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Libery and Justice for some

I ain't so sho bout justice, but I knows it fer a fact da libery is open to all

That's a nice piece of writing, who wrote that?

Written by one of the best investigative journalists around, check the link provided in GP: "no longer held accountable to the law"

Technicalities like you are pointing out are certainly little more than a poor cover for breaking our own laws. As I just pointed out in this thread, these people (as in NSA, financial and political elites, MIC etc) are no longer held accountable to the law of the land. The dont care that they are violating the fourth amendment, technicality or not... there are no repercussions for their illegal actions (other than some wining in some online forums and twitter - with no political consequences even for that).

The past decade has witnessed the most severe crimes imaginable by political and financial elites: the construction of a worldwide torture regime, domestic spying perpetrated jointly by the government and the telecom industry without the warrants required by the criminal law, an aggressive war waged on another country that killed hundreds of thousands of people, massive financial fraud that came close to collapsing the world economy and which destroyed the economic security of tens of millions, and systematic foreclosure fraud that, by design, bombarded courts with fraudulent documents in order to seize homes without legal entitlement. These are not bad policies or mere immoral acts. They are plainly criminal, and yet – due to the precepts of elite immunity which were first explicitly embraced during Ford’s pardon of Nixon — none of those crimes has produced legal punishments.

By very stark contrast, ordinary Americans are imprisoned more easily, for longer periods of time, and in greater numbers than any nation on earth. New legal classes of non-persons with no rights have been created over the last decade as well. Thus, over the same four decades that elite immunity has taken hold, the nation — namely,the same elite class that has aggressively vested itself with the right to act with impunity — has resorted to ever more merciless punishment schemes for ordinary Americans and others who are marginalized who, for multiple reasons, have very few defenses when the state targets them for punishment. While being rich and powerful has always been an advantage in the judicial system (and in all other aspects of American life), our political culture has now explicitly renounced the concept of equality of law, and it is thus now unabashedly clear that who you are is far more important than what you do.

> police can determine where the next crime will occur and sometimes prevent it

No need to predict, why the heck have they not stormed the banks, arrested any of the significant financial fraudsters, yet? Oh... yeah, there is only Libery and Justice for some . Silly me.

America’s two-tiered justice system – specifically, the way political and financial elites are now vested with virtually absolute immunity from the rule of law even when they are caught committing egregious crimes, while ordinary Americans are subjected to the world’s largest and one of its harshest and most merciless penal states even for trivial offenses. As a result, law has been completely perverted from what it was intended to be – the guarantor of an equal playing field which would legitimize outcome inequalities – into its precise antithesis: a weapon used by the most powerful to protect their ill-gotten gains, strengthen their unearned prerogatives, and ensure ever-expanding opportunity inequality.

And how many of those artists do you think are going to risk their careers by standing up and complaining about it?

I'd love to answer that question.

Agreed, however the biggest bidder of all is the Military Industrial Complex. They have developed lots of new toys and techniques to "control crowds". All specifically designed so that you, citizen, are never allowed to trim that derelict hedge... ever. Just look at what they are throwing at Julian Assange/Wikileaks, the first modern journalist/publishing platform designed to inform citizens on how corrupt, dirty and vile our governments have really become.

Terrorism (except for the sort spouted about by politicians looking for a catch-phrase) comes down to intent.

That might be the case for academic/professional usage of the word, but in popular usage the word "terrorism" does vary according to the perpetrator. Salon had an interesting article about this after the Norway attacks, where some news sites actually editing their reporting to remove references to the words "terrorist" and "terrorism" after it was discovered that the perpetrator wasn't a Muslim. The omnipotence of Al Qaeda and meaninglessness of “Terrorism” - The news reaction to the Oslo events clarifies the real meaning of "terrorism" (at the end we discover the surprising factoid that, of 294 Terrorist attacks attempted or executed on European soil in 2009 as counted by the EU, a grand total of one — 1 out of 294 — was perpetrated by "Islamists", despite the mainstream media portraying the opposite)

Kind of like you making shit up about what he did? His failing is that he didn't independently verify some of what was reported to him by workers in the factories.

Well, he said he personally met people that he did not meet, and that they told him their stories, when these people did not exist and the stories were things that he made up based on rumors he'd heard.

He also lied about the name of the translator who was with him during these purported interviews, and when "This American Life" asked to contact her to check the facts of the story, he told them she'd moved, changed her phone number, and could not be contacted, when when she had not changed her phone number nor moved nor would have been hard to contact if they knew her name. If his failng had been merely "he failed to independently verify," it seems a bit peculiar that he would lie to the producers and tell them it was impossible to contact his translator.

Some links:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/03/16/148761812/this-american-life-retracts-mike-daiseys-apple-factory-story
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/blog/2012/03/retracting-mr-daisey-and-the-apple-factory/
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/460/retraction
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/19/theater/defending-this-american-life-and-its-mike-daisey-retraction.html
http://www.salon.com/2012/03/19/mike_daisey_and_the_inconvenient_truth/

The take-home lesson is that even if you think you're on the side of the angels, you shouldn't lie, because it makes people disbelieve anything you say. In fact, especially if you think you're on the side of the angels.

True, but it's worth pointing out that this effect is larger in conservatives. The more a conservative learns about a topic the stronger his preconcieved beliefs are.

The result was stunning and alarming. The standard view that knowing more science, or being better at mathematical reasoning, ought to make you more accepting of mainstream climate science simply crashed and burned.

Instead, here was the result. If you were already part of a cultural group predisposed to distrust climate scienceâ"e.g., a political conservative or âoehierarchical-individualistââ"then more science knowledge and more skill in mathematical reasoning tended to make you even more dismissive.

Contrast liberals, where learning more about a topic is more likely to change his belief.

Nuclear power is a classic test case for liberal biasesâ"kind of the flip side of the global warming issueâ"for the following reason. Itâ(TM)s well known that liberals tend to start out distrustful of nuclear energy: Thereâ(TM)s a long history of this on the left. But this impulse puts them at odds with the views of the scientific community on the matter (scientists tend to think nuclear power risks are overblown, especially in light of the dangers of other energy sources, like coal).

So are liberals âoesmart idiotsâ on nukes? Not in Kahanâ(TM)s study. As members of the âoeegalitarian communitarianâ group in the studyâ"people with more liberal valuesâ"knew more science and math, they did not become more worried, overall, about the risks of nuclear power. Rather, they moved in the opposite direction from where these initial impulses would have taken them. They become less worriedâ"and, I might add, closer to the opinion of the scientific community on the matter.

I'm a big believer in "solve every problem with the least government

I am too. The problem is most conservatives see drugs as a problem by definition, and want to solve it with the least government possible. Since the drug "problem" is not solvable, that translates into maximal government whenever drugs are concerned.

The difference between conservatives and liberals isn't big government versus small government. Both sides are more than willing to use big government to get what they want. It's how responsive they are to facts that contradict their ideas.

No :-)
YOU set up that straw-man, by saying "You think the labels don't actually pay their artists anything?".
I personally don't have a clue what the labels pay. Do you? Please, share it with us.

However, I read the following two articles (not a "reliable source", for sure, but convincing me):
Courtney Love does the math, where she gives a hypothetical example and comes out at -200% . MINUS 200%. So "No, they don't." is a euphemism: it would be more honest if GGGP had said "No, the artists actually even have to pay the labels".
And RIAA Accounting: Why Even Major Label Musicians Rarely Make Money From Album Sales, which summarizes "That report suggests that for every $1,000 sold, the average musician gets $23.40.". That's arguably not nothing but you're splitting hairs: the creative source, without which the product wouldn't exist, gets 2.3%?

The current system only works because musicians have the music in their blood, and want to make it anyway even though the bloodsuckers reap the profits.

Please give us your reliable source that the labels pay a significant percentage of the royalties to the artists.

Thought this might interest you: http://www.salon.com/2012/07/09/in_defense_of_single_people/

The guy who wrote the book that article is based on is a professor of English at the University of Toronto.

As an English professor for 26 years, I can ask with confidence, what the fuck does an English professor know about anything, especially about what makes for successful human relationships?

But it is a pretty interesting article, in all seriousness. Here's the deal: married people like me like to defend the importance of marriage to society. Otherwise, I'd have to face the fact that I've only had sex with one woman for the past 23 years and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.

Pair bonding is good for society, regardless of the respective genders of the couple. It's healthy that society promotes it.

Thought this might interest you: http://www.salon.com/2012/07/09/in_defense_of_single_people/

Rand Paul != Ron Paul.

More importantly, Rand Paul !== Ron Paul.

Indeed. Rand is a douche, much more likely to go along with the bigot faction of the republican party. Ron not so much.

Twelve seconds in google produced these: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-12006421
http://articles.cnn.com/2009-08-18/world/venezuela.radio_1_venezuelan-president-hugo-chavez-venezuelan-law-press-freedom?_s=PM:WORLD
http://www.salon.com/2012/06/02/venezuela_prohibits_sales_of_guns_ammunition/

Of those twelve seconds, I spent three picking out sources from the "liberal media". Just for you.

If you think the government will just ignore the law and do whatever it wants anyway, then any discussion of the law is moot.

That's very much what the Bush administration did. See http://www.salon.com/2010/04/01/us_warrantless_wiretaps/. The government clearly is of the opinion that it should be considered above the law when going about its business, heeding the law only as long as it is convenient to do so.

Not wrong, seven different studies support my statement.

Had Fox simply fought the claim that they were lying, then they would have implicitly accepted the idea that the government gets to decide what is and is not "truth" and thereby would have ceded the government's right do censor anything it considers "untrue".

We crossed that bridge a long time ago when we carved out exemptions for "shouting fire in a crowded theater", libel and slander, lying to federal agents, and fraud. Each of those is only an offense if the statements are untrue.

Those events are historical facts, all of which I've lived through.

You mean the historical revisionism you pulled out of your ass. For starters, no one has every proven that Iran was involved in the Marine barracks bombing. But even if they were, if you want to call attacking a hostile military force occupying another country "terrorism", then you need to prosecute all kinds of former Reagan officials for supplying the Mujahedin with weapons to use against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Because that would also be "terrorism".

What's good for the Goose is good for the Gander.

The disposition of the Shah and the institution of the UK's choice was the UK's matter, not the US. And the prick got what he deserved for signing up with Hitler at the start of WWII. You do know that Hitler named Iran, getting them to drop Persia? Right you ignorant kid? Take the dirt out of your ears, STFU, and open your eyes. Try to learn.

Try to take your own advice, if you manage to extract your head from your jingoistic, hypocritical ass. You cannot throw stones at Iran arresting tourists when the U.S. has had people kidnapped and tortured far from our own borders.

And if Iran had overthrown the U.S. government, they would have thanked their lucky stars if our reprisal was limited to seizing the personnel in the Iranian embassy used as a part of the coup. Stick that in your exceptionalism pipe and smoke it.

We are the baddies.

A story in the Washington Post is hardly an admission by the country

It is in the age of "Officials say" journalism. And the president using one side of his mouth to say that the very existence of his drone war is classified information, while using the other side of his mouth to brag about it's supposed effectiveness.

A story in the Washington Post is hardly an admission by the country

It is in the age of "Officials say" journalism. And the president using one side of his mouth to say that the very existence of his drone war is classified information, while using the other side of his mouth to brag about it's supposed effectiveness.

Fire Departments - Private Fire Departments http://www.salon.com/2010/10/04/libertarian_fire_department/

LOL--you truly are an idiot. What happens if you are truly free and you decide to pay the fire department? They try to put out the fire. What happens if you are truly free and you decide to NOT contract with the fire department? Well--in most cases they let your house burn down. You had the choice and chose to have them let it burn. (I haven't heard of a single private fire department refusing to fight a fire when LIVES were on the line--i.e. someone trapped inside.)

Now imaging you are in the average community today. What happens if you decide to not pay the fire department? Well--that means you aren't paying your taxes...which means eventually the IRS shows up with guns and forces you out of your home or shoots you. So fuck you. And if you do pay the fire department, the unionized firefighters will sit back on couches while raking in much more than the average worker in your community while reminding you how heroic they are and to not forget 9/11. I'll take the private system any day.

Only governments have the right to use guns

That used to be the case but no longer is.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0910-07.htm

"Privatization" is the primary agenda of the corporate sponsored Tea Party and related movements. The goals are to dismantle the government offices and subcontract those roles to private corporations (on the presumption that government-run organizations are inherently inefficient and waste taxpayer dollars). Multi-national conglomerates already "own" the US Congress through aggressive lobbying, kickbacks for campaign funding, and the promise of highly compensated future roles as consultants, senior executives, or board members for today's politicians, judges, and appointed officials. The mega-corporations are to US government what the cocaine and heroine cartels are to the Mexican government.

To give you an idea, here's a quick summary of the transitions sought or already begun:
WAS - NOW
Regulatory Agencies - Self-regulation

Public Utilities - Same utilities but customers now have to buy through specially qualified "distributors" of the same utility rather than direct

Public Courts - Private Arbitration (many judges today are issuing one-sided pro-business decisions in the hope of landing a better paid position as a private arbitrator at one of the major firms. Arbitration proceedings do not have to follow state or federal rules of procedure, appeals are limited, legal precedant does not apply, there is never any jury of peers, and rulings do not even need to abide by the US Constitution)

Collections Agencies - Sheriffs and Judges (ok, this is a reversal, but not a good one, and one that serves corporate interests and re-institutes debtor's prisons: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/jailed-for--280--the-return-of-debtors--prisons.html )

Corrections Facilities - Private Prisons (and much incentive to fill them regardless of guilt or innocence: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal )

CIA - Private contractors (including foreign nationals. No oath of service or duty to uphold the Constitution. Can violate US and international law while not accountable to anyone outside of their employment contract)

US Armed Forces - See above
State Law Enforcement - See above

Public Schools - Vouchers for Private Schools (non-sectarian schools have limited capacity. In a "free market" your kids would likely end up in a fundamentalist religious school). In time the vouchers would go away as they are not a product of the "free market" and make the system unworkable.

Fire Departments - Private Fire Departments http://www.salon.com/2010/10/04/libertarian_fire_department/

The "benefits" of privatization have been debunked for most roles of government http://umaine.edu/ble/files/2011/01/Privatization-BP-08.pdf
But privatization is still pushed as a cure-all in election campaign ads. I could go on, but as I show above, "privatization" eventually eliminates all of your Constitutional rights and protections. Once the corporations OWN the government AND the guns, who is going to help you? I'd rather not give corporations any more rights than they already have, especially since they are now considered "people" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission.

This article talks about for-profit Corinthian Colleges soaking up federal dollars while many of their students drop out and default. Pretty interesting when considering whether the federal dollars are really helping students.

Sure they are http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/325402#ixzz1vooIlTFd
The Vanguard Shadowhawk will give the Montgomery County Sherriff's Department
"unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is equipped .... and capable of firing rubber bullets, ejecting tear gas canisters and launching taser projectiles."
If you want you can get some nice grenade lunchers and 12-gauge shotguns upgrades too....
http://www.salon.com/2012/04/24/drones_for_urban_warfare/
Don't worry its just for intelligence, search, reconnaissance ... just like all the new kit was only to be used in Iraq too...
Welcome to the domestic (U.S.) battlefront.

Drones, Keeping America Safe.... NOT!

Excuse me, sir, but I have a question. Does the word "nigger" offend you?

Drones, Keeping America Safe.... NOT!

it's time to invest in prison stock!

Indeed...

Does anyone here really have anything against poledancers? http://www.salon.com/writer/tracy_clark_flory/

You are confused.

You are spinning and rationalizing. And it's beneath you.

The US didn't ignore the ABM treaty, it withdrew from it as was allowed under the treaty.

Pedantry over "ignored" is noted, and met with...pretty much every treaty ever signed with any of the native tribes.

Bush and Obama aren't ignoring the Geneva conventions - Al Qaeda is not entitled to their protections due to fighting in an unlawful manner

The sheer, soulless, unmitigated arrogance in bombing weddings, rescuers trying to help the wounded and then finally bombing the funerals for the dead, and then having the gall to whine about "fighting in an unlawful manner"? Fuck that neocon bullshit. Either Al Queda operatives are soldiers and captured ones should be treated as P.O.W.s, or they are suspected criminals. Either classification carries rights.

There is NO third category that allows you to kidnap people and torture them, or simply assassinate them along with any poor bastards that happen to be standing nearby.

but captured Al Qaeda members are still being treated in a humane fashion at Guantanamo Bay prison camp

We've held people there for nearly 10 years, many of which we knew were innocent, some of which were even captured as minors. The president's of both parties have insisted they have no rights, with the current one even insisting he has 'post acquittal detention' powers. As in: Obama will keep them imprisoned, even if ordered released by a court of law.

A broad coalition of nations is dealing with Iran and its unacceptable behavior, but if it makes you happier - Iran has been threatening to attack the US, Europe, Israel, and various Arab nations for some time, not to mention making veiled threats of genocide, and engaging in an active campaign of terrorism and assassination around the world.

Every single word in those two sentences was a total lie. It's been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation - compared to dozens of first strikes and wars of choice for both Israel and the U.S. since WWII alone. Iran's "threats" have been retaliatory in nature, as in "we will strike back if we are attacked". Well, no shit, Sherlock. The "genocide" shit is another lie based on a willful mistranslation by the press. The 'torture and assassination around the world' shit is pure projection, as it's the U.S. doing that shit with CIA blacksites and drones.

The Secretary of Defense has clearly stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. But even if they did, they have every reason to want such weapons as a deterrent to Israel and their arsenal of 200+ nuclear warheads. The United States has stated that it will treat 'cyberattacks' as an act of war - guess what Stuxnet under U.S. rules? And of course it's actually the United States in violation of the U.N. charter with it's multiple belligerent threats towards Israel.

So, you want to walk back that hairball of propaganda and tell us just who is threatening who here?

You are confused.

You are spinning and rationalizing. And it's beneath you.

The US didn't ignore the ABM treaty, it withdrew from it as was allowed under the treaty.

Pedantry over "ignored" is noted, and met with...pretty much every treaty ever signed with any of the native tribes.

Bush and Obama aren't ignoring the Geneva conventions - Al Qaeda is not entitled to their protections due to fighting in an unlawful manner

The sheer, soulless, unmitigated arrogance in bombing weddings, rescuers trying to help the wounded and then finally bombing the funerals for the dead, and then having the gall to whine about "fighting in an unlawful manner"? Fuck that neocon bullshit. Either Al Queda operatives are soldiers and captured ones should be treated as P.O.W.s, or they are suspected criminals. Either classification carries rights.

There is NO third category that allows you to kidnap people and torture them, or simply assassinate them along with any poor bastards that happen to be standing nearby.

but captured Al Qaeda members are still being treated in a humane fashion at Guantanamo Bay prison camp

We've held people there for nearly 10 years, many of which we knew were innocent, some of which were even captured as minors. The president's of both parties have insisted they have no rights, with the current one even insisting he has 'post acquittal detention' powers. As in: Obama will keep them imprisoned, even if ordered released by a court of law.

A broad coalition of nations is dealing with Iran and its unacceptable behavior, but if it makes you happier - Iran has been threatening to attack the US, Europe, Israel, and various Arab nations for some time, not to mention making veiled threats of genocide, and engaging in an active campaign of terrorism and assassination around the world.

Every single word in those two sentences was a total lie. It's been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation - compared to dozens of first strikes and wars of choice for both Israel and the U.S. since WWII alone. Iran's "threats" have been retaliatory in nature, as in "we will strike back if we are attacked". Well, no shit, Sherlock. The "genocide" shit is another lie based on a willful mistranslation by the press. The 'torture and assassination around the world' shit is pure projection, as it's the U.S. doing that shit with CIA blacksites and drones.

The Secretary of Defense has clearly stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. But even if they did, they have every reason to want such weapons as a deterrent to Israel and their arsenal of 200+ nuclear warheads. The United States has stated that it will treat 'cyberattacks' as an act of war - guess what Stuxnet under U.S. rules? And of course it's actually the United States in violation of the U.N. charter with it's multiple belligerent threats towards Israel.

So, you want to walk back that hairball of propaganda and tell us just who is threatening who here?

i don't really understand an analysis of the usa's lack of moral loftiness when we are dealing with organizations within pakistan whose own methods make the usa's drones and cyberwarfare look like jaywalking. the goal is to defeat these organizations, not look like paragon of moral virtue

Are those organizations within Pakistan funded by American taxpayers? Are those organizations within Pakistan running drone wars on American citizens on American soil? Are you really sure you want to throw rocks here after Bush/Obama torture, assassinations, and holding innocent people in prison without trials?

Greenwald:

U.S. v. Pakistan on transparency and accountability
A Pakistani Supreme Court ruling does something unthinkable in the US: compels disclosure of detainee abuse

A federal appeals panel on Monday turned away efforts by a U.S. citizen who was detained for nearly four years as an "enemy combatant." Jose Padillaâ(TM)s efforts to reinstate a lawsuit against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other government officials were rejected by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond.

vs

Seven men detained by Pakistan's spy agency, the ISI, appeared in court Monday in a landmark case that places one of the nation's most powerful institutions under the scrutiny of its highest court..

Pakistan's Supreme Court ordered the government to give each detainee a medical exam and report the results in four days. The court also ordered the spy agency to produce all documents related to the detention of the men by the first week of March. . . .

There's barely any collateral damage now that Obama has defined "militant" as being "military age male".

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/29/militants_media_propaganda/

A few infants here and there don't really bother democrats.

Which is already happening in the US.

MIC being the military-industrial complex, or as I like to call it, the military-industrial-congressional-contractor-prison-surveillance complex. Young people, go get computer science degrees with a specialization in security, so you can either work for the Pentagon or work for contractors working for the Pentagon.

Greenwald:

The U.S. is the leading developer and perpetrator of cyberwarfare, not the leading target. The New York Times this morning has a long excerpt from a new book by its hawkish national security reporter David Sanger â" the book is entitled âoeConfront and Conceal: Obamaâ(TM)s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Powerâ â" which reveals that President Obama personally oversaw the development, and ordered the deployment, of the worldâ(TM)s most sophisticated computer virus, unleashed (in cooperation with Israel) on Iranâ(TM)s nuclear enrichment facility.

Isnâ(TM)t it amazing how the U.S. is constantly the worldâ(TM)s first nation to use new, highly destructive weapons â" at the same time that it bombs, invades, and kills more than any other country by far â" and yet it still somehow gets its media to tell its citizenry that it is Americaâ(TM)s Enemies who are the aggressors and the U.S. is simply a nation of peace seeking to defend itself.

Needless to say, if any cyber-attack is directed at the U.S. â" rather than by the U.S. â" it will be instantly depicted as an act of unparalleled aggression and evil: Terrorism. Just last year, the Pentagon decreed that any cyberattack on the U.S. would be deemed âoean act of war.â

An awful lot of Americans are paying a lot and getting very little out of college right now... especially at for-profit universities. Every taxpayer has an interest in this subject because of federal student loans.

Major reform is going to be necessary because the college debt bubble is going to pop sooner rather than later. I applaud this man's effort to bring some fiscal sanity to the world of higher education.

Some quotes from that Salon article. Highly recommended reading:

"Arbitration is billed as a cheap, quick and private way to resolve civil disputes. The practice gained momentum in the 1980s, when judges, bowing to pressure to alleviate overcrowded courtrooms, began encouraging litigants to resolve their disputes voluntarily. Since then, arbitration has snowballed into an unlicensed industry that’s conservatively estimated at $350 million in annual sales, according to a spokeswoman at the nonprofit American Arbitration Association.

“We hear a lot of complaints about these cases,” said Gerald Uelman, professor of law at the University of Santa Clara. The for-profit arbitration business is booming, especially in California, he added. “It’s upsetting to the extent that it’s a resource used by institutional litigants.”

One big reason for the boom is money. Public judges, who earn about $150,000 a year in the public courts, often retire early to become, in effect, rent-a-judges. By doing so they can earn between $100 and $500 an hour — easily doubling or tripling their salaries. Arbitration firms often have powerful attorneys or corporations as steady clients. They pay monthly retainer fees or get volume discounts. As a result, some for-profit justice firms have a vested interest in keeping their clients happy if they want the return business, which has been the topic of seminars sponsored by the California Judges Association.

The rules that apply in open court often aren’t followed in private court. No laws prevent the hired judges from accepting gifts from attorneys. Another criticism is that the arbitrators and their clients and attorneys often work together regularly. “The same judges are often employed by one side or the other,” said Uelman. As it turned out, Girardi had ties to at least three of the private judges in the PG&E case: Jack Tenner, John Trotter and Jack Goertzen. Had this occurred in public court, judicial rules would have forced the judges to recuse themselves from the case due to a conflict of interest. But no such ethical standards bind participants in private arbitation."

http://www.salon.com/2000/04/14/sharp/

> whats wrong with the real small claims court?


Real small claims court doesn't spend much time on investigating claims. To clear cases quickly the judge quickly weighs up sides and makes a snap decision. Under the adversarial system of justice its not about finding the truth, but about who deciding presents the best arguments. That's easier for the judge, but it shouldn't be confused with justice. In some jurisdictions you can't appeal or even be told the reasons. The judge makes a mistake (they are human so it happens) you won't even know.

Small claims court weren't created because they are better than the bigger courts, but as a way of offering the little people cheaper although less reliable justice. The bigger courts are worse though since they are extremely expensive charging rates that cannot be justified. Whoever has the most money to fund the most appeals and buy the better lawyers wins.

Arbitration is in theory a great idea, but a big problem is that the arbitration system is taken over by judges and lawyers charging the same rates. It's sold as a cheaper alternative, but it has many traps. One problem is a big company who nominates an arbitration company (yes, they are companies) will pick one that gives them favorable results or they won't get repeat business. I loved Erin Brockovich the movie, but the arbitration system they used has been severely critcized by some of their clients. If you loved the movie then don't read this:

http://www.salon.com/2000/04/14/sharp/
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=8169252&page=1#.T875jlK6SSo
http://www.givemebackmyrights.com/bma-faq.htm
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-05-21/consumers-may-see-new-limits-on-mandatory-arbitration
http://www.homeloanbasics.com/articles/FirstTimeHomeBuyers/MandatoryArbitrationClausesStripHomebuyersofSuitableRecourse
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x301912
http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/website-aims-to-boost-50m-arbitration-industry-2351246.html

The justice system badly needs reform, but you have many politicians and lawyers doing very well out of the current system who won't give it up.

[Lybian war] in a month, for under a billion dollars

Sounds like you are quoting the figures that were given before the war and didn't bother to check if that's how things actually played out. The war in Lybia lasted from March 31 to October 31, so it was more like 7 months. And wikipedia says 1.3 Billion spent just by the US. And now that Gaddafi is dead, everything is great there right? Not quite. There is still plenty of murder, torture, rape, etc. going on, probably worse that what was occurring under Gaddafi.

As far at the Republican criticisms being inconsistent, I won't argue with you there, but Obama has been at least as inconsistent as them on this issue given that during his candidacy he specifically said the president does not have the power to do what he did in Libya.

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/31/what_gets_declassified/singleton/

That would surely require a constitutional amendment.

Hardly. It would just require our silent acquiescence.

Like how Obama has normalized Bush's radical policies of due process free detention, and has gone a step further with his policy of due process free execution. I mean, if your willing to let the executive branch on its own and in secret be the "due process" in the phrase "no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law," then there is absolutely nothing the president can't do because executing American citizens without trial is as big as it gets.

Obama has been the worst thing to happen to freedom and liberty ever -- at least when GWB was doing the things Obama does, Democrats pretended to care and push back. Now they just silently acquiesce, or worse, actively support the constitutional destruction they once opposed (for instance Marty Lederman.

As a liberal, I hate to say it, but we'd be better off with a freak like Santorum as president, who basically promised war with Iran, because then perhaps the Democrats would go back to pretending to care about peace and freedom, and fight back against all this crap. With Obama in the office for another four years though, the damage to civil liberties and freedom will be immense because Democrats will just sit on their hands and let it continue to happen.

The US is kinda bad, eh? Then why are its citizens petitioning for the creation of a (Please) Do Not Kill (Me) list?

The US is kinda bad, eh? Then why are its citizens petitioning for the creation of a (Please) Do Not Kill (Me) list?

Yeah, and they'll stop these with drone attacks. Welcome to the age of corporate Stalinism

The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel prepared a lengthy memo justifying that extraordinary step, asserting that while the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of due process applied, it could be satisfied by internal deliberations in the executive branch.

Attorney General Eric Holder then publicly claimed: "'Due process' and 'judicial process' are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security. The Constitution guarantees due process, not judicial process."

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/30/how_extremism_is_normalized/singleton/

Ah, this ties into this article someone posted here earlier, which describes how increasing levels of education make conservatives less likely to believe in factual positions that contradict their world-view. Something which dominates the discussion here in any number of stories that involve economics, psychology, climatology or morality. As much as I enjoy reading the debates these stories engender, it's mostly in a car-crash fashion; the increasingly labyrinthian arguments really do defy any kind of rational explaination.

I am reminded of this Salon article talking about how social conservatives basically assign a lot of emotion and identity to their belief. They think it is rude if others challenge their beliefs, yet they desire to push their beliefs on everyone else. http://www.salon.com/2012/02/24/the_ugly_delusions_of_the_educated_conservative/

Sadly, that attitude is not limited to Southern Baptist creationists, but actually tends to be shared with those accepting of mainstream science as well; In fact, I would go so far as to say that emotional arguments make up the vast majority of opinions from all sides in most politicized debates. One has to go no further than this page to see that "liberal"* thinkers are just as guilty of dickishly writing off ideals that counter their beliefs as others, as if what they believe is unquestionable fact. If you really pay attention, you'll notice that a person doesn't necessarily have to support the idea of creationism to be subjected to verbal abuse; merely offering any opinion that counters the accepted mainstream ideology is enough to be written off as a crackpot, tin-foil hatted looney who has no regard for scientific evidence.

The irony, of course, is that the people who make such assertions normally do so without regard to the fact there's no scientific evidence to the contrary: For example, I noticed an earlier comment critical of people who believe in the "hollow Earth" theory. I assume this though process comes from the accepted Terran model of crust/mantle/core being unquestionable in its reality. While I personally have never heard of anyone digging a hole and finding the planet hollowed out, I have also never heard of anyone digging a hole and validating the crust/mantle/core model. So, being the ultimate skeptic that I am,. I refuse to write off either theory, rather tagging them as "not enough evidence for a conclusion." This mentality of requiring actual evidence as opposed to assumed evidence tends to make me an unpopular fellow with both camps, as it seems everyone wants everyone else to accept their word as gospel without question.

To me, that's the real problem - most people seem unable or unwilling to accept that their personal philosophy may be incorrect, and that the truth is likely somewhere in between. These sort of idiotic, emotion-fueled 'debates' will continue until opposing camps learn to either agree to disagree and move on, or work together to form a general consensus that is acceptable to most.

I'm guessing the time-frame on that is close to 'never.'

* - Surely I can't be the only one fed up with these stupid "conservative" v "liberal" labels. First off, who the hell decided to change the meaning of those terms to indicate political beliefs? And where does this idea that a person has to be one or the other come from? C'mon, everyone, as a species we're pretty damn smart animals, how about we use these wonderfully complex minds we were gifted with to have intelligent, well-reasoned debate, instead of pasting bullshit labels on one another so we can pretend that person's opinion doesn't count?

Growing up very religious in a small town, I really thought that I knew what evolution was, and why it was wrong. It seemed so silly to me that 'scientists' could believe in this conjecture,er 'theory' full of 'missing links'. Clearly it was a conspiracy by godless atheists (where I now seem to comfortably fit in) to drown out the 'Truth'.

Then at age 18 I got the internet and began to discover that I never, in fact, had ever been taught what Evolution really was. I had been taught a fantasy, an imaginary concoction that nobody actually believed in. As we all have seen, Creationists create a straw man simplification of evolutionary theory and then attack the straw man, rather than attacking the real thing.

So I set out with my newly acquired knowledge. Surely, I though, now that I know that we've only been taught a mistaken notion of what evolutionary theory is, I can convince some people. Boy oh boy was I ever wrong. The first responses I got was, quite literally, "how dare you accuse our religion of LYING to us. They wouldn't lie to us". And so forth. I learned a lot about logical fallacies. The straw man. The fallacious appeal to false authority (look, this 'scientist' says evolution is fake, therefore it is). The argument from ridicule ("Man was made from monkeys, what kind of nitwit believes that"). It was a fascinating and revealing time in my life, and the clear intellectual dishonesty I saw compelled me to change my life. Within a couple years I went from being a homophobic creationist to going out to queer parties, not because I was gay, but because I discovered many of my friends were queer, and hadn't told me for obvious reasons.

I am reminded of this Salon article talking about how social conservatives basically assign a lot of emotion and identity to their belief. They think it is rude if others challenge their beliefs, yet they desire to push their beliefs on everyone else. http://www.salon.com/2012/02/24/the_ugly_delusions_of_the_educated_conservative/

In the end, you cannot convince people who do not want to challenge their presuppositions and assertions. What will happen in the future, is that we will continue to move on and embrace exciting new advances, technologies, medicines that stem from biology, while those who do not understand it will simply be left behind.

Flaming aside, you can read the news right? How about the latest batch of 8, an entire family including 6 kids, in an Afghanistan airstrike:

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/27/the_authoritarian_mind_2/singleton/

The LA Times identified the victims as "Mohammed Shafi, his wife and his six children," and cited the statements from the spokesman for the Paktia governor's office that "there is no evidence that Shafi was a Taliban insurgent or linked with Al Qaeda." The Afghan spokesman blamed the incident on the refusal of NATO to coordinate strikes with Afghan forces to ensure civilians are not targeted ("If they had shared this with us, this wouldnâ(TM)t have happened").

Amazon wasn't as much dictating more reasonable prices (for your definition of "reasonable") as "selling at below cost" to build a dominant market position.

Besides, one vendor being able to dictate prices in the market is hardly seen as a healthy market.

They weren't selling below cost to build a dominant market position. They were making a profit via arbitrage, not book sales in and of themselves. It is like saying Google is selling their search service at "below cost", since it is free. Essentially, Amazon is giving you a free service at processing orders with the publisher and processing your credit card in exchange for being able to keep your money for a month before they pay the publisher. Amazon's business model has more in common with American Express Travelers Cheques than it does with Walmart.

Amazon wasn't as much dictating more reasonable prices (for your definition of "reasonable") as "selling at below cost" to build a dominant market position.

Besides, one vendor being able to dictate prices in the market is hardly seen as a healthy market.

Artificial Stupidity
http://www.salon.com/2003/02/26/loebner_part_one/

Long, funny, and informative article on the history of the Loebner prize.