Slashdot Mirror

"Stasi files row as Britain refuses to return documents to Germany" (29 Dec 2011) ".. already encompass 69 miles (111km) of files .." https://www.theguardian.com/wo... Miles of files is often used.

It's not a truly international measure until compared to the size of Belgium.

"Stasi files row as Britain refuses to return documents to Germany" (29 Dec 2011)
".. already encompass 69 miles (111km) of files .."
https://www.theguardian.com/wo...
Miles of files is often used.

Recent studies have criticized earlier studies, and concluded that neonicotinoids were NOT significantly harming honeybees, except when in conjunction with other environmental stressors and varroa mites mites in particular (and no, global warming was not one of them).

O RLY?

Won't happen. The Chinese now control the South China Sea which means the US will want to keep its options available.

As long as there is other matching evidence I am more agreeable with the testing, but if the only evidence is DNA match that is just not enough.

While the chances of false positives are low, reality is just too following case of a person being arrested for looking like and having the same first name of a criminal..

https://nypost.com/2017/06/12/...

or this one...

https://www.theguardian.com/us...

there are 8 billion people on the planet and a lot of people share a lot of similar genetic information name and other identifying information. It is also shocking how much law enforcement is happy to put an innocent person in jail because at least they have someone to arrest just so they can call it a case closed.

There is a reason we need to make Law enforcement jump through hoops and get warrants to exercise power. They are humans like the criminals they go after. An open database of DNA they can use to scan people with is going to end badly for a lot of people.

Just becoming a suspect in a case like this will leave an impact and possibly wreck their life! It has happened all too often!

https://www.theguardian.com/co...

There is growing concern over stuff like this. DNA tests often only test a small subset of information which means that false positives are possible and when you have a whole database to match against the greater that chance of a false positive happening.

We already know that law enforcement is sloppy, lazy, and corrupt. Until accuracy and better controls on this data have been instituted then this is going to result in more innocent people getting fucked over while the real criminals get of Scott free with society ignorantly believe it has its man.

And what exactly has that to do with handing out money?
If I get $1000 via work, it has the exact same value as if I get it as gift or UBI.
If I go into a shop no one knows how I got the money.

Our money is fiat money, it is essentially a note for future production; when you produce a $1,000.00 worth of production, the economy promises you a $1,000.00 of production in the future, i. e. your asset of money is balanced by the ecomony's liability of future production. When money is given without production, the only way the economy balances is by reducing the value of money to equal the value of production.

If you want a concrete example of this Venezuela is it.
.

Well, the last time we had an earth-shaking announcement about a comet, the story wasn't the comet. This article buries the lede and doesn't address the real story here: what kind of shirt was the spokesman wearing when he made the announcement? Because we know, from direct empirical observation, that that information is more important than humanity literally landing on a comet.

The spokesman's description of the difficulty of the Rosetta mission? "She's sexy, but I never said she was easy." The reaction was immediate:

This is a photo of Matt Taylor. He was watched by millions as he landed his robot on a comet, while wearing an exploitative sexualized shirt.

His shirt says to girls watching from their elementary classrooms: Science is not for you. You shouldnâ(TM)t be an engineer sending robots into space.

His shirt says to women in STEM: I have no respect for you as a professional. When I look at you, I see a sex object, and not a colleague.

"His shirt says to women in STEM: I have no respect for you as a professional. When I look at you, I see a sex object."The Bad Astronomy blog said: If you think this is just a bunch of prudes, you're wrong. It's not about the prurience. It's about the atmosphere of denigration.

Speaking for the highly respected The Atlantic, journalist Rose Eveleth brilliantly captured what that shirt represents in a community that continues to struggle, if not outright fail, to respect women: No no women are toooootally welcome in our community, just ask the dude in this shirt.

The spokesman broke down in tears the next day and apologized. He said, "I made a big mistake and I offended many people and I am very sorry about this."

If you can force a rocket scientist, celebrating the accomplishment of a lifetime, to cry and grovel and beg forgiveness on international TV for wearing a shirt, you are not unempowered.

The BBC sent about 450 people for a month long 5* stay in Brazil during the Olympics, despite not being the broadcaster cover the events.

Uncited claims by an anonymous poster. Hhhm... what are the chances its all bullshit? 100%

The number of accredited staff is down on the 765 who covered the 2012 Games, and slightly fewer than the 493 who flew to China for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Alongside its coverage on TV and radio and an expanded digital offering through its interactive red button service, each individual sport will be streamed online.
...
“We are planning to deliver roughly the same volume of output as London 2012 but with 455 accredited staff being sent to Brazil – around 40% below the total number of accreditations for London 2012 and 35% below Glasgow’s Commonwealth Games in 2014.
BBC staff for Rio 2016 Olympics to be 40% down on 2012 Games

If only moderators were skeptical enough to use google before up-modding lies.

So, by your theory, more than 50% of the US-govt-sponsored studies during the Bush administration should have been anti-climate-change.

Not true at all. You pretend to misunderstand the very concept of the "conflict of interest". Whoever is in charge of an institution, for its employees to conclude, that their work is pointless and overvalued is to issue themselves a pink slip. Worse, it also means, their entire choice of profession is (almost) meaningless. Few people are capable of it — and climate scientists aren't any better at it, than anyone else. Hence the frantic resistance...

Meanwhile, consider this — none of the theories you are alluding to would be acceptable for American financial institutions.

The folks who used to work for Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers would like to laugh (and cry) at this obviously false statement.

The regulations I'm referring to were introduced after those names have collapsed. "Obviously false" my tail.

The problem is that the best way to falsify is to run a different experiment with different subjects

Which is just another way for you to admit, it is not, in fact, falsifiable. You've accepted — and confirmed — this fact, you are just trying to explain why. And the "why" is irrelevant... The few falsifiable statements that have been made, have already been falsified — indeed, I offered a link to one, more are easily available. I've requested citations to the counter-examples, which you — despite replying twice already — have been unable to provide. I will not reply again, until I see the list of link-pairs I described above...

But that doesn't make them unscientific.

The person starting this thread claimed, "climate science" is equally scientific to the perfectly falsifiable field of medicine — and denounced everyone, who accepts medical treatments like vaccines while rejecting climate scientists' recommendations, as hypocritical. That statement was bullshit, because medical researchers actually do follow scientific method. Climate researchers do not — whether it is due to some fault of theirs, or the very nature of their domain, is irrelevant.

Whether this makes them completely unscientific or just less scientific, is a matter of semantics — but it certainly makes their conclusions less reliable than those of other disciplines (such as medicine). Hence, rejecting or questioning them is not at all "anti-science".

The "raw data" showed a higher temperature rise, due to the effects of increased industrialization near recording stations, so they had to "massage" it to remove that flaw

Thank you for confirming my statement — that massaging did take place. I'm not saying, it was not necessary — I was just pointing out, that it was done by programs written by fallible humans, who had the same conflict of interest I keep bringing up. They had all the incentive to "hide the decline" — such as by subtly altering the software or tweaking the calibration constants in it until the resulting figures confirmed, what they (or their bosses) wanted to see.

They also attempted to hide the raw data, and even destroyed some of it. Had scientists working for "Big Tobacco" or "Big Oil" been caught at any of such, their credibility would've been destroyed forever — why you'd give the "Big Government" scientists a pass, escapes me.

Un

I think that you maybe missed the substantial reform of libel law that happened in the wake of the Simon Singh case (see http://www.libelreform.org/ and https://www.theguardian.com/la...).

The UK still has less of a legal emphasis on protecting free speech than the US does and that definitely tips things more in favour of the accuser than the accused (relative to the US) but the libel reform bill addressed that balance somewhat and brought libel cases into alignment with other UK law in forcing an innocent-until-proven-guilty assumption.

In short - things are pretty much closer to an even balance between accuser and accused now with more protections for uneven fights between individuals and corporate entities and special protections for scientific publications.

See here. It's a full 180 on his previous position. A big part of this is the evangelical leaders stick with him no matter what. They in turn bring their followers with them.

The "normal" candidates (who would have done all the same policies as Trump but been nice about it) would have stayed in and fought if they thought they had a chance. They dropped out because Trump was destroying them. And the reason why is because those economic reasons I mentioned.

The #nevertrump crowd didn't stay home, so much for #nevertrump. At the end of the day the Republican party fell in line with Trump and Trump fell in line with Goldman Sachs. The party's been had. If you voted Trump or supported him you've been had. He's not the populist you wanted him to be. The sooner you acknowledge that the sooner we can start voting these bums out.

Or not. They're the American Royalty. Easier said than done getting rid of your kings and queens.

Mind you, that war did not have the vast government-paid research institutions attached to it, who'd fear for their survival. Unlike the climate quacks.

You make this point a few times. So this should be very easy to prove. The W-Bush administration did not believe in climate change, and put people in charge of the "vast government-paid research institutions" who did not believe. Same with the Trump administration. The Obama administration was the opposite.

So, by your theory, more than 50% of the US-govt-sponsored studies during the Bush administration should have been anti-climate-change. If that is true, then you are right and I will apologize. If that is not true, then you are wrong.

Meanwhile, consider this — none of the theories you are alluding to would be acceptable for American financial institutions.

The folks who used to work for Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers would like to laugh (and cry) at this obviously false statement.

What it does mean, however, is that the theory is not scientific. As in "not confirmed by scientific method".

Why are you saying the theories are not falsifiable? Of course they are. The problem is that we cannot falsify them quickly or easily. For example: The past few years have been among the hottest on record. So, any theory from 5 years ago which predicted reversion to the mean have been falsified with a very high probability. See how easy that was?

The problem is that the best way to falsify is to run a different experiment with different subjects. Only one earth, so we can't take the easy road; we have to instead compare the predictions to each new year's data. And it's even worse since the data is noisy, so distinguishing long-term trends from short-term cycles and one-year events requires a good grasp of statistics. But that doesn't make them unscientific.

And before you say "but raw data!" — don't. The raw data is imperfect, so they massage it with their own software "to bring it closer to pristine"... Ha-ha...

I suggest that you take some basic statistics courses to learn what "massaging data" means in a scientific context, since you clearly have no idea. Hint: The "raw data" showed a higher temperature rise, due to the effects of increased industrialization near recording stations, so they had to "massage" it to remove that flaw. Use that raw data and you'll see even more climate change than predicted.

Because the Romans had no "zero" and the Greeks didn't consider zero to be a number. It wasn't until the 8th century that arabic numbers (0, 1, 2, ..., 7, 8, 9) was adopted in Europe

People who disprove well-known and accepted theories are extremely famous, and often rich.

Yeah? Please, name the hero, who became famous and well-off by disproving the scientific consensus, on which the "war on fat" was waged? Mind you, that war did not have the vast government-paid research institutions attached to it, who'd fear for their survival. Unlike the climate quacks.

Also, most climate scientists are not getting rich.

They are earning a comfortable living, which will disappear for most of them, if the underlying assumptions — that Global Warming is an imminent threat facing humanity — are even questioned, much less disproven. The conflict of interest is obvious.

So if you are a "distrust people who are getting the money" kind of person, you should probably distrust those who are making record profits.

I'm well aware of the conflict of interest of any researcher paid by a company, whose product may lose demand based on the researcher's conclusions. This thread, however, is about a different group of people with their own conflict of interest. Please, don't change the subject.

Some theories do it pretty accurately, and some do it less accurately.

Funny, that you continue making these claims without offering any citations — despite an explicit request for some... Meanwhile, consider this — none of the theories you are alluding to would be acceptable for American financial institutions. Had a bank's models come up with predictions so far apart from reality, the bank wouldn't be able to buy back stocks, pay bonuses to executives, etc.

The problem isn't that the experiments are not falsifiable, it's that the time frames are too long and we don't really have dozens of planets where we can run 300-year-long double-blind tests, so any experiments on climate will be hard to falsify soon enough to be useful. That sucks, but it doesn't mean we should throw up our hands

What it does mean, however, is that the theory is not scientific. As in "not confirmed by scientific method". It does not, of course, disprove it — but it does remove the "scientific" mantle from it. And therefore, questioning it is not automatically tantamount to "rejecting science", contrary to an assertion made by aepervius above.

guess we'll pretend that the teamperatures and sea levels are not rising

Are they? The only evidence of the rise comes from the folks at NASA and NOAA (and similar government institutions in other countries), who have the above-discussed conflict of interest.

And before you say "but raw data!" — don't. The raw data is imperfect, so they massage it with their own software "to bring it closer to pristine"... Ha-ha...

To weigh them in the manner you suggest they would have to have built in associations between places and these racial groups.

I'm not sure what your programming experience is, but "AI" based on neural nets is not programming in Prolog. Times, they are a changing!

Cite proof.

There are a number of examples from the last few years that support GP's assertion. (Sorry, last couple may be partially paywalled.)

The source code can be audited.

Not in any meaningful sense it can't, no, because it's not the code that results in the decision, it's the combination of the algorithm & training. Neural nets are essentially 'black boxes', and what goes on inside them to arrive at the decision is a mystery, even to the people that programmed them.

I should point out that I generally agree with most of what you've been saying in your posts on this topic, but, as much as we might wish it otherwise, on this I think the others have a valid point. I'm sure they (the "AI's") will get better but, in the meantime, it's probably wise to maintain a certain degree of skepticism regarding the process & outcomes.

I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.

Yeah, I would, but I've used enough mod points in this thread to tip the balance towards an anonymous post. I can live without a reply anyway as, because I won't get an email informing me of one, I probably won't read it anyway... Whibla.

I've been kinda confused that everyone is so angry at Facebook, while MS has been given a free pass.

Microsoft cooperates with secret survalence programs. Google and Facebook don't...

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/t024bMoRiDPIDialGnuKPsg/edit#gid=1669966328

Impressive credentials.
Just a sampling of some of the luminaries distilled from the fields of engineering and science who participated in this unprecedented survey:

Go4IT
luckyluke
Silent Bolt
Cookie Monster
Bonkers
Juicer...

No UK or USA so no slouches like Jeremy Clarkson 55 mile Roadster range, or even Edmunds.com 120 miles range Tesla S down from a indicated 251 miles range.

... or the UK or Japan or Australia or Germany. https://www.theguardian.com/us...

"London murder rate overtakes New York as knife crime rises ... Of the 47 murders in London so far this year, 31 have been committed with knives" https://www.reuters.com/articl...

There is a hue and cry for knife control in the UK. It's the logical next step.

In case people thought you were joking ...

"London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced a crackdown on knives Sunday in response to the rising levels of violence in London, which recently surpassed New York City's homicide rate for the first time. "No excuses: there is never a reason to carry a knife," Khan tweeted. "Anyone who does will be caught, and they will feel the full force of the law.""
https://www.usatoday.com/story...

We pay for 13 years of education at no cost to the child is or the child's family... If the locals choose to reward teachers that fail to teach their students with higher paychecks, tenure, and life-long pension and healthcare rather that's on the community.

People aren't denied education, they simply mismanaged the resources provided to educate them.

Disclaimer: I'm a IT staff member in a public school district.

Given your low 4-digit UID, I assume you're an old fart. So let me spell out something for you.

There is mismanagement of resources, but placing the blame squarely at the feet of teachers is wrong.

Throwing money at education, much like anything else, doesn't guarantee success. Further, it's not like the students being educated are products at the local store. You can't just run in and pay for "education" in a can and always walk out with the exact same product every time. It's a craft, not a mass produced trinket from China. You will get imperfections and defects every time. Even more so once you realize the craft is being applied to substandard materials, IE. Children. These students are not adults with a desire to learn, they are kids who for all intensive purposes, are being held against their will, in a room by people they may not like, along with a bunch of other peers they may not like and may even be terrorized by, under the pretext of it being "good for them".

One of the biggest issues is the gamification of education. The No Child Left Behind Act is directly responsible for this mess because a bunch of politicians decided that everyone was perfect, and mandated by law perfection, with showering of money for showing constant "growth" in student proficiencies, and pink slip Russian roulette for constant "regression". Cue the pubic school districts wanting free money or to avoid losing their jobs bumping up the test scores, and being found out. All of that's before you get into the misuse of the Standardized Test Scores. Plus it's getting worse, what with our US Department of Education Secretary being a privatization of education proponent, e.g. Charter Schools which have a profit incentive to ensure low passage rates and high tuition costs as a business model, who's supporters say she should step down, and state governors like Matt Bevin (KY) who wants to use public funds to support said for profits, while at the same time cutting public education funds saying the money isn't there. Long story short, you can't gamify a person's continued employment completely based on the input from others and expect the results to be good.

And before you say: "We'll that's what they get for not teaching them." Remember that the Standardized Tests are Multiple Choice tests for the sole purpose of expedient grading. They are not a valid method to determine a person’s knowledge because it's perfectly possible to ace the test without knowing any of the answers through sheer probability / luck. Worse, it's perfectly possible for a student to hide their deficiencies on the test because of this. So even an educa

So your argument is that the program was configured to filter for those names?

You think there is a name look up table that associates given name types with given cultural backgrounds?

Is that your argument?

Do you HONESTLY think that the program was set up that way. Because I don't believe you honestly think that. I think you're just making up implausible garbage to save a stillborn argument.

The only thing anyone has ever actually proved was this thing from Xerox:
https://www.theguardian.com/sc...
""But the most problematic correlation had to do with geography. Job applicants who lived farther from the job were more likely to churn. This makes sense: long commutes are a pain. But Xerox managers noticed another correlation. Many of the people suffering those long commutes were coming from poor neighbourhoods. So Xerox, to its credit, removed that highly correlated churn data from its model. The company sacrificed a bit of efficiency for fairness.""

Note this was not the result of racism, was not designed to be racist, and only affected "poor neighborhoods" in that the commute was longer.

Any actual evidence of this racism?

I suspect not. We're increasingly a post-evidence society at this point. Just go with your dogmatic belief and then cling to it in the face of all empirical contradiction and absent any evidence.

Such progress you people have made over your old religious past. Truly pathetic.

And if you want to rebut that... find some evidence. Absent that... its sustained.

What people really need to do is start living on less. Tiny houses and apartments, and cutting back on monthly expenses.

You first.

... or the UK or Japan or Australia or Germany. https://www.theguardian.com/us...

"London murder rate overtakes New York as knife crime rises ... Of the 47 murders in London so far this year, 31 have been committed with knives"
https://www.reuters.com/articl...

... or the UK or Japan or Australia or Germany. https://www.theguardian.com/us...

It was reported last year and recently that national Buddhists use Facebook as a channel to post things that help to incite violence towards minority Muslims called the Rohingya in Burma. A monk called Wirathu was banned, by the government, from public preaching, and that included Facebook.

More information:
A War of Words Puts Facebook at the Center of Myanmar’s Rohingya Crisis
Rohingya crisis: How we got here
U.N. Fact Finders Say Facebook Played a 'Determining' Role in Violence Against the Rohingya
Myanmar: UN blames Facebook for spreading hatred of Rohingya
Is Facebook playing a part in the Rohingya genocide?
The Facebook official who oversees the news feed says his team loses sleep over the site's alleged role in violence in Myanmar

Martin Shkreli got off scot-free in my book. These people should be hanged for all the deaths they cause to people who can't afford their drugs.

Big Pharma is JUST LIKE big insurance, folks. They write the laws in their own favor.

What's the worth of living in a place where you can die of exposure (or get eaten by a moose*/bear/wolf)? Here I just stay out of the ocean and I'm safe from sharks. I stay out of rivers if they are north of the tropic and I'm safe from crocodiles. Kangaroos or emus may kill me but at least they won't eat me!

Ah yes, Australia. Well known for its completely safe wild life and environment. A place so popular to many of the early settlers only got to move there after fighting a court case.

except when they directly cause harm or injury, like flying into terrain?
or maybe when they run over someone?

And yet,
States consider bringing prescription drugs from Canada to US as costs soar

Sovaldi [a hepatitis C drug], is a good example of how prices can vary between countries. In the US, a course of Sovaldi lasts 12 weeks and costs $90,000 US retail.

American insurers typically negotiate a discount of 41%, according to a Bloomberg News analysis. That puts the cost of the drug at $17,700 a month in the US.

But in the United Kingdom, that drug costs $16,770 a month, and in Canada $14,493.

For an even more dramatic example, consider Gleevec, a leukemia drug. It costs $10,122 in the US, $2,645 in the UK, and $2,420 in Canada.

“Our Medicaid drug prices, particularly for specialty drugs, are way over the top,” said Lyons. “So, we’re trying to identify those drugs where the cost has escalated in the past few years, or the payment per dose is very high as compared with Canada.”

...

Americans pay on average three times more than British people for top-selling prescription drugs.

How many people have to pay the retail price?

Average foreign-to-Canadian price ratio for patented drugs as of 2016

It looks like the drug companies charge what they like because the market in the US is fixed.
Are Canadian Pharmacies the Solution to America's High Prescription Drug Prices?

This is what’s at stake if U.S. drug prices fall — and Europeans don’t pay more

Our calculations suggest that the U.S. market accounts for as much as 78% of all global drug profits. These are the profits that drive innovation, and they are coming out of American wallets.

Why does this happen? Branded prescription drugs are 20% to 40% cheaper in Europe in large part because the national health plans there drive hard bargains. The state-run buyers can impose price caps, or even refuse to allow a drug onto a national formulary if they think it is not worth the cost.

Bargaining does occur in the free-market U.S., but not nearly in such draconian terms. Medicare was expressly forbidden from bargaining when the drug benefit was added during the George W. Bush Administration. If the Food and Drug Administration approves a drug and a physician prescribes it, Medicare will almost always cover it. Private insurers and pharmacy-benefit managers can usually negotiate down from sticker prices, but they typically don’t have the European-style ability to broadly deny access, which is the big bargaining chip.

I can shoot down your theory with two words: Donald Trump. But hey, you're probably right about the toilet.

Regarding Keillor, he claims he only patted a woman on the back but the radio station says that there were detailed allegations.

MPR said in a statement Tuesday that Keillor was accused by a woman who worked on his A Prairie Home Companion radio show of dozens of sexually inappropriate incidents over several years, including requests for sexual contact and explicit sexual communications and touching.

MPR said the woman, whom it has not identified, detailed the allegations in a 12-page letter that included excerpts of emails and written messages. MPR said as it attempted to investigate the case, Keillor and his attorney refused to grant access to his computer, emails and text messages.

https://www.theguardian.com/wo...

Since it's all been hushed up and settled out of court we will probably never know.

Meh. We've already seen this movie before. The plot always goes like this in every one of its sequels:

A French president finishes reading an old newspaper from his minitel emulator, and begins resenting out loud about how most of the world doesn't pay enough attention to France anymore. He observes his people always paying attention to and patronizing the latest technology trend coming out of America, who he wants to be better than.

"I've got it!" he mutters in French to himself, "I'll make a better one, and France will be the envy of the world!"

Several hundred million dollars later, nobody remembers that the project ever existed, a new president gets elected, and the previous president shouts from his bedroom window "You may have won this time, America, but I'll get you back by making all French people snooty to you from now on!"

The first movie in this series, called Quaero, was panned by film critics:

https://www.theguardian.com/te...

FYI: France approves 'Big Brother' surveillance powers

Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda

It's pretty old news. I guess someone arguing that they don't exist might be one. The upvoting might be as well.

So can you give me some links to the "Pentagon trolls?

Sure, here is some relevant reading:

Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda
Pentagon ramping up public relations offensive: Agency moves to bolster image in face of mounting criticism of Iraq war
U.S. Media Knew Kosovo Reports Were Propaganda
Meet The State Department Team Trying To Troll ISIS Into Oblivion
Military Plays Up Role of Zarqawi -- "The U.S. military is conducting a propaganda campaign to magnify the role of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, according to internal military documents and officers..."
Pentagon Paid for Fake âAl Qaedaâ(TM) Videos
The Government's Social Media Propaganda Machine
âoeOn the Offensiveâ: US State Dept. Gives $40M Boost to âoeTroll Farmâ Propaganda Efforts
How the American government is trying to control what you think

That should get you started.

Of course, our mass media tends not to emphasize such American skulduggery and propaganda. They'll do an initial report on the issue, but it's rarely, if ever, put into the news loop and repeated over and over and over again. Funny how that works, eh? It makes one think of Ted Turner, the founder of CNN, who once bluntly said, "There's really five companies that control 90 percent of what we read, see and hear."

If you want any more you'll have to search for it.

It was also gerrymandered up the wazoo when Democrats were in power.

Yes. Reynolds v. Sims and Baker v. Carr. Of course, those Democrats were often entirely different in politics. Such is history.

Gerrymandering simply strengthens whoever is currently more popular.

Wrong. In some cases, actually weakens those who are more popular, as shown in Wisconsin and North Carolina.

If congressional districts were assigned rationally, Democrats wouldn't do very well anyway

Yes, but that's because your definition of rational which is 100% Republican Agenda. You do realize your biases, however, are not supported in actual math that is independent of your partisan bias.

The only way Democrats could do well if the US went to strict national popular majorities, but that is utterly unacceptable and incompatible with federalism.

Or you know, actually voting. Of course, that is utterly unacceptable to the Republican agenda which relies on voter suppression.

In actual fact [people-press.org], liberals only make up about 17% of the US political spectrum and California is thoroughly unrepresentative of the country.

Actually, California is highly representative of the country, and it's only because of zealots like you that it gets demonized as some outside nemesis.

The reason Republicans are so strong is because Democrats have fallen out of favor with the political center: moderates and independents.

Also untrue, the truth is quite contrary.

It is actually the Republicans who have become more extremist, but they rely on moving the perceptual concept to turn the tables instead of embrace reality.

I'm a good example of that: I used to be a registered Democrat but loathe what the Democratic party has become over the last decade. I won't vote for Democrats again until they clearly disavow people like Kamala Harris, Hillary Clinton, Corey Booker, and Elizabeth Warren.

You're actually a good example of the lying fraud of the GOP, as you vacuously and repetitively pretend to claim to be a Democrat and a moderate, yet entirely espouse the hard-core right-wing agenda, and blame Obama for creating conflict.

Tell you what, maybe people will believe you when you disavow individuals like Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thoma

This is old enough news that the backlash against this has already hit print media.

The Guardian print version is here:
https://www.theguardian.com/ne...
Or if you prefer the same content as a podcast, it's here:
https://www.theguardian.com/ne...

Since this is England, the whole thing directly relates to class. Upper-class (or perhaps the Brits call that 'Middle-class') jobs essentially require a an internship now before you can get a real job. Finishing an internship means being able to afford to live with no paycheck in London for six months. This means only the wealthy can afford to have an internship. This locks the educated non-wealthy out of the higher-class professions.

So this is not about serfdom -- a path with no escape. It's about making people pay for jobs. You have to BUY your job. (LIke you'd BUY a commission in the army in a Jane Austin novel.) And if you cannot afford to buy your job, you're the wrong sort of person for work here anyhow. Nudge nudge wink wink.

This is old enough news that the backlash against this has already hit print media.

The Guardian print version is here:
https://www.theguardian.com/ne...
Or if you prefer the same content as a podcast, it's here:
https://www.theguardian.com/ne...

Since this is England, the whole thing directly relates to class. Upper-class (or perhaps the Brits call that 'Middle-class') jobs essentially require a an internship now before you can get a real job. Finishing an internship means being able to afford to live with no paycheck in London for six months. This means only the wealthy can afford to have an internship. This locks the educated non-wealthy out of the higher-class professions.

So this is not about serfdom -- a path with no escape. It's about making people pay for jobs. You have to BUY your job. (LIke you'd BUY a commission in the army in a Jane Austin novel.) And if you cannot afford to buy your job, you're the wrong sort of person for work here anyhow. Nudge nudge wink wink.

You need medicine research to be funded by the goverment. Because the companies just said "Ain't no money in it."

Capitalism is a great system as long as there are profit motives, but falls far short where quality and safety are most important, profits be damned.

Sadly a lot of the research leveraged by big pharma is already publicly (i.e. taxpayer) funded. The idea that the pharma companies need to make huge profits in order to fund R&D is a convenient myth; it's all about generating short-term shareholder value. These days big pharma companies are more concerned with mergers and acquisitions than investing in research.

You need medicine research to be funded by the goverment. Because the companies just said "Ain't no money in it."

Capitalism is a great system as long as there are profit motives, but falls far short where quality and safety are most important, profits be damned.

Sadly a lot of the research leveraged by big pharma is already publicly (i.e. taxpayer) funded. The idea that the pharma companies need to make huge profits in order to fund R&D is a convenient myth; it's all about generating short-term shareholder value. These days big pharma companies are more concerned with mergers and acquisitions than investing in research.

You need medicine research to be funded by the goverment. Because the companies just said "Ain't no money in it."

Capitalism is a great system as long as there are profit motives, but falls far short where quality and safety are most important, profits be damned.

Sadly a lot of the research leveraged by big pharma is already publicly (i.e. taxpayer) funded. The idea that the pharma companies need to make huge profits in order to fund R&D is a convenient myth; it's all about generating short-term shareholder value. These days big pharma companies are more concerned with mergers and acquisitions than investing in research.

Really? I seem to remember a certain Nobel Peace Prize winner that ran out of bombs.

https://www.theguardian.com/co...

https://www.cnn.com/2015/12/04...

So fuck off with your Trump hysteria.

Newsflash: They've been fucking you/us forever - and they prefer it that way.
Richest 62 people as wealthy as half of world's population

How else would they manage to keep this up?
Constant distraction, divide and conquer (there has to be an enemy – always), continuous buttering up by the media...
Even then, occasionally somebody sets out to make the world a better place. That's what they fear. They want to be able to stop it, before it becomes a dynamic movement.

Before you get all holier-than-thou, note that's true in the US too.

The US and Australia are actually leading the way in renewable energy production. Google and Apple just went 100% renewable with their energy use. Other US companies are looking do the same

Individual companies aren't a good guide for what is happening. In this case, government policy matters a lot. It is true that Australia has a boom in solar power, but that's despite the current government https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/feb/11/australias-solar-power-boom-could-almost-double-capacity-in-a-year-analysts-say https://www.marketforces.org.au/campaigns/ffs/ not because of it. And in many respects Austarlian coal plants are producing all sorts of pollutants that wouldn't even be allowed in most of China https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/aug/15/australian-coal-power-pollution-would-be-illegal-in-us-europe-and-china-report.

On the other hand China and India are ordering more coal plants be built than any other counties. China is taking a look at scaling back coal use but still major cities in China are simply unfit to live in because of pollution.

It is true that China and India are building new coal plants also, but that's only a fraction of their new grid production. In fact, Chinese cities have become substantially cleaner in the last few years https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-pollution-beijing-insight/beijing-may-be-starting-to-win-its-battle-against-smog-idUSKBN1EN0ZJ.

Africa is scheduled to become major problem in the next ten years too as more power is needed to provide for their growing economies. Coal is the only source of fuel for Africa that is cheap enough for them to exploit.

Actually, there are a lot of solar projects in parts of Africa also. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/06/26/the-race-to-solar-power-africa, but if you note in the comment you are replying to, I specifically included a link to the Solar Electric Light Fund; as I explained in that comment, it is particularly important to help get solar panels for Africa precisely so they don't turn to fossil fuels. So if you are concerned about Africa's fossil fuel production, then by all means donate to SELF.

The US and Australia are actually leading the way in renewable energy production. Google and Apple just went 100% renewable with their energy use. Other US companies are looking do the same

Individual companies aren't a good guide for what is happening. In this case, government policy matters a lot. It is true that Australia has a boom in solar power, but that's despite the current government https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/feb/11/australias-solar-power-boom-could-almost-double-capacity-in-a-year-analysts-say https://www.marketforces.org.au/campaigns/ffs/ not because of it. And in many respects Austarlian coal plants are producing all sorts of pollutants that wouldn't even be allowed in most of China https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/aug/15/australian-coal-power-pollution-would-be-illegal-in-us-europe-and-china-report.

On the other hand China and India are ordering more coal plants be built than any other counties. China is taking a look at scaling back coal use but still major cities in China are simply unfit to live in because of pollution.

It is true that China and India are building new coal plants also, but that's only a fraction of their new grid production. In fact, Chinese cities have become substantially cleaner in the last few years https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-pollution-beijing-insight/beijing-may-be-starting-to-win-its-battle-against-smog-idUSKBN1EN0ZJ.

Africa is scheduled to become major problem in the next ten years too as more power is needed to provide for their growing economies. Coal is the only source of fuel for Africa that is cheap enough for them to exploit.

Actually, there are a lot of solar projects in parts of Africa also. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/06/26/the-race-to-solar-power-africa, but if you note in the comment you are replying to, I specifically included a link to the Solar Electric Light Fund; as I explained in that comment, it is particularly important to help get solar panels for Africa precisely so they don't turn to fossil fuels. So if you are concerned about Africa's fossil fuel production, then by all means donate to SELF.

Who could have seen this coming, besides anyone who gave it a moment’s thought?

The new federal legislation that closed down Backpage.com "is creating an actual market for pimps."
WaPo reports on the unintended consequences of the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act.
According to The Guardian, the site allowed sex workers to screen potential online clients before meeting them in person. It was a simple layer of safety without resorting to pimps for protection. These deals, that were once handled online, will now be pushed back into the open streets, leaving women on their own to protect.

The Internet disintermediates. Take away the Internet, and you get re-intermediation.

Selling that content, or even just publishing it, depending on the case, is a different matter.

It is a different matter, and it is protected by the First Amendment. As long as news media can publish anything they choose to, including people's tax-returns and unproven crime-allegations, so can anyone else, "social media" (however defined) included.

Failed to denounce Nazis? Are you insane?

Not insane, just not in a coma like you must have been.
https://www.theguardian.com/us...

Seriously. It's hilarious to watch the mental gymnastics of Google's CEO openly tauting that he's DIRECTLY working with a presidential candidate to "use our data" to help the candidate.

  - Facebook sold some ads. Who the fuck reads Facebook ads?
  - Google literally used their entire platform (read: tracking your information) + "muh algorithms" to assist a candidate.

And IN RETURN, the CEO got, and I quote, "a virtual open door to access the White House at will"

https://www.googletransparency...

https://theintercept.com/2016/...

https://mashable.com/2009/04/2...

https://www.wired.com/2008/11/...

https://www.politico.com/story...

https://www.theguardian.com/te...

"Eric Schmitt, 'CEO of America' "

And these are LIBERAL WEBSITES running these articles. So you can't even play the whole "alt-right / foxnews / fakenews / Russia-wrote-it" Red Herring bullshit.

Of course, I don't know why we're restricting to Obama either. Under Hillary, they did the same thing (for likely the same quid-pro-quo arrangement):

https://www.washingtonpost.com...

http://www.googletransparencyp...

https://qz.com/823922/eric-sch...

https://www.politico.com/magaz...

https://qz.com/520652/groundwo...

So with literally DOZENS upon dozens of professional articles dedicated to the subject from dozens of separate news organizations, anyone who ignores this well-established fact is throwing their head in the sand and humming, and not worthy of a debate response and should be downvoted accordingly for low signal-to-noise ratio.

  -> Google did everything Facebook did, and far more.