too aggressively.

In a letter to the Chamber released Tuesday, Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) -- the ranking Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the House Energy and Commerce Committee, respectively -- describe how committee staff looked through the institute's tax filings and found that 14 of the group's 55 board members between 2007 and 2010 "were affiliated with companies that were reportedly under investigation for violations or had settled allegations that they violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act."

We're not talking chump change here.

The Huffington Post calculated last year that a mere eight members of the Chamber -- not all board members of its legal reform arm -- had altogether paid nearly $1 billion resolving FCPA charges in the last seven years.

So I would assume that the next step would be to legalize bribes in the US. We have it effectively anyway, so why keep the pretense that "all people are created equal". Remember that "corporations are people" and "some animals are more equal then others".

The Chamber is not overtly taking a pro-bribery position. Rather, its lobbying blitz couches the proposed changes as tune-ups, a few safeguards needed to protect against overzealous prosecutors.

"Our proposals are aimed at preserving existing law enforcement tools so that the government can pursue the bad actors while ensuring that the good actors have clarity and more certainty under the law, which is clearly lacking today," said Harold Kim, a senior vice president at the Chamber's Institute for Legal Reform, in a statement to The Huffington Post.

But the Chamber's list of demands boils down to this: It wants four loopholes that companies could use to escape criminal liability -- and it wants the government to make a clearer demarcation between foreign officials they are not allowed to bribe and those they are.

This might be related to the fact that Chamber board members we in companies involved in bribery scandals when they were advocating these changes.

The Institute for Legal Reform has been leading a powerful and unprecedented lobbying campaign to persuade Congress to rewrite key provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a 35-year-old statute that criminalizes bribes to foreign officials, on the grounds that prosecutors have been enforcing it too aggressively.

In a letter to the Chamber released Tuesday, Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) -- the ranking Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the House Energy and Commerce Committee, respectively -- describe how committee staff looked through the institute's tax filings and found that 14 of the group's 55 board members between 2007 and 2010 "were affiliated with companies that were reportedly under investigation for violations or had settled allegations that they violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act."

We're not talking chump change here.

The Huffington Post calculated last year that a mere eight members of the Chamber -- not all board members of its legal reform arm -- had altogether paid nearly $1 billion resolving FCPA charges in the last seven years.

So I would assume that the next step would be to legalize bribes in the US. We have it effectively anyway, so why keep the pretense that "all people are created equal". Remember that "corporations are people" and "some animals are more equal then others".

This is precisely why this type of thing was forbidden by the Bill of Rights.

So if someone in power doesn't like you then all they need to do is get creative and then it's okay to take away your liberties?

Either charge them with something malum in se or let them live their life free. Don't spend your time creating malum prohibitum laws just so that you can lock-up whoever you want to.

The U.S.A. is addicted to making malum prohibitum laws just so we can claim the title of highest incarceration rate.

Ironically, its a crime because he made it one. Hiding large bank transactions was made reportable to the FBI and lying to the FBI about them was made a crime both by the Patriot Act that was pushed for and voted for most vociferously by then House Speaker Dennis Hastert.