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Then why the hell didn't the court make up that exception? This is the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court we're talking about, they're not new to inventing law when it pleases them.

Do you really want to say there is no connection between recruiting technical workers upon whom no effective background check can be done and security breaches?

I think the question should at least be examined closely. Enron BTW made some rather strange investments in India-and was an H-1b intensive shop.

Noone has done a comprehensive analysis here-in part because the companies that bought H-1b legislation have specifically made reporting standards inadequate for such an analysis.

I don't think most H-1b workers are involved in fraud-but if the H-1b program only allows a few terrorists or criminal organizations to put a few people in place that way-that is enough to cause big problems.

I don't think anyone upon whom a good background check can't be done should be allowed anywhere near sensitive data or critical infrastructure. Workers from Japan, Singapore, the EU can be given real background checks. Workers from more corrupt countries simply cannot.

Here are two links which take different take on the issue but arrive at a similar conclusion. The first link says that Galileo was only condemnded after attacking philosophy.
http://www.traditioninaction.org/History/A_003_Galileo.html

The next link shows that it was professors at University that pushed for the Inquisition and that the Church initially supported him
http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2005/08/16/galileo-redux/

religion led to ethics

Wait, back up. People have attempted to give religious justifications for ethics, but that doesn't mean that ethics depends upon religion or anything like that. See, e.g., here.

I attribute consciousness and will to the influence of God. In the absence of a deific source of these qualities, I believe them to be illusory traits that happen to be beneficial to the survival of the species.

Consciousness can't be illusory, by definition. (Descartes and all that.) However consciousness arises, there it is. I'm not telepathic, but I'm pretty sure other people are conscious, too. Saying they're 'illusions' is nonsensical. Consciousness is a lot more complicated than many people naively suppose, but that doesn't mean it's an 'illusion'.

Now, I personally think that consciousness arises from the operation of the brain. At the absolute bare minimum, we know that a brain is vitally necessary for human consciousness (see above link), and it may be (I think probably is) sufficient. We don't have to know everything about automotive engineering to be able to tell that if the engine is pulled out, the car won't run.

In the absence of God, I perceive the universe as intrinsically amoral.

The universe isn't conscious, and thus isn't a moral agent, so in that sense it's amoral. But you should read the links I provided if you don't think the interaction between conscious agents and the universe has moral implications. If nothing else, take a look at this one, it addresses that specifically.

if God doesn't exist, then there's no basis for morality

Nope. Wrong.

Read these two articles and get back to me http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2006/scien ce-vs-religion-part-2/ http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/kellmeyer/05081 5 Religion and Science can co-exist but you seem to want them to be in opposition all the time.

You live in Boston? I assume you are familiar with the federally supported Big Dig http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article431 8.html/, which has so far cost $14,600,000,000.00? 14 billion dollars for a road?

Why the hell should the federal government pay for a freaking ROAD in Boston, which it hasn't needed for the past two hundred years, and they shouldn't pay for food, shelter, and clean water for citizens who have just had their life savings and home destroyed?

If you're serious, why don't you propose that Boston impose a 30% sales tax increase to pay for its own road and give the money back to the feds? I'm sure they could resettle a lot fo people from New Orleans for that amount of money.

By the way, I live near DC, and DC and Alexandria have had several problems with flooding due to hurricanes in the past few years. Not 'evacuate' problems, but problems that cost a lot of money.

You know, it's interesting that people (even Republicans, i find) totally ignore Democratic cases of voter fraud. Republicans are not the only ones responsible for it -- in fact, they seem to me like they're less likely to do it than Democrats, on the whole.

Some of these are really biassed, but here are some examples:

http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article385 5.html

http://billhobbs.com/hobbsonline/004765.html (LOTS of articles about it here)

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/007968.php

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1250035/p osts (admittedly, Free Republic is a pretty bad place to go for potentially reputation-harming information about Democrats, but there it is anyway <_<)

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/fund20040913 0633.asp

Even The New York Times had a story about Democratic voter fraud.

This isn't to say that the Las Vegas thing and Chuck Hagel's involvement with that voting-machine company and the convenient Diebold incident in Georgia aren't troubling, because they are, very much. But so many people mysteriously forget that the other party isn't the only one that can be 'filthy'.

known internationally for the degrading chain gangs and other harsh policies introduced by its infamous sheriff

'degrading chain gangs'?!? Boo-effing-hoo, their criminals they should work to pay off their debt to society.

As for the webcam lawsuit, that was in 2001 and I couldn't find anything about it's current status.

And there's this rebutting most of the rest.

If Congress doesn't declare war, we are not in a war. (Article I, section 8, clause 11, the U.S. Constitution)