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Here's a writeup on it from the Florida Attorney General's office.

http://myfloridalegal.com/ago.nsf/0/2be69982597761f385256eb7005f8fdf?OpenDocument.

Basically, anywhere that is a road, or there is expressed or implied consent to drive, traffic laws can be enforced.

You could argue that you don't have to obey them. You would lose in court. And as I mentioned in the previous post, this is Florida law, so your state may be different.

In Florida, transparency is not up to the whim or grace of public officials. Instead, it is an enforceable right.

From the website of the Office of the Attorney General of Florida titled Open Government. The irony is strong in this one.

Who the fuck cares about facial recognition, I say arm the citizens and save money and time.

Go to Somalia and find out how good that works out.

Why go to Somalia? You don't have to travel outside of the United States. (And many countries have one or more of these sorts of laws.)

America's Toughest Sheriff, Joe Arpaio

As chief law enforcement officer for the county, Arpaio continues to reduce crime with hard-hitting enforcement methods. . . . The posse, whose ranks have increased to 3000 members under Arpaio, is the nation's largest volunteer posse. Posse men and women help in search and rescue and other traditional police work as well as in special operations like rounding up deadbeat parents, fighting prostitution, patrolling malls during holidays, and investigating animal cruelty complaints. The posse's contributions are invaluable and essentially free to taxpayers.

POSSE

Wait, there's more! (This sort of law is common in the US.)

"901.18 Officer may summon assistance. -- A peace officer making a lawful arrest may command the aid of persons he deems necessary to make the arrest. A person commanded to aid shall render assistance as directed by the officer. A person commanded to aid a peace officer shall have the same authority to arrest as that peace officer and shall not be civilly liable for any reasonable conduct in rendering assistance to that officer." --- Advisory Legal Opinion - AGO 75-200

In most cases, this means you.

That's not all. If you are an American male, you are probably in the militia - US Federal, and state - even if you don't know it.

State militia, members.

41.050. The militia of the state shall include all able-bodied citizens and all other able-bodied residents, who, in the case of the unorganized militia and the Missouri reserve military force, shall be more than seventeen years of age and not more than sixty-four, and such other persons as may upon their own application be enrolled or commissioned therein, and who, in the case of the organized militia, shall be within the age limits and possess the physical and mental qualifications prescribed by law or regulations for the reserve components of the Armed Forces of the United States, except that this section shall not be construed to require militia service of any persons specifically exempted by the laws of the United States or the state of Missouri. The maximum age requirement may be waived by the adjutant general on a case-by-case basis.

Federal: Sec. 311. Militia: composition and classes

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied
males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section
313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a
declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States
and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the
National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are -
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard
and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members

As a criminal offense, Florida's law is typical. Price gouging may be charged when a supplier of essential goods or services sharply raises the prices asked in anticipation of or during a civil emergency, or when it cancels or dishonors contracts in order to take advantage of an increase in prices related to such an emergency. The model case is a retailer who increases the price of existing stocks of milk and bread when a hurricane is imminent. It is a defense to show that the price increase mostly reflects increased costs, such as running an emergency generator, or hazard pay for workers.

Well guess what? I'm not a "supplier" or "retailer" of any goods...hence why I'm selling it on craigslist!

(I didn't actually sell anything, but I don't quite like the idea of the state being able to come to my garage sale and arrest me for my prices being to high)

As a criminal offense, Florida's law is typical. Price gouging may be charged when a supplier of essential goods or services sharply raises the prices asked in anticipation of or during a civil emergency, or when it cancels or dishonors contracts in order to take advantage of an increase in prices related to such an emergency. The model case is a retailer who increases the price of existing stocks of milk and bread when a hurricane is imminent. It is a defense to show that the price increase mostly reflects increased costs, such as running an emergency generator, or hazard pay for workers.

Ballots, while anonymous, are generally public records that can be examined by anybody. For example, here's a link to a letter from the Florida attorney general answering a question about ballots in that state being public record. Here's another one in Ohio. Including ballots as part of public records means that outside individuals or groups are free to verify that ballots were counted correctly. In fact, I think several newspapers did just that in Florida for the 2000 Presidential election. Ruling that petitions are confidential would make them less open than actual votes.

The loyalty oath issue is interesting. The loyalty oath in Florida used to contain the language "that I am not a member of the Communist Party; that I have not and will not lend my aid, support, advice, counsel or influence to the Communist Party". This was a big deal during the Red Scare era in the 1950s. It's not an oath of office; all state employees were required to sign it.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that language to be an unconstitutional restriction on free speech and association in 1961. So the legislature took out the "Communist party" part. The shortened oath is still required of all state employees and candidates.

Florida law says that any state employee refusing to sign the oath shall be discharged. It's not clear there's any penalty for an employee who, through some omission of the state, was never asked to sign it.

Florida judges are mostly elected, and normally the loyalty oath is required as part of the paperwork for getting on the ballot. But it seems that Judge Tunis was appointed (by Gov. Jeb Bush) to fill a vacancy created when the Legislature increased the number of judgeships. For most state employees, it's the responsibility of the employee's superior to make sure that the loyalty oath is signed. But for elected positions, there's no "superior", so it's not clear who's supposed to get this done. Which is probably how she became a judge without signing the loyalty oath first. Anyway, Judge Tunis did sign the oath at a later date.

"Price Gouging" is for life-essentials - like food, water, shelter. A cellphone plan isn't a life essential. The merchants may be overcharging, and there may need to be legal action against them, but they're not _gouging_. Keep that term for when people are going to die without the goods.

(Yes, increased communication can save lives, but that does not appear to be the tack the court case is going with, and I would argue that cellphones are still on a different tier from sustinance and protection from the elements)
</Pet-Peeve>

AP) Police in seven European countries struck Tuesday at a sophisticated child abuse and pornography ring dubbed "Shadowz Brotherhood," arresting 50 people and seizing computer equipment, CD-ROMs and videos, authorities said.

Police described the images created and distributed by the group as some of the most shocking they had ever seen. Members of the ring allegedly broadcast live pictures of abuse on the Internet and posted images of children, including babies, being sexually abused and tortured.

"In terms of the kind of material they are posting and allowing access to, it's the worst group I have ever encountered," said Detective Chief Supt. Len Hynds of Britain's National High-tech Crime Unit, which coordinated a yearlong investigation with the European police organization Europol.

I wouldn't suggest you go looking for it.

This "pedophilia in the internet" meme is actually more disgusting than adults having sex with children.

If you really believe that, your values put you in a very tiny minority, and near some very unsavory people.

Because a true pedophile can only harm a limited number of people, whereas the people who keep bringing the fear of pedophiles are the meanest evil bastards one can find in the world.

This guy had hundreds of pictures, which means hundreds of victims:

TALLAHASSEE - Attorney General Charlie Crist today announced the arrest of a Clay County convicted sex offender for violating his probation. Authorities arrested Robert Reed, a registered sex offender since 1999, after receiving a tip that he had child pornography on his computer and was distributing it over the internet. The case will be prosecuted by the Attorney General's Office of Statewide Prosecution.

A joint investigation by the Attorney General's CyberCrime Unit, the FBI Cyber Crime Task Force and the Florida Department of Corrections Probation and Parole Services revealed that Reed, 26, placed pornographic videos on the internet and made them available to others online. A search of Reed's computer was conducted, unearthing hundreds of images of child pornography. Reed was arrested by officers with Probation and Parole Services.

Children for sale documents an enormous problem.

The FBI documents an enormous problem:

Dr. Hernandez concluded that 76 percent of the child pornographers or travelers (those who travel or intend to travel interstate for the purpose of having sex with a minor) who participated in his study admitted to having committed contact sex crimes which went undetected by the criminal justice system. These offenders had an average of 30.5 child sex victims each. In fact, this group of offenders admitted to having molested a combined total of 1,433 victims without ever having been detected. That is not 1,433 more offenses - - it is 1,433 more victims. If you factor in the number of times they offended against each individual victim, the number would be significantly higher. In addition, while Dr. Hernandez' study lumped child pornographers and travelers in the same category, his data shows that the number of undetected sex crimes was significantly higher for child pornographers than it was for travelers. In short, child pornographers, who consisted of 49 of the 62 subjects, were responsible for the vast majority of the 1,433 victims reported for that group.

History has repeatedly demonstrated that you cannot open a door to censorship, because once you have it, who will

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned pharmaceuticals fraud in the context of this thread. A few years ago drug stores in Florida bought and distributed what they thought were real chemotherapy drugs. Here's a link to the story:

http://myfloridalegal.com/newsrel.nsf/newsreleases /2C02516B2654F1D18525713E006D02CA

If you are receving spam from florida, and the spam itself has something wrong with it (bad subject line, bad from address, forged routing info, etc...), You can file a complaint with the Florida Attorney General's office, so that they'll go after the guys.

Their complaint form is at: http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/CB94AA46D 5A0974985256EBB006D2E21?OpenDocument

note: You might want to include evidence tying the message to florida (a whois, traceroute, etc...).

There should be a law making all records public after a certain period of time

During the hurricane a state official was on the television reporting that many similar events had occurred. She mentioned to call the state attorney. The relevant information is available at http://myfloridalegal.com/contact or you can just call 1-866-966-7226.

Florida has for a long time been the haven of spammers, so the State knows all eyes are on the AG's office to see how they enforce the new law. You can read more about the law, and there is a provision to report spam, on the MyFlorida web site. The only downside to their reporting procedure is that you have to fill out a form, rather than just forward the spam email, but that may change in the future.