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Why? That wasn't news, we already heard about it under Bush.

You're like the parent who confronts his kid's drug use, and then they say they learned it from you.

Who never had to teach grandpa to spy on Americans, let alone suck eggs.

Look, you want to convince me you give a rat's ass about privacy, and aren't just grinding a partisan axe? Show some concern beyond the previous administration, the one that's out of office. Take a gander overseas, or in the boardrooms. Then maybe I'll think it is something other than an irate pretense that you'll drop as soon as somebody else is in office.

So it's bad that NATO leaves a one country buffer zone between Europe and Russia, but not bad that Russia installs military bases right on Europe's doorstep such as Kaliningrad, Moldova, and now parts of Ukraine that it's outright annexed?

For a start, Russia is a European nation and always has been. So it's not surprising that it has bases in Europe. On the other hand, the USA is NOT a European nation, yet Europe is teeming with American bases, soldiers and weapon systems - including thermonuclear weapons. Russia did "annexe" Crimea, which had been part of Russia since before the USA existed, after the illegal regime in Kiev began determined efforts to exterminate Russian-speaking citizens.

Kaliningrad - Koenigsberg as was - "became part of the Soviet Union pending the final determination of territorial questions at the peace settlement (as part of the Russian SFSR) as agreed upon by the Allies at the Potsdam Conference". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Kaliningrad is now part of Russia, just as Hawaii and Alaska are part of the USA. Does the USA have military bases in Alaska and Hawaii? According to Time magazine, the USA has about 800 military, naval and air force bases in 70 countries outside the USA. http://time.com/4511744/americ... See also https://www.thenation.com/arti...

That map is a fine example of telling half the story - Kazakhstan has a NATO base that was used only for onwards staging and transport to Afghanistan purely for anti-Taliban operations for example, yet Russia has a full blown permanent offensive military presence there.

Kazakhstan used to be part of the USSR, and before that part of the Russian Empire. It has a large Russian-speaking population and is a close ally of Russia. However, it also presents a tempting avenue of attack against Russia's "soft underbelly". Given the presence of Islamist terrorists and NATO in Afghanistan, it's hardly surprising the Russians are on guard and keeping a wary eye open.

More to the point, what on earth is the USA doing in Afghanistan where it has no business to be, and no legal right? Indeed, the USA has no business to be interfering anywhere in Asia, Europe or Africa.

Many of them are parents who don't want to pay for their kids. And, of course, some people are just confused, like you are.

Wait, so wanting to help other people makes me confused? Okay, now I'm confused....

And your evidence that making college free leads to a "well-educated public means less crime and more economic output" is where exactly?

Decades of history. Look at Japan. Look at California prior to the 1970s. And so on. And various studies back up that statement, too.

Society only benefits from sending kids to college if the cost of college is small compared to the increased future earnings; when that is the case, student loans are the right mechanism to finance a college education. When that is not the case, "free" college education is harmful both to the kids and to society.

Uh, no. That's not true at all, and by that, I mean that it is objectively false, rather than subjectively. Statistically, even small increases in college attendance result in large drops in crime rate. So even if the cost is high compared with the increased future earnings, society still benefits from sending kids to college, and so do the kids.

Ah, the knee-jerk response that "billionaire = conservative". Of course, that's nonsense; if anything, billionaires tilt slightly left [politico.com]. They pay negligible income tax, and even if they lost 99% of their money to the government, they'd still be wealthy.

Okay, let me restate that by replacing the word "billionaire" with "wealthy person". It is inarguable that the wealthy are substantially more likely to lean to the right than the poor and middle class.

Nope, sorry, I don't believe it. I only know of one significant study that makes that claim (Margolis), and it is wrong (in fact, I'd call it dishonest).

I would argue that the other studies are, in fact, dishonest, as they treat 100% of donations to churches as charitable giving despite the fact that only about 10-15% of those donations typically are used for programs that help the less fortunate, and the rest tends to go towards operations of the church, from which the donor typically benefits to some degree as a member, thus placing it at least to some degree into that whole "self-interest" category that you say isn't charity.

In any case, it's also irrelevant. Charity necessarily involves a personal element that you yourself just admitted the left is denying that element. So, whatever the left is doing, it's not charity.

*shrugs*. The way I see it, what matters is the result, not the approach. I don't disagree that charity involves a personal element, but I do disagree that campaigning for laws/policies/candidates that help the poor isn't a personal element. My comment about protesters earlier was not intended to imply that protests, letter writing, campaigning for office, etc. aren't useful tools, nor to imply that all of (or even the majority of) the protesters are bozos. Many of them are legitimately trying to help.

Yes, and that's what makes the left so utterly evil, namely the view that when people are successful, it is because stuff was "given" to them.

Okay, here's a challenge for you. Be born in a country that has no roads, no sewers, no clean running water, and become a billionaire. Or heck, start out poor in this country and become one. In theory, it can happen, but it is statistically a fluke. On average, people who become enormously wealthy started out at least moderately wealthy. People near the botto

Actually, the US is far far far from being the bastion of democracy that they claim (somewhat vocally) to be!

http://www.inquisitr.com/376286/texas-threatens-to-arrest-un-backed-election-observers-liberals-fear-voter-supression/

https://www.thenation.com/article/the-economist-just-downgraded-the-us-from-a-full-democracy-to-a-flawed-democracy/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/riley-waggaman/its-not-just-arizona-elec_b_9550670.html

Good point about the loss of communication. But there are MANY problems:

1) What if communication is hijacked?

2) There are many, many dogs that would jump on a drone trying to land a package.

3) There are children would try to capture a drone. Mom! I found a plane in our yard!

4) A drone would be REALLY, REALLY ANNOYING to a lot of people. Why? A drone would compromise their safety. A drone would emit scary noise. Many, many people in the U.S., a nation of gun owners, would shoot at a drone. Even children might use their BB guns to shoot at a drone.

5) Thieves might like to capture a drone.

6) Weather is often ENTIRELY UNPREDICTABLE. A big, unexpected gust of wind could smash a drone against a house. There are many places where 2 weather systems come together in which weather reports are only educated guesses.

7) Electronics sometimes fails. (Funny: I can imagine Slashdot readers saying, "What! I didn't know that!")

8) Mechanical devices sometimes fail.

9) There are often design errors that are only discovered after device failure.

These are problems of TRUMPIC proportions!

But yes, Jeff Bezos is still better than Donald Trump.

Let me give you a little hint of just how corrupt it all was: practically NONE of the evictions in 2009 were legal.

Uh......the evictions were for people who weren't making payments. If you're not making payments, you're eventually going to get evicted, and that's not ever going to change.

Never trust a banker further than you regulate his ass.

And go one farther: don't trust the banker even after regulation. You can't buy loopholes, the banker can and did.

The right wing is largely okay with approved immigration.

The right wing likes to win and does whatever they think will help them win. Immigration generally doesn't help them win, so they don't particularly support it that much.

Now they will say they are "protecting the rule of law", but in practice it is just going to be their control. It is the exact same reason they invent all these identification requirements to vote, including sometimes requiring. Here are some links.

link1
link2

Here is one that was struck down. link3

Basically in person voting fraud isn't really a problem. There are very few cases and the penalties are stiff. By targeting how they create the laws they can disproportionately benefit their candidates. They do the same thing by selectively purging voting roles and such.

So, In summary, just because the right says they are in favor of legal immigration, does not mean they really are. Sometimes you need to look deeper. In this case it is probably just a way of pretending to have the moral high ground while being as evil as ever.

> The world, unfortunately, will not be going back to local employment or local consumption in our lifetimes.

I wouldn't be too sure about that.

I'm starting to wonder if it isn't the other way around: a power grab in the US with terrorists as the boogey man (since the Soviet Union and Cold War is over). I used to think it was just ineptitude, but it is just too consistent for that. The US policy in the Middle East always seems to create future enemies that need to be fought, benefiting military contractors. Every bomb dropped needs replaced, just look at those revenue numbers skyrocket! Then of course rebuilding everything afterwards requires expensive contractors as well.

* US backs Shah against democratically elected officials, creating theocracy and a future enemy.
* US trains Bin Laden and others how to fight against a superpower, creating a future enemy.
* US provides weapons to an enemy in the Iran Contra scandal.
* US alllows it's companies to sell key technologies to Iraq, which aided them in their chemical, missile, and nuclear programs, building up a future enemy.
* US, with drones and other planes bomb weddings and children on a disturbingly frequent basis. The military and intelligence agencies know this will create blowback, more future terrorists, yet on it continues.
* US destabilizes Iraq, allowing ISIS to get built up and armed. Say what you will about Saddam, he kept jihadists in check. This enabled an enemy to rise to power, which is still our enemy.
* US provides weapons and aid to jihadists in Syria (same CNN link above) . Come on, if you've been paying attention you know what these people will become right? Future enemies! So predictable!

When will this madness end? No wonder everyone in the Middle East hates the US, just look at history and it's all laid out to see.

Saying Obama decided not to enforce the cannabis laws is inaccurate. Initially following Obama's inauguration, there was some rhetoric that the DEA wouldn't target caregivers in medical cannabis states, but that turned out to be a ruse.

A June 2013 report issued by Americans for Safe Access found that the DEA had carried out some 270 medical marijuana raids under Obama—twelve more than had been conducted in the previous twelve years combined. It calculated that the Obama administration had spent $300 million “interfering” with state medical marijuana laws in the last four and a half years, outspending the Bush administration (both terms) by $100 million.

The Ogden memo was not only supposed to prevent these raids; to those in the medical marijuana industry, it had sent a message encouraging the industry’s growth. Indeed, some have said that the reason the number of raids carried out under Obama spiked is due explicitly to the sheer number of dispensaries that set up shop after the memo’s release.

In January 2013, an anonymous White House official told the Huffington Post that the Ogden memo had been misconstrued: it was never meant to encourage the industry’s growth. “If you read the memo, with the exception of a few words you maybe could’ve worded better, it’s really not that different from current law,” the source told reporters Ryan Grim and Ryan J. Reilly. “It took us by surprise, I will tell you, the way it was received in the beginning, and then the media ran with that narrative, that this was a change in policy and Obama’s gonna allow medical marijuana shops.

To correct the impression that it had given a green light to medical marijuana providers, the Justice Department released a new memo on June 29, 2011. Named after Deputy Attorney General James Cole, it was marketed as a “clarification.” While the Ogden memo hadn’t been too explicit about who constituted a “caregiver,” the Cole memo defined the term explicitly as an individual who cares for patients, “not commercial operations cultivating, selling or distributing marijuana.” Practically overnight, dispensary operators and growers who thought they were free and clear so long as they didn’t traffic, work with gangs or sell to kids found themselves in the same category as the members of organized crime.

So when they saw everyone 'initially misconstrue' the Ogden memo why didn't they clarify then? Well because it wasn't misconstrued, they went back on their word.

I've never seen any signs in a Wal-Mart pointing out that the Levi jeans are a special Walmart-only version without the quality of Levi jeans elsewhere.

That's new — the Anonymous OP I was replying to made no allegations of the Walmart-only TVs being lower quality. Reduced feature-set — yes. But he never mentioned quality issues — indeed, his parents are, reportedly, happy enough with the purchase for him to recommend the shop to /. colleagues.

Without adequate information, cheap crap drives expensive quality out of the market

Well, whatever the quality of Walmart's wares, there is obviously still plenty of places to get other kind of stuff on the US market.

if you don't mind how they treat their employees.

I'm unaware of anybody being forced to work there. If people do so voluntarily, I certainly am not going to pay attention to Communists and their rent-seeking running dogs at the various Unions.

Salvadoran Civil War
Time for a US apology to El-Salvador
Revisiting American Involvement in El Salvador: The Massacre at El Mozote

https://www.thenation.com/arti...

I'm finally seeing some media questioning this CIA nonsense as well, citing many, many examples from their own tortured history as well as more recent facts.

This story is clearly planted and I, for one, do not for a moment believe these media shills or their anonymous sources nor can I give them even a shred of credibility. They could, would, and in fact have been the cheerleaders for any number of ill-advised wars, so anyone trying to reheat the Cold War based on anonymous rumors is going to be considered a warmongering shill for that very reason.

And that's ignoring those self-admitted "hacks" like Glenn Thrush who are proven shills. I mean, funny coincidence that, just look at what this "hack" is peddling:

The Kremlin’s canny operatives didn’t change votes; they won them, influencing voters to choose Russia’s preferred outcome by pushing stolen information at just the right time—through slanted, or outright false stories on social media.

So, Glenn, you say that Russia won this for Trump by revealing that you're a self-described hack? Please do go on...

Are you going to then explain how Russia made Donna Brazille rig the debates? Or lie about them being altered, despite the fact that we have DKIM validation to provide cryptographic non-repudiation of the message body? Or were they responsible for all the many ways the Democratic primary was a farce? Did Russia make them adopt the "pied piper" strategy to promote Trump, believing he would lose to Hillary? Did Russia keep them from holding campaign events in their "firewall" states and ignoring their own staffers? Maybe Russia planted that fake news CNN reported about it being illegal to read Wikileaks (lest one find their involvement in the aforementioned debate rigging...). Maybe next time they'll be smarter and simply publish the debate questions for everyone? Did Russia cause Hillary to collapse in the street and get thrown into a van after all that insistence that her health was just fine? Did Russia do the "bird dogging" wherein you staged violence at the Trump rallies and blamed Bernie's supporters for it? Did they hack the FEC to put the operatives on the MoveOn payroll (something my past comments have covered in significant detail)? Did Russia make Zulema tell that tale to the cops outside the Arizona rally that we have plenty of independent, video coverage for? Did Russia give Zulema credits on those "Trump Ducks" photos that only further corroborate O'Keefe's videos? Did Russia funnel all of the money from the state campaigns to Hillary's campaign to make the losses even more painful when she managed to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory?

There's a reason the DNC is fighting this so hard in so many ways. This is a fight for their own survival. By all rights, their leadership should be entirely replaced.... which makes me wonder if there are any actual plans out there to do that. We seem to live in interesting times.

In New Hampshire, no proof of residence or pre-registration is required. On voting day, anyone may show up, sign an affidavit that they live at any address in NH, and then vote. There is no ID or residency time requirement. Nothing is verified or validated.

Actually, they have an ID requirement. And if you dispute any of them, you can check them out.

Residency is a fool's gambit, and as worthless as Trump's claims.

I personally know people who live in RI who also vote in CT and MA where they had previous residences. (All Dems, btw.)

If you actually knew this, then you'd call a media outlet and give their names. Or the local elections offices. Or the local US Attorney.

I personally know illegal aliens who vote in VA using false papers.
(They work for outsourced IT on federal govt contracts, btw.)
They voted for Hillary due to the "immigration" issue.

Again, if you actually knew this, then you'd call a media outlet and give their names.

My personal experience leads me to believe that there is a fair amount of voter fraud, and that it could affect election results in key districts.

So far your experience has been to do nothing, even though you allegedly can testify to a crime.

Really, that's very telling.

It's quite a bit more likely you're making up a story. But if not, fair enough, write down these names and mail them to a media outlet.

Some other stuff Sesssions has done in his illustrious career.

He wrongly prosecuted black activists for voter fraud, was blocked from a judgeship because of racist statements, and opposed the Voting Rights Act.

https://www.thenation.com/arti...

The only way Obama could have been considered a liberal is if he was being compared to hardline conservative

Obama isn't a "liberal" in the traditional sense of the word, he is a US-style "liberal", i.e., an authoritarian progressive technocrat.

Just because the GOP loudmouths were labeling him a socialist for months before he was elected didn't make it true.

The confusion between "socialists" and "social democrats" is something Democrats themselves engaged in when they incorrectly referred to the Nordic countries as "socialist". Don't blame the GOP for this.

I don't know when that labeled began to be applied to the Euro countries or by whom but it's clear one side doesn't truly understand the advanced social democracies and the other doesn't care to
https://www.thenation.com/arti...

Simple, because there are NOT FUCKING CITIZENS!! Geez, how hard is that to get?

Oh, its not hard to get. You're pulling a classic Lee Atwater and rationalizing your racism:

You start out in 1954 by saying, "N****, n****, n****." By 1968 you can't say "n****"-that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states' rights, and all that stuff, and you're getting so abstract. Now, you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites..."We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "N****, n****."

Only your abstraction is "illegal immigrant". Aside from the irony of the descendants of white imperialist invaders calling the descendants of native inhabitants illegitimate, is this little thing called the Monroe Doctrine.

There isn't a single South American country that hasn't been fucked over, hard, by the United States. Over and over and over again. If the U.S. has bankrupted Jorge's family farm with NAFTA, murdered Miguel's parents with CIA-backed death squads, and kept Maya locked up in prison for dissent in a U.S.-backed dictatorship - it owes each of them a green card at the border, no questions asked, and an easy path to citizenship after that. Just for starters.

Real justice would involve trillions in restitution, as well as deporting everyone from CIA flunkies to former Secretaries of State to face trial.

So, cayane, you want to add a couple of zeros to your annual tax bill to make up for the coups and slaughter from Guatemala to Chile? Or do you want to let the poor bastards in to work at a car wash or lawn care business?

I wasn't saying there isn't fraud.

I was saying that "He who smelt it - dealt it." Again and again and again...

https://www.thenation.com/arti...
http://www.redistrictingmajori...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

While being paranoid about farts.
Everywhere! Farts as far as the eye can see!
Did you know that people fart 8-20 times per day? EVERYONE!
Farts are EVERYWHERE!!!

They just use different language. Instead of "rigged", use the words "voter suppression".

Except voter suppression IS are real thing - or there would be nothing for courts to overturn. Again and again and again...

http://www.democracynow.org/20...

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

https://www.thenation.com/arti...

I mean... either those laws WERE voter repression... or it's a secret conspiracy buy judges in various US states against the Republican party's attempts to... hmm...
Wait... hold on... there must be a way to paint this as a conspiracy against old white conservatives instead of the people they are actively trying to keep from voting.

But why even bother with that... when "UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT" puts it so much more succinctly:

After years of preclearance and expansion of voting access, by 2013 African American registration and turnout rates had finally reached near-parity with white registration and turnout rates. African Americans were poised to act as a major electoral force.
But, on the day after the Supreme Court issued Shelby County v. Holder, 133 S. Ct. 2612 (2013), eliminating preclearance obligations, a leader of the party that newly dominated the legislature (and the party that rarely enjoyed African American support) announced an intention to enact what he characterized as an âoeomnibusâ election law.
Before enacting that law, the legislature requested data on the use, by race, of a number of voting practices.
Upon receipt of the race data, the General Assembly enacted legislation that restricted voting and registration in five different ways, all of which disproportionately affected African Americans.
In response to claims that intentional racial discrimination animated its action, the State offered only meager justifications.
Although the new provisions target African Americans with almost surgical precision, they constitute inapt remedies for the problems assertedly justifying them and, in fact, impose cures for problems that did not exist.

Oh... and by the way... while you're cherry picking through wikipedia... You do know that other people can read that and point out that your worm is showing?

I mean... I'm not even talking about you quoting THIS as a proof.

Earl Mazo, a reporter for the pro-Nixon New York Herald Tribune, investigated the voting in Chicago and "claimed to have discovered sufficient evidence of vote fraud to prove that the state was stolen for Kennedy."[43]

Which IS proof, but only for the paranoid conspiracy theory bias among Republicans.

I'm talking about you failing to read the full section. Like this part.

In Illinois, Schlesinger and others have pointed out that, even if Nixon had carried Illinois, the state alone would not have given him the victory, as Kennedy would still have won 276 electoral votes to Nixon's 246 (with 269 needed to win).
More to the point, Illinois was the site of the most extensive challenge process, which fell short despite repeated efforts spearheaded by Cook County state's attorney, Benjamin Adamowski, a Republican, who also lost his re-election bid.
Despite demonstrating net errors favoring both Nixon and Adamowski (some precinctsâ"40% in Nixon's caseâ"showed errors favoring them, a factor suggesting error, rather than fraud), the totals found fell short of reversing the results for either

So, wait, is opposing unlimited immigration racist Trumphitlerism, or rational self interest today?

Both.

Slashdot groupthink seems very confused on this one.

No. You're throwing two extraordinarily different issues into the same boat, because they both involve the word "immigration".

1) Latinos. And yes, bitching about them is engaging in classic rationalized racism: (asterisks to appease the Lameness filter which isn't smart enough to recognize a quote)

You start out in 1954 by saying, "N****, n****, n****." By 1968 you can't say "n****"-that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states' rights, and all that stuff, and you're getting so abstract. Now, you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites..."We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "N****, n****."

Only instead if "n****" (or "spic" in this case), the go to abstraction is "illegal immigrant". Aside from the irony of the descendants of white imperialist invaders calling the descendants of native inhabitants illegitimate, is this little thing called the Monroe Doctrine.

There isn't a single South American country that hasn't been fucked over, hard, by the United States. Over and over and over again. If the U.S. has bankrupted Jorge's family farm with NAFTA, murdered Miguel's parents with CIA-backed death squads, and kept Maya locked up in prison for dissent in a U.S.-backed dictatorship - the least you can do is let the poor bastards come over here and work at a gas station. Real justice would involve trillions in restitution, as well as deporting everyone from CIA flunkies to former Secretaries of State to face trial.

2) H1-B. On this one, it's the people calling "racism" to opposition to the policy who are full of shit. The visa program's only purpose is to increase the size of the labor pool to decrease labor costs for the benefit of corporations. Many Asians should get a green card on the spot and an easy path to citizenship for the same reason as Latinos (U.S. murdered 3 million in Vietnam, backed another brutal dictatorship in Indonesia) but H1-B is all about temporary visas, not bringing workers (and their families) over to become citizens.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Of all the presidential candidates, Jill Stein is the only one who stands for justice.

Vice presidential candidate Ajamu Baraka was also arrested.

Their civil act of disobedience has earned my vote.

News media's use of confidential sources has been tested and upheld MANY times.

It's been tested many times-- but not always upheld. Most recently, New York Times reporter James Risen faced the threat jail time for refusing to reveal his source for a story: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01... https://www.thenation.com/arti...

In the words of Leanne Phillips" "Can a journalist be forced to reveal confidential sources? The answer appears to be no...as long as that journalist is willing to go to jail." https://www.legalzoom.com/arti...

some others:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/10/17678244-journalists-watch-as-reporter-faces-jail-time-for-not-revealing-sources?lite
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2013/04/08/fox-news-reporter-facing-jail-for-protecting-source-mainstream-media-yawns-raising-questions-of-liberal-bias/
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/press_box/2005/12/lipservice_journalism.html
http://www.rcfp.org/jailed-journalists

I'm wondering if humans will ever shake off their extremely violent ancestry and wind down the war and militarism. The US is the greatest exporter of weapons and the most militarily aggressive country in the world with military action in over 100 countries.

https://www.thenation.com/arti...

If we can't lead by example in toning down endless warfare, and instead provide the cover that other countries need to justify and build their own drone and robot armies, then the world of the future is going to be a very dismal place indeed.

Oh - you've really nailed a mainstream problem. Right-wing attacks on abortion clinics are a just something you see every... oh wait, I think you have your right-and-left backwards. Why not stop spreading your false narrative, and check out the reality of https://www.thereligionofpeace.com/ - if you're interested in physical attacks.

Wait, wait, are you confused, and think that the various Islamic fundamentalists are on the left?

They're not.

But yes, attacks on Planned Parenthood are real. And even the non-violent actions are flawed, since they're based on fabrications and misrepresentations.

Because I know there are tens of millions, if not at least a hundred million Americans, that believe your statement sincerely. I even have a few family members that have espoused such sentiments. And so I will reply accordingly.

We Americans have been bred to honor and respect property rights. It is ingrained so deeply, even so far as our honorable Constitution itself, that the hard-working-man's "honest wages" are as sanctimonious as Holy Communion in the eyes of the red, white, and blue. So, no matter how absurd and adulterous ones income, I understand that taking money from those that "work hard" to distribute among those that "hardly work" is no different than the priest taking a piss into the chalice as his way of blessing the wine.

I get it. Really, I do.

But I just have one question for you: Are you OK with 20 people in our nation controlling more wealth than one hundred and fifty five million? Are you -really- OK with this? Because that's where our continued ignorance and/or unwillingness has gotten us. Your bull-headedness is putting the ridiculous wealth of 20 individuals in our nation ahead of the general welfare of 155 million. In any other nation throughout the course of human history, this level of wealth unbalance has instigated violent revolt and revolution among the masses. And it's only a matter of time before it happens here, as long as people like you continue to believe what you've just said.

I can't think of any other reason someone in his position would support the Republican Party.

Republicans are probably a lot nicer to him than Democrats. Would Democrats invite him to speak at their convention?

He also has a long history of supporting free speech and opposing speech codes and criminalization of speech as "hate speech". Just this week Hillary announced her support for a constitutional amendment repealing free speech for specific people.

Before you post about your failure to think of things, maybe try a little harder.

Sorry, you don't get a pass on this, I'm calling bullshit.

Your bullshit. You're doing the same thing every other asshole American Exceptionalist does in pinning all violence carried out by people who might be Muslim on Islam, while pretending his own Christianist shit doesn't stink.

Get that beam outta your eye before complaining about motes.

Take a look at this: http://www.thenation.com/article/the-national-security-expose-so-secret-even-edward-snowden-didnt-know-about-it/ where a former assistant Inspector General for the Pentagon claims whistleblowers were treated illegally. Neither the parent article nor that linked one inspire confidence in any DoD related Inspector General office.

illegal immigrants have a lower rate of crime than the average population

This statement — unsupported by any citations, BTW — is irrelevant to my point. Even if they are less crime-prone on average, they are a source of crime anyway.

We can not get rid of native criminals by deporting them anywhere, but we can deport the folks, who have entered this country illegally (and already have this "original sin" to their name).

But yeah sure, a wall will stop that.

It may not stop that entirely, but it will reduce it, that's for sure. 15 years ago, when Israel was building its much derided wall, similar predictions of failure were made.

But the walls work:

The number of fatalities from terror attacks within Israel dropped from more than 130 in 2003 to fewer than 25 in 2005.

According to a 2006 estimate cited by Slate (the article itself is hardly sympathetic to the idea, BTW), an Israel-kind of wall stretching for 2000 miles would cost $6.4 bln (or about 1/3rd the annual cost of NASA). And we may not even need it that high and sophisticated — because, unlike Israel, we aren't facing an enemy bent on our destruction... Nor are there any border-disputes with Mexico — the other complication of their project.

Only an eight year old would ...

My eight year old would already recognize this rhetorical trick as one used only by crooks and liars. Your parents should not have allowed you access to the Internet until you've read up on classic literature...

You cannot prove a negative. Jailing someone until they do is a huge miscarriage of justice. You can hit them with that 5 dollar wrench all day, but they still won't be able to prove a negative (as proved by the CIAs torture of Abu Zubaydeh).

http://www.thenation.com/artic...

If there is actually child pornography there, He's certainly better off in a local jail on contempt charges than in a big prison on child porn charges. He's also likely to be released in a decade or so without being on any predator lists. That is still a far better outcome (from his perspective).

A more interesting case to illustrate this is a man who's wife claimed he had money in an offshore account during a divorce. He claimed he had no such money, so the judge naturally jailed him for contempt until he could find the missing millions. He was released 17 YEARS later and the SAME judge was on the bench and was convinced that this 73 year old man would rather spend 17 years in prison and be too old to even spend the money rather than hand it over and continue the proceedings.

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/sto...

"CIA ... trashing the constitution"

Secret U.S. government agencies do whatever they want. There is very little oversight. Those who want to kill people have no need to take a chance on getting arrested for murder. They join one of the many secret or semi-secret agencies.

Those who want to play video games that kill real people could work for the U.S. government in 19 countries. Now only 18 countries since the Uzbek government evicted the CIA killing organization.

Those in the U.S. who want to mistreat other people don't need to risk going to prison.

Those who want easy money that can be wasted in crazy schemes have no need to face bankruptcy. They can join a secret agency and use taxpayer money for things like a $43 million compressed natural gas station that serves only about 100 taxi drivers.

Those who want to find investment opportunities can join the many secret U.S. government agencies like No Sense in America, NSA, and listen to phone calls. Think the NSA is one organization? No, the NSA has contracting companies: How Private Contractors Have Created a Shadow NSA.

There is little democracy in the U.S. The U.S. government helps the rich get richer.

I really don't understand the "gee this is boilerplate" milquetoast shrug-and-bear it response. Boilerplate dogshit is what it arbitration clauses are.

These include details like waiving your right to a juried trial and agreeing to go into arbitration instead

Did you know you can opt-out in many cases?

"All things considered" has more on why these arbitration clauses are evil and you should always say "no".. So does the la times, the nation, lifehacker", and pretty much everywhere.

When you agree to arbitration you're agreeing to wave your right to a try in lieu of a system that is biased for business and rules against consumers 94% of the time

TIL that the Oculus Rift is toxic.

But then again, it may not...

Here in Ontario, Canada, we raised the minimum wage from $10.25 to $11.00, and unemployment went down in the following months and year, from around 7.5 %to 6.75% (source). While that doesn't prove that minimum wage increases never result in unemployment rises, it does disprove that they always result in unemployment rises.

Minimum wage increases killing jobs is a ridiculous notion - prices can always raise as well, and besides, the naysayers repeat this line almost Every. Single. Time. - even for overdue inflation-indexed increases, which generally casts doubt on their positions. In reality, it's a lot more complicated than that.

I will never understand why minimum wage is not tied to inflation rates - this is a ridiculous argument to have Every Five Years.

http://www.thenation.com/artic...
http://www.thestar.com/busines...
https://www.weforum.org/agenda...

Yes, yes, yes finally someone gets it. Yes, she's more republican than Trump and WAY more republican than Sanders.

I will be modded to oblivion by the Hillary shills, but oh well. When you have someone who starts more conflicts than George Bush, pushes MULTIPLE trade agreements to strip US of businesses and workers, was against gay marriage before she was for it, wasn't always on the minority's side, ran a war room against the women which Bill had hurt then tweeted all women who are assaulted should be heart, and is in bed with Wall Street, yes she's pretty much a Republican.

Yes, yes, yes finally someone gets it. Yes, she's more republican than Trump and WAY more republican than Sanders.

I will be modded to oblivion by the Hillary shills, but oh well. When you have someone who starts more conflicts than George Bush, pushes MULTIPLE trade agreements to strip US of businesses and workers, was against gay marriage before she was for it, wasn't always on the minority's side, ran a war room against the women which Bill had hurt then tweeted all women who are assaulted should be heart, and is in bed with Wall Street, yes she's pretty much a Republican.

Given that the two groups are largely the same, your argument fails, and is also an example of some epic level projection.

And yes, opposition to social programs that predominately benefit minorities, because low income/poor people are predominately minorities, is in fact the most frequent example of modern racism.

You start out in 1954 by saying, “***, ***, ***.” By 1968 you can’t say “***”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites. “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “***, ***.” -- Lee Atwater, 1981

http://www.thenation.com/artic...

To be absolutely clear, I want benefits for all persons living here.
But when earning enough to be part of the top 1% of African Americans still means being only in the top 40% of White Americans, there is a systemic problem. And its not our side that is using racism to single out a group or protect a group.

It's supposed to work by choosing a good candidate, that's how.

The voters in 2008 were naive and stupid. They elected a guy with no track record at all, and blindly believed all his lies about hope and change.

This time around, we have two Democratic candidates with very long political records, so you absolutely can make an informed choice. Hillary has been in politics for several decades now, and has a strong record of supporting Wall Street, being personally involved in and profiting from arms deals, being against same-sex marriage, helping install a militarized regime in Honduras based on repression, I could go on and on. Bernie has been in politics since the 60s, and has a strong record of supporting regular people and supporting progressive social causes like equal rights for blacks (he was present at MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech) and not working for any corrupt special interests.

I guess we'll see pretty soon which one of these the Democratic voters prefer. But they absolutely do have a choice, and you can't claim that you don't really know these candidates based on their prior histories.

But their are no anti-trust violations as the government allows this. The courts have re-interpreted anti-trust laws http://www.thenation.com/artic... You are woefully uninformed.

The John William Pope Center is a mouthpiece for a right-wing think tank, and is no friend of higher education.

That having been said, some of the incidents described are pretty egregious. But then university administrators have been cowardly autocrats since universities began.

No they haven't. Universities have historically been strongholds of free speech. In many countries during the middle age universities had special laws that allowed them freedom of speech eventhough no one outside the university had it.

Now, they are more business and less higher learning, and as most businesses are, they are more worried about their public image and earnings than their principles.

The John William Pope Center is a mouthpiece for a right-wing think tank, and is no friend of higher education.

That having been said, some of the incidents described are pretty egregious. But then university administrators have been cowardly autocrats since universities began.

Except the Christian extremist do tend to get their way in places like Uganda, with encouragement from American evangelicals. Exporting hate is a growth industry.

You mean in USA?

Meanwhile, while they can't exactly push through laws against being gay at home, though they still try, they shift their focus where they can create such laws.
See... it's not just a local thing. God hates gays EVERYWHERE!

As for bombing and killing indiscriminately and war... How many wars was it that US is fighting this week?
After being left that as legacy from a guy who was convinced that god himself wanted him to be the president and punish the "evildoers".

The future of journalism, by david Simmons (writer of The Wire)

Your taxes actually do go to the 1% via mass, multi-billion dollar tax breaks, refunds, pre-tax exemptions, etc. JPMorgan, 1.3 billion tax refund in 2013, American Airlines, $22 million refund, Boeing $82 million tax refund in 2013. These numbers took 10 seconds on a Google search of "tax breaks and refunds for corporations". My stats come from The Nation, and in general these "tax breaks" cost the US economy over $150 billion last year. Corporate inversions are transferring money out of the US into foreign firms.

If you're an American (or frankly, any innocent person) anywhere in the world who isn't an active member of a foreign terrorist organization or an agent of a foreign power, the Intelligence Community DOES NOT CARE ABOUT and actually DOES NOT WANT your data. Sounds crazy and bizarre for foreign intelligence agencies to care about things like foreign intelligence, I know, but it's true.

You would think. And, if the government lived up to our ideals for it, that would be true. Why would a government want to spy on their own citizens?

But in the real world, history shows us that sometimes governments decide that they do want to spy on their own citizens. They decide that some citizens are "dissenters" and need to be spied on. They decide that court orders and civil rights don't apply to them. They make "enemy lists" and try to dig out dirt to discredit the enemies. They wiretap reformers and try to blackmail them.

If you're an American (or frankly, any innocent person) anywhere in the world who isn't an active member of a foreign terrorist organization or an agent of a foreign power, the Intelligence Community DOES NOT CARE ABOUT and actually DOES NOT WANT your data. Sounds crazy and bizarre for foreign intelligence agencies to care about things like foreign intelligence, I know, but it's true.

You would think. And, if the government lived up to our ideals for it, that would be true. Why would a government want to spy on their own citizens?

But in the real world, history shows us that sometimes governments decide that they do want to spy on their own citizens. They decide that some citizens are "dissenters" and need to be spied on. They decide that court orders and civil rights don't apply to them. They make "enemy lists" and try to dig out dirt to discredit the enemies. They wiretap reformers and try to blackmail them.

1- we're supposed to believe that all 82 people were cases of "black on black" crime?

2- the "black on black crime" canard needs to go away. a pretty good summation ( http://www.thenation.com/artic... ) :

1.The term is a racial canard. Of course, it could merely be descriptive, an adjective for a certain kind of crime, like “same-sex domestic-partner violence.” But it’s not. Same-sex domestic-partner violence is distinguished from opposite-sex domestic-partner violence. But “black-on-black crime” has no racial equivalent: nobody talks about white-on-white crime (see 2) or Asian-on-Asian crime. It’s a construct assigned solely to black people, and it interprets their transgression through a purely racial lens. It ranks alongside “the down-low,” a phrase used to refer to black gay men who lead straight lives, only to cheat on their wives with other men. When white men do it, it’s called “Brokeback Mountain”; when black men do it, it gets a special name. The phrase “black-on-black crime” makes sense only if you understand black people’s propensity to commit crimes against people of their own race as inherently different from the way other racial groups commit crimes.

2.In this regard, black criminals are not particularly different. America is very segregated, and its criminality conforms to that fact. So the victims of most crimes are the same race as those who commit them. Eighty-four percent of white people who are killed every year are killed by white people. White people who buy illegal drugs are most likely to buy them from white people. Far from being extraordinary, the fact that black criminals are most likely to commit crimes against black people makes them just like everybody else. A more honest term than “black-on-black crime” would be, simply, “crime.”

3.It is not a taboo. Anyone who seriously thinks that black people are not talking about black people killing other black people just doesn’t know any black people. Black people talk about it a lot. They have a lot to talk about. But while black-on-black crime is a nonsense term, black crime is a serious issue. Black people may not be much more likely to kill members of their own racial group than whites, but they are still more likely to kill and be killed. It’s not as though the black community hasn’t noticed that. Most cities have several black-led organizations confronting this very thing. Nor do black people grieve according to some code of silence. Go to any inner-city church, youth club, park, concert, barbershop, beauty salon or high school basketball game and listen. Every now and then, like last year after Chicago high school student Hadiya Pendleton was shot, they even get a national platform to talk about it. And when they do, they seize it.

4.The police are a special category. That’s the point. Black people are not, by dint of their melanin content, instructed to protect and serve the public; the police, by dint of their employment, are. Black people do not have a monopoly on violence; the police do. So when the people entrusted with upholding the law kill someone, that raises very different issues than if a kid from down the block shoots somebody. When the people who are supposed to protect everybody show an undeniable propensity to kill one group of people more than others (black men aged 15 to 19 are twenty-one times more likely to be shot by police than their white counterparts), that inevitably raises the question of discrimination. Our taxes don’t pay to support black criminals in their pursuit of black victims; they are currently going to support police in the shooting of black people.

5.The police are not an elevated category. The law still applies to them. When black peopl

1- we're supposed to believe that all 82 people were cases of "black on black" crime?

2- the "black on black crime" canard needs to go away. a pretty good summation ( http://www.thenation.com/artic... ) :

1.The term is a racial canard. Of course, it could merely be descriptive, an adjective for a certain kind of crime, like “same-sex domestic-partner violence.” But it’s not. Same-sex domestic-partner violence is distinguished from opposite-sex domestic-partner violence. But “black-on-black crime” has no racial equivalent: nobody talks about white-on-white crime (see 2) or Asian-on-Asian crime. It’s a construct assigned solely to black people, and it interprets their transgression through a purely racial lens. It ranks alongside “the down-low,” a phrase used to refer to black gay men who lead straight lives, only to cheat on their wives with other men. When white men do it, it’s called “Brokeback Mountain”; when black men do it, it gets a special name. The phrase “black-on-black crime” makes sense only if you understand black people’s propensity to commit crimes against people of their own race as inherently different from the way other racial groups commit crimes.

2.In this regard, black criminals are not particularly different. America is very segregated, and its criminality conforms to that fact. So the victims of most crimes are the same race as those who commit them. Eighty-four percent of white people who are killed every year are killed by white people. White people who buy illegal drugs are most likely to buy them from white people. Far from being extraordinary, the fact that black criminals are most likely to commit crimes against black people makes them just like everybody else. A more honest term than “black-on-black crime” would be, simply, “crime.”

3.It is not a taboo. Anyone who seriously thinks that black people are not talking about black people killing other black people just doesn’t know any black people. Black people talk about it a lot. They have a lot to talk about. But while black-on-black crime is a nonsense term, black crime is a serious issue. Black people may not be much more likely to kill members of their own racial group than whites, but they are still more likely to kill and be killed. It’s not as though the black community hasn’t noticed that. Most cities have several black-led organizations confronting this very thing. Nor do black people grieve according to some code of silence. Go to any inner-city church, youth club, park, concert, barbershop, beauty salon or high school basketball game and listen. Every now and then, like last year after Chicago high school student Hadiya Pendleton was shot, they even get a national platform to talk about it. And when they do, they seize it.

4.The police are a special category. That’s the point. Black people are not, by dint of their melanin content, instructed to protect and serve the public; the police, by dint of their employment, are. Black people do not have a monopoly on violence; the police do. So when the people entrusted with upholding the law kill someone, that raises very different issues than if a kid from down the block shoots somebody. When the people who are supposed to protect everybody show an undeniable propensity to kill one group of people more than others (black men aged 15 to 19 are twenty-one times more likely to be shot by police than their white counterparts), that inevitably raises the question of discrimination. Our taxes don’t pay to support black criminals in their pursuit of black victims; they are currently going to support police in the shooting of black people.

5.The police are not an elevated category. The law still applies to them. When black people kill other black peop

This is from about a month ago

http://www.thenation.com/artic...