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I'm not surprised esp. when hearing 83% of Russian approve Putin https://www.washingtonpost.com.... If the citizens feel that the way of life in Russia is good, they're ok with high up people accumulating wealth and hide them. Let them be. They deserve it.

How can there be so many defects in Flash? Is Adobe paid to include vulnerabilities? If so, who pays? Secret government agencies? One of the many stories: The NSA hacks other countries by buying millions of dollars worth of computer vulnerabilities.

Is Adobe badly managed?

"Honestly, the only thing which has cumulatively had more security holes than Flash is Windows."

Is Microsoft paid to include vulnerabilities? Or is it bad management? "Monkey Boy" can't run a technology company?

Okay, so why does it remove entry-level jobs for minorities but apparently not for white teenagers?

Because white kids have a lot more opportunities. Many of them don't want a job, because they are too busy studying for college. Or they work part-time at their daddy's business. Black and Hispanic kids are at the bottom, so when that last rung is taken away, they get hurt the most.

For a clear illustration of what happens when you push "white" solutions onto communities where they don't apply, look what happened in Puerto Rico. The economy was doing well, and it was a hub for low end manufacturing, mostly paying about $3 an hour. Then the courts ruled that federal minimum wage laws had to apply to PR. So overnight the wages went up to $7.25, and the jobs disappeared. So instead of making $3 an hour, the workers were making $0 an hour, debts piled up as people stopped paying taxes, and now PR is bankrupt, and seeking a federal bailout.

What happened to PR will likely not happen in California, because the change will happen more slowly, and California has a far more diverse economy. But the same principles apply, and the worst effects will be on the people that can least afford it.

This is complete bullshit. I'm white, came from lower middle class, and my "daddy" didn't have any business for me to work at. I worked at McDonald's at 17 to save for my first car and there were more minorities who could barely speak comprehensible English working than there were middle class white kids with all of these "opportunities". Also I had to take out STUDENT LOANS to pay for my college. If you're a minority odds are it was all paid for you. I HAD TO GET GOOD GRADES to get into my school. Thanks to affirmative action I had way more competition with far LESS COMPETENT people. People who would rather learn how to speak improperly in order to stay "real" than to actually try for success. How is that MY fault? I'm not their fucking parents. Minorities are the ones who have the upper hand in this society. The problem is that most of them chose the route of ignorance instead of knowledge and success. That's a parental problem. My parents were not rich, they did not get me any jobs, they did not buy my first car at 17, they did not buy my way into college, they did not pay for my college tuition, they did not cosign on ANY loan I have ever taken out, they did not pay the down payment on my first house at 26, and they did not cosign on my mortgage. I did all of this all on my own and it would have been easier if I were a minority, less competent, and if I would have not been as responsible. For example I didn't qualify for an $8000 subsidy on my down payment for my first home because I had "saved too much". That's how Obama rewards responsibility. Quit bitching about minorities not having the same opportunities, they're just as available, and they are even given a boost over whites. We are well past our grandparent's generation where that wasn't the case so quit your bitching, everyone is tired of it. The age of PC for obnoxious "minorities" is finally fucking over.

For Al Gore, it's about $100 million he's made, mainly on making investments in green companies that received billions in Federal subsidies and grants. Hmm, ex VP and presidential candidate for the Democrat Party invests in green energy, and those companies happen to receive billions and billions of dollars from the Federal Government, enabling said ex-VP to inflate his net worth from under $2 million to over $100 million. No connection there at all, eh?

Those overseas students now face being deported from the United States for buying visas

One would think, the government's priorities would be to block the poor foreigners entering the country illegally and most immediately becoming a public burden. Only after we stop importing poverty, would the borders-enforcers turn on to people, who express their love for the United States without asking taxpayers for financial assistance.

Surely, both groups are breaking the law and ought to be prosecuted, but, if you must exercise prosecutorial discretion, wouldn't you start with those, who cause the most damage? The current Administration's priorities are exactly the opposite, for some reason...

Which is quite surprising, because prosecuting these immigrants — who had the advantage of geography in coming over here — would not require the elaborate entrapment schemes like setting up fake universities — the Administration already knows many of them, and even argues in court, it ought to be allowed to let them partake in Social Security and other "earned benefits" programs!

It is almost as if the plan is to allow them all to stay — despite going through the glacially slow motions of "deferred actions" — and, while staying, vote for the party in power, huh?

But seeing "Trump 2016" chalked onto a sidewalk will make those same weak-willed twits wail in horror?

Awww, such special snowflakes!

I'm older, but at 18 or 20 years old my father and grandfather were jumping out of troopships while being shelled and shot at....but millennials shit their pants if the rice in the school cafeteria isn't "authentic" to the way they make sushi in Japan. I'm not making this up.

That was a hate law. Seeing a penis won't ruin some little girl's life.

But seeing "Trump 2016" chalked onto a sidewalk will make those same weak-willed twits wail in horror?

Awww, such special snowflakes!

(And I'm willing to bet you don't have a daughter, no do you?)

I generally prefer to peruse at least another source or sometimes even two.

The fact that primary crossover is relatively rare is not reflective of its importance because of the relatively small numbers in which people vote.

Some forms of Gerrymandering are actually mandated by federal law too!

The Voting Rights Act amendment of 1982 actually led to minority majority districts that are specifically designed to give minority voters a voice, then are held up as that terrible Gerrymandering boogeyman.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/79...

In fact, this is the cause of "the most gerrymandered districts" that the Wall Street Journal talks about here:
https://www.washingtonpost.com...

Funny how there is so much noise about federally mandated gerrymandering of districts to give minorities a voice in places like North Carolina, but you hear so little about the gerrymandering in Maryland (where I live) that is controlled by Democrats.

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

Just in case people thought the last bit was purely exaggeration.

Triggered...by chalk.

Bill Gates on dangers of artificial intelligence: "I don't understand why some people are not concerned"

I think we should be very careful about artificial intelligence. If I were to guess like what our biggest existential threat is, it's probably that. So we need to be very careful with the artificial intelligence. Increasingly scientists think there should be some regulatory oversight maybe at the national and international level, just to make sure that we don't do something very foolish. With artificial intelligence we are summoning the demon. In all those stories where there's the guy with the pentagram and the holy water, it's like yeah he's sure he can control the demon. Didn't work out.
--Elon Musk

I am in the camp that is concerned about super intelligence. First the machines will do a lot of jobs for us and not be super intelligent. That should be positive if we manage it well. A few decades after that though the intelligence is strong enough to be a concern. I agree with Elon Musk and some others on this and don't understand why some people are not concerned.
--Bill Gate

Most prostitutes these days are virtually, or literally, slaves.

Not true. Most prostitutes work because they need the money, and are not otherwise coerced.

"Most" isn't really the question. The question is whether it happens enough that it is a problem. It does. The figures for the US are relatively low, in the tens of thousands. In-country trafficking is also a problem--abusing an at-risk use and offering them attention and the illusion of caring and then putting them on the corner and telling them to earn money.

They are often kidnapped or trafficked into the US.

False. Only a near-zero number of sex workers are "trafficked" into the US. "Sex trafficking" is mostly hysteria used by law enforcement to justify bloated budgets. It is nearly non-existent in America.

Not true at all. Law enforcement budgets have nothing to do with it--most law enforcement agencies don't even recognize human trafficking when they encounter it. Statistics are hard to get because it's a crime--you don't do a lot of gallup polls identifying drug users either. People who encounter it often don't know they do, because men seeking sex tend to not be the most observant people in the world.

They are then beaten into submission by their pimps

Wrong again. Prostitutes with pimps are less likely to be victims of violence. They also make more money, even after paying their pimp, than women working solo. Some groups of prostitutes will team up and hire a pimp, boosting both their safety and income. Source: SuperFreakonomics.

Coercion, violence, trafficking, etc. are not reasons to make prostitution illegal. They are the result of making it illegal.

Hahahahahaha. Parts of what you are saying are almost true. If someone teams up and hires someone to be their security or agent, that's one thing--if they are being coerced, it is another. Coercion, violence, and trafficking are NOT the result of making prostitution illegal. They are the result of demand exceeding supply and of the very high ROI you can get from trafficking in women. Even if you legalize, demand still exceeds supply, and demand grows more because you've just *legalized* it.

There are absolutely cases where prostitution is a victimless crime. But let's not pretend they're unrelated.

Legalise and regulate it. It is what they have done here in Australia. If you want to become a prostitute then you work at a brothel. Brothels that have women under coercion get caught pretty quickly, those responsible get jail time and the women being coerced get their freedom back...

Most prostitutes these days are virtually, or literally, slaves.

Not true. Most prostitutes work because they need the money, and are not otherwise coerced.

"Most" isn't really the question. The question is whether it happens enough that it is a problem. It does. The figures for the US are relatively low, in the tens of thousands. In-country trafficking is also a problem--abusing an at-risk use and offering them attention and the illusion of caring and then putting them on the corner and telling them to earn money.

They are often kidnapped or trafficked into the US.

False. Only a near-zero number of sex workers are "trafficked" into the US. "Sex trafficking" is mostly hysteria used by law enforcement to justify bloated budgets. It is nearly non-existent in America.

Not true at all. Law enforcement budgets have nothing to do with it--most law enforcement agencies don't even recognize human trafficking when they encounter it. Statistics are hard to get because it's a crime--you don't do a lot of gallup polls identifying drug users either. People who encounter it often don't know they do, because men seeking sex tend to not be the most observant people in the world.

They are then beaten into submission by their pimps

Wrong again. Prostitutes with pimps are less likely to be victims of violence. They also make more money, even after paying their pimp, than women working solo. Some groups of prostitutes will team up and hire a pimp, boosting both their safety and income. Source: SuperFreakonomics.

Coercion, violence, trafficking, etc. are not reasons to make prostitution illegal. They are the result of making it illegal.

Hahahahahaha. Parts of what you are saying are almost true. If someone teams up and hires someone to be their security or agent, that's one thing--if they are being coerced, it is another. Coercion, violence, and trafficking are NOT the result of making prostitution illegal. They are the result of demand exceeding supply and of the very high ROI you can get from trafficking in women. Even if you legalize, demand still exceeds supply, and demand grows more because you've just *legalized* it.

There are absolutely cases where prostitution is a victimless crime. But let's not pretend they're unrelated.

Most prostitutes these days are virtually, or literally, slaves.

Not true. Most prostitutes work because they need the money, and are not otherwise coerced.

They are often kidnapped or trafficked into the US.

False. Only a near-zero number of sex workers are "trafficked" into the US. "Sex trafficking" is mostly hysteria used by law enforcement to justify bloated budgets. It is nearly non-existent in America.

They are then beaten into submission by their pimps

Wrong again. Prostitutes with pimps are less likely to be victims of violence. They also make more money, even after paying their pimp, than women working solo. Some groups of prostitutes will team up and hire a pimp, boosting both their safety and income. Source: SuperFreakonomics.

Coercion, violence, trafficking, etc. are not reasons to make prostitution illegal. They are the result of making it illegal.

After he's finished (or started) raising everyone's taxes to pay for the vast new Washington bureaucracy he envisions. Maybe he can outpromise Bernie Sanders in the government giveaways department.

You're speaking in your head and then translating the sounds into the language's script (or matching the sound with a written word that sounds like the word you want). How native speakers make those mistakes so often is a little more troubling."

There is nothing troubling about it.

Even after knowing the language perfectly such homonym swaps can come out during typing text out in the language. Get over it.

Okay, so why does it remove entry-level jobs for minorities but apparently not for white teenagers?

Because white kids have a lot more opportunities. Many of them don't want a job, because they are too busy studying for college. Or they work part-time at their daddy's business. Black and Hispanic kids are at the bottom, so when that last rung is taken away, they get hurt the most.

For a clear illustration of what happens when you push "white" solutions onto communities where they don't apply, look what happened in Puerto Rico. The economy was doing well, and it was a hub for low end manufacturing, mostly paying about $3 an hour. Then the courts ruled that federal minimum wage laws had to apply to PR. So overnight the wages went up to $7.25, and the jobs disappeared. So instead of making $3 an hour, the workers were making $0 an hour, debts piled up as people stopped paying taxes, and now PR is bankrupt, and seeking a federal bailout.

What happened to PR will likely not happen in California, because the change will happen more slowly, and California has a far more diverse economy. But the same principles apply, and the worst effects will be on the people that can least afford it.

No. I'm white and I grew up in a home for children that had kids from all ethnic backgrounds and none of us had any money. Those of us who made good decisions have done well and those of us who made bad decisions have not done well. This had nothing to do with race at all. Same situation. Same opportunities. Same chances. Different decisions, different results.

What happened in PR had nothing to do with ethnicity. If they were white the exact same thing would have played out.

...y'all might bear in mind, here, that the government deliberately changed the definition of what "overweight" is, specifically in order to describe more people as overweight. Now, I'm not saying that people haven't gotten heavier. You look at an old black'n'white movie and everyone looks practically gaunt. But, the statistics have been meddled with by changing the definitions.

The federal government plans to change its definition of what is a healthy weight, a controversial move that would classify millions more Americans as being overweight. ...old article, just first one up. This change was, in fact, made. So, instant "fat epidemic", courtesy of the government's fat fingers on the scales.

Okay, so why does it remove entry-level jobs for minorities but apparently not for white teenagers?

Because white kids have a lot more opportunities. Many of them don't want a job, because they are too busy studying for college. Or they work part-time at their daddy's business. Black and Hispanic kids are at the bottom, so when that last rung is taken away, they get hurt the most.

For a clear illustration of what happens when you push "white" solutions onto communities where they don't apply, look what happened in Puerto Rico. The economy was doing well, and it was a hub for low end manufacturing, mostly paying about $3 an hour. Then the courts ruled that federal minimum wage laws had to apply to PR. So overnight the wages went up to $7.25, and the jobs disappeared. So instead of making $3 an hour, the workers were making $0 an hour, debts piled up as people stopped paying taxes, and now PR is bankrupt, and seeking a federal bailout.

What happened to PR will likely not happen in California, because the change will happen more slowly, and California has a far more diverse economy. But the same principles apply, and the worst effects will be on the people that can least afford it.

Here's evidence to the contrary.
https://www.washingtonpost.com...

I don't think so. See this Washington Post article for some prior history of derivative sovereign immunity and related matters. Generally speaking, if a contractor is doing something authorized by the government and they don't exceed the authorization, they probably have immunity. Unless Cellebrite did something not authorized by the government, they probably can't be sued successfully. If the FBI acted within their powers granted by Congress, and searching the terrorist's phone is clearly within these powers, they should have immunity. I don't think there's any way to successfully bring a lawsuit against either the federal government or against Cellebrite.

Contributions from wealthy donors in Saudi Arabia (as well as Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates) does comprise a major part of the revenues ISIS collects. However, it's not the greatest part. Most of it comes from theft (particularly of oil resources), kidnapping, extortion and taxation.

You'd think that by now all the oil resource sources and distribution facilities would have been blown to hell and back to keep ISIS from having that money.

There's obviously a deeper game being played.

Contributions from wealthy donors in Saudi Arabia (as well as Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates) does comprise a major part of the revenues ISIS collects. However, it's not the greatest part. Most of it comes from theft (particularly of oil resources), kidnapping, extortion and taxation.

Money doesn't dictate outcomes, it just helps a little...

Like 91% of the time

Muggers on Metro are a relatively recent phenomena. However, the Metro system seems to be suffering from imminent cascade failure. During the one day total shutdown of Metro, 26 separate badly-worn cable connections were found, of the sort that caused a local shutdown on March 14th, and similar to the short that caused the L'Enfant Plaza incident in 2015 that killed one rider, and hospitalized 80 more. .

The REAL question, at least in my eyes, for Metro, is given the damage shown during the March 17th shutdown, how did these cables POSSIBLY have passed the inspection that was claimed to have been done after the L'Enfant Plaza incident. . .

Some people want to find discrimination or outrage everywhere...

Yeah, the plight of the all-American worker having his government and economic prospects ruined by imaginary illegal voting. Its right up there with the back-breaking work required to keep the South's gerrymandering in a league of its own. Breaks my heart...

The dallasnews story is based on allegations made way back in 2007. How did those pan out?

People are looking for any opportunity to remove people with Latin- or black-sounding names from the voter rolls. Florida has experienced a rash of this form of disenfranchisement. The state of Florida claims there are many thousands of people illegally registered as voters, and yet they consistently do this based on misspelled names and such... as if their computers couldn't tell the difference. Its a pattern of intentional voter suppression. Just the number of citizens reporting disenfranchisement totally swamps the confirmed cases of voter fraud.

You may think voter IDs could solve these issues, but in reality it would just move the nature of the allegations to ID fraud. It would pit xenophobes against the ability of many citizens to even hold an ID. ...and it would. As a gay person, I see the issue through the Right's burning desire to exclude. There are always new tactics -- like the War On Drugs or "religious freedom of for-profit businesses" -- to try and preserve for the standard-bearers the luxury of choice: to pretend different people don't exist, or else intimidate and abuse them with impunity.

Since you're so dismissive about the studies on this subject, I'll leave it there.

(The assertion about close races was in the GP you seemed to allude to.)

The voters in the first article may be interested to learn the discrimination has an Anglo-Saxon cultural basis, but I doubt they would find solace in that in any case.

If you ignore the history of voting fraud in places like Chicago, or the organized (frequently through illicit means and threat of force or violence) control of marginalized peoples by Tamany hall, then you're ignoring a lot of important history.

Once again, the subject is not ballot-box stuffing or similar attempts at mass fraud. Voter fraud is when someone impersonates another person at the poll or tricks authorities when registering to vote; That is salient to the subject of voter IDs and immigrants.

Here is a link about written tests in US voting history. Also, more recently poll taxes. As with Tamany Hall, this is grade school history.

That judicialwatch link is an opinion piece from nine years ago that doesn't even give a rough idea of scale beyond weasel words like "many". It has one broken link to a newspaper, and several other links that are activist groups (just as judicialwatch is, itself, a conservative activist group). IOW, they don't feel confident enough to link directly to research and they conveniently left statistics out. You took accepted their opinion as true on their authority. The other articles you think you saw were probably about accusations that didn't pan out -- see the studies I referenced via washingtonpost.

That article contains many independent studies - scholarly works. Perhaps you could read the synopsis at least.

That's interesting about Mexico, though it would be ironic to hold them up as a good example when their people are fleeing. As for "pot-kettle", false equivalence canards got old in the 90s. They don't hold water in most places. Not only have I looked at your sources more closely than you have looked at mine, I have backed-up my concerns; you haven't.

So you think there are Mexicans plotting to walk into polling stations so they can impersonate Americans? Or that there are enough of these people willing to risk arrest and deportation to make a significant difference?

If that were true, there would be enough registered-but-seldom-voting Americans who do return to the polls in order to make that phenomenon stand out as a statistic. I mean, there have to be more than a couple foreigners who tried this and arrived at the polls *after* their mark, right? Where are the cases??

Speaking of poll paranoia, its usually racist: http://www.rawstory.com/2016/0...

Next they'll be issuing written tests to screen voters, and jacking up the fees and conditions for holding an ID. And of course, it not like any of this has anything to do with the darker periods of electoral history. Just like racism itself, that old stuff happened on another planet and people suggesting its a real problem are 'bonkers' and there is just no way to discuss the issue with data so ridicule will do instead. LOL

BTW, I lurrrrve the assertion that elections are too neck-and-neck to allow even one foreigner to besmirch our lovely democracy... because the rights holders in this debate ARE US citizens and the flippant "anti-populist" sentiments about "oh some long lines, polls closed on them, so what boohoo losers -- lets move on" are whats completely insane by comparison. When conservative douchebags want to turn over a new leaf on this issue then maybe they'll warrant more respect.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

They abandoned the political tradition required to make this country function: Argue in chambers and then go to dinner together afterwards. Negotiate and compromise. They just don't do that any more since GW Bush Jr's 1st term. And they became the party of "NO" in 2009.

This simply isn't true. The Washington Post keeps a database of votes by Congresscritters and Senators. If you click on the right-most column ("Party"), it sorts each member by how often they voted with their own party.

109th Congress when R held the House (2005-2007). R were more likely to vote with their party in the 109th Congress, but so were a lot of D. And if you look at the bottom (least likely to vote with their party) it's a scattered mix of R and D.

110th Congress when D held the House (2007-2009). Now look at the 110th Congress when D took back the House. With the exception of one R, the entire top half of people who voted mostly with their party is D. If you look at the bottom, it's mostly R who voted against their party. In other words, Repubicans in the 110th Congress were more cooperative than Democrats in the 109th Congress.

The 111th Congress (D held, 2009-2011) is more of the same. An almost solid block of D in the top half of most likely to vote with their party. Republicans were more likely to vote with the Democrat party in 2007-2011 than Democrats were likely to vote with the Republican party in 2005-2007. The exact opposite of the obstructionist claim.

Same thing in the Senate. In the 109th Senate when R held the majority, there's no real pattern to who voted most with their party, But in the 110th Senate when D held the majority, it is by far D who voted most with their party and R who voted most against theirs. Same pattern holds for the 111th Senate.

It's the Democrats who were uncompromising in 2007-2011. The Republicans were more cooperative in those years than Democrats were in 2005-2007. The general trend is that the party in power tends to have more "faithful" members. But this is much more true when D is in power than when R is in power.

There's no better reason to vote for Donald Trump than to make SJWs heads fucking EXPLODE!!

Not just "SJWs". Someone scrawled "Trump 2016" in chalk in many places on the Emory University campus. Trivial vandalism, right? The student reaction?

That afternoon, a group of 40 to 50 students protested. According to the student newspaper, the Emory Wheel, they shouted in the quad, "You are not listening! Come speak to us, we are in pain!"...

Jim Wagner, the president of the university in Atlanta, met with the protesters and later sent an email to the campus community, explaining, in part, "During our conversation, they voiced their genuine concern and pain in the face of this perceived intimidation."

What are we becoming as a nation? This notion that "emoticon diversity is a core part of CS" is not some oddball exception. We've really lost the thread here.

I don't believe your statement to be true. The local public radio (at least here) gets the majority of its money from "underwriters" (local business) and member donations. This funds both local programming and NPR subscriptions. There are other states where public radio is funded by local universities. In other regions that don't have as much money - Corp for PB helps subsidize operations so that "everyone" has access to public radio.

"More than 90% of VPR's funding comes from the local community." and "Less than 10% of VPR's funding comes from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting government"

Others have pointed out that tax deductible donations are a form of gov't funding. But even then it is estimated to be 25% - not 50% (even Fox news quotes 25%) Using the same math - Religion is costing taxpayers $71 billion / year. I don't think one can compare NPR total $166MM budget to $71 billion / year.

http://digital.vpr.net/support...
http://www.americanthinker.com...
https://www.washingtonpost.com...

A lot of hay has been made about Trump's support from uneducated voters, largely from this poll, page 36, which puts percent of supporters with "college degree" at 46%.

The press, of course, is quick to point out that 46% is less than half, so they proclaim far and wide that his supporters are "mostly uneducated".

What the press doesn't note, however, is that 70 % of Americans don't have a degree.

Trumps supporters are more educated than the population average.

(A copy of my earlier post, but it seems appropriate here.)

> Trump won't tank the country.]

How do you know? He's on all sides of practically every position - he hates outsourcing, but he outsources the manufacture of his branded clothing to mexico, china, honduras and bangladesh.

He says he's against H1B visas,then he's for them, then he's "changing," then he's against them again.

No one has a clue what Trump will do, what we do know is that he's skilled at innuendo and insults. Beyond that, no clue. And if you are one of those people who thinks that's a great qualification to be president, then you're just drinking kool-aid.

> Trump won't tank the country.]

How do you know? He's on all sides of practically every position - he hates outsourcing, but he outsources the manufacture of his branded clothing to mexico, china, honduras and bangladesh.

He says he's against H1B visas,then he's for them, then he's "changing," then he's against them again.

No one has a clue what Trump will do, what we do know is that he's skilled at innuendo and insults. Beyond that, no clue. And if you are one of those people who thinks that's a great qualification to be president, then you're just drinking kool-aid.

Trump 2016

Suddenly I feel this aura of safety leave the room... Perhaps it's some musings left by python enthusiast ;^)

All of this is very interesting, especially in the context of D.C.'s recent dealing with WalMart. The council agreed to let WalMart build supercenters agreeing to increase in minimum wage in exchange for their promise to build some stores in food deserts. Then, low and behold, WalMart said that the economic conditions would no longer make it possible for them to build the grocery stores in those locations after they already built the ones that they figured would be profitable.

Washington post coverage

"Fool me ... won't get fooled again."

You seem not to realize: Christians and Jews and Yezidi and if you want I google for the other Abrahmic religions: are not heathens.

True or not, this is not relevant. The point was, Muslims are compelled by their faith to actively spread it — including, even if not always, by violence. This makes Islam worse (to an objective observer) than Christianity or Judaism.

a) they are poor and have nothing to lose b) someone killed their family

That may be true about people in Afghanistan or Iraq, but it is decidedly not true about the terrorists in the West. Even Washington Post agrees. Najim Laachraoui — the maker of the Paris and Brussels bombs — immigrated from Morocco, grew up in Belgium and graduated a university. He was well off and his family was safely in Europe. The two homicide bombers also grew up in the rich Brussels (with all the "safety net" of a European country). Like millions of others, they had criminal records, but no prior ties to terrorism — no one in their family were killed. They got radicalized by something — but poverty is not it.

The San Bernardino murderers were also wealthy Americans. Tsarnaev brothers moved to the US at young age, but weren't poor. They did immigrate from a war-torn region, but had no one in their immediate family killed — and, if anyone was, it was not by the US.

So, your attempts to blame poverty and desire to avenge family thoroughly debunked, you are left with the two choices I gave you before: a) skin color; b) religion.

Your middle part was just nonsense.

The grace, with which you surrender your positions, continues to astound. It seems, we are done here.

Agreed, but borders is a prerequisite. You can't complain that we're not kicking people out therefore we don't need borders, when we don't actually have well controlled borders to begin with. That logic doesn't work.

I disagree - you are trying to use reverse logic for this. To take this in the abstract: If you have a piece of land somewhere in the forest that you are not throwing anyone out of, then you do not need a fence around it. So unless and until we are actually throwing people out (which is by far more difficult than having a border as the people in question tend to have papers that allow them to be here) then there is no use for the border.

Even the loners are doing it for some ideology or in the name of some group, even if they're not actually part of it. The San Bernardino terrorists, afaik, were not "part" of ISIS, but the woman declared her allegiance to ISIS before they did it.

Well yes...and?

You must not read much news. I've seen it in every major newspaper, both in articles and in the comment section. Here's just one of many examples of what I said above: https://www.washingtonpost.com...

The entire line of reasoning is idiotic... you make decisions based on what's best for you, not some psychoanalysis of your enemy and what they want or don't want.

I can see your point with this but I suspect it is more people who want to allow refugee migrants in that are trying to use any argument they can to change public opinion - including "The enemy of our enemy is our friend".

More people die in car crashes than lots of stuff. Yet we regulate lots and lots of other stuff. Now unless you're going around saying "I'm not willing to put up with the inconveniences of food safety regulations just to save a handful of people from food poisoning, when CAR CRASHES kill so many more" then you're being awfully hypocritical.

Your argument is also very short-sighted... we already do a hell of a lot to fight against terrorism right now. We have multiple government agencies, civilian and military, dealing with terrorist groups and state sponsors. I think it's pretty remarkable, and no accident, that a wealthy terrorist group like ISIS hasn't gotten their hands on some nuclear bombs when there are suppliers from the former USSR, Pakistan, North Korea, and so on.

You are right: - we do do a hell of a lot to fight terrorism right now and I think that it's enough, if not more than enough (witness the uselessness of TSA checks).

I am not saying "do not do food safety checks" - I am saying "do not take every grain of rice of every shipment from every country and examine it for lead content" because at some point a line needs to be drawn saying "We are not willing to let go of more of our freedom in the name of a bit of perceived [temporary] safety". I am paraphrasing Ben Franklin of course but here it stands true. We are doing, in my opinion, quite enough against the real level of danger that Daesh (and whatever one-offs associate themselves with Daesh) present - relatively not much - and I am not willing to continue to give the state (states in fact as this is more than one country) more and more and more power out of fear of something that has zero (to some number of decimal points) possibility of actually harming anyone that I know.

I agree about security theater, in the instances where it is theater, but let me ask you this. If you're not Muslim, and even if you are but you're not like a hardcore radical, how would it significantly change your life if we went around shutting down radical mosques, deporting every Muslim who ever said "Yes I would welcome sharia law in [some Western country]" or "Yes I support the death penalty for apostasy", refusing all refugees and immigrants from areas with strong

Except, wasn't the whole Jennifer Lawrence naked photos scandal all about images leaked out of an iPhone? Wasn't it images on an Apple cloud drive??

Nope, more than half were from hacked Gmail accounts - keep up with the news, binge shitter.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2016/03/16/the-shockingly-simple-way-the-nude-photos-of-celebgate-were-stolen/

Based on what we know from the plea agreement and prosecutors, it appears that one major part of Celebgate is much less elaborate than what some 4chan users claimed at the time: that many of the photos were stolen through a clever exploitation of a previously unknown iCloud security flaw — a claim that Apple had denied.

Instead, Collins used a method of gaining access to password-protected accounts that can victimize pretty much anyone. Phishing schemes come in a lot of different flavors, but all follow the same basic outline: Users are tricked into giving out sensitive information by malicious email accounts or websites that appear legitimate. Spear phishing, which appears to be what happened here, involves targeting specific users by impersonating businesses or individuals they might already know.

According to court filings, Collins stole photos, videos and sometimes entire iPhone backups from at least 50 iCloud accounts and 72 Gmail accounts,

If I had to guess, I would say it was Johns Hopkins University.....

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

Johns Hopkins denied it today.
 

"it will hand yet more power to the financial sector in that banks and related fintech companies will oversee all transactions."

Banks compete with each other and have to please me to keep my business. The real danger is the government. It already forces banks to snitch on customers, will gleefully confiscate "suspiciously large" amounts of cash, and are already talking about eliminating large bills to further discourage you from using cash.

While folks are up in arms about the FBI, the real threat to privacy is the taxman... Can never buy yourself enough civilization, can you?

NIRP = Negative Interest Rates, a situation where a central bank tries to push interest rates below zero (instead of getting interest on your savings, you pay the bank to hold your cash). The theory is that THIS is the thing that will force consumers to spend their wealth, and yadda yadda, the economy starts growing and adding jobs (the reason for the 2% inflation target is similar, to make debt more attractive as one can pay it off in less valuable currency, and to institute a "use it or lose it" tax which doesn't need to be voted on by the legislature).

The PROBLEM is that if rates get too negative, then people will convert their wealth to cash. Large denomination bills enable that. That's why there has been a push on to eliminate the 100 dollar bill, under the guise of battling terrorists and criminals. The head of the European Central Bank has recently proposed eliminating the 500 Euro note for the same reason. A happy coincidence is that this makes it harder for people to convert their wealth to cash.

This won't be instituted all at once. This is how it is introduced, under a false casus belli.

A cashless society means you are a captive audience to these sorts of experiments. Additionally, while cash doesn't require infrastructure to complete transactions, cashless transactions require a great deal of infrastructure. Buying something electronically means you are requesting permission to buy - either via authentication or other constraints.

Humans have been using currency for thousands of years. Instead of hastily rushing to do away with it, we should approach the situation with a lot of caution. Something proponents most certainly do not want.

Currency is already a logical construct. The slips of paper are inherently worth very little. They don't even function that well as toilet paper (not that I would know). Currency which becomes an electronic logical construct gives a tremendous amount of power to the people running the servers. And even more importantly perhaps, their cronies.

foreign countries also have monuments to their cultural or political heroes too.

It's a fair point: if our President visits a foreign country, he will be photographed in front of political art in that foreign country. When Reagan visited the Soviet Union, he was photographed in front of art of Lenin, and Lenin had an even higher body count than Che Guevara.

But the charge I level against President Obama is that he his helping the government of Cuba without getting anything at all in return. When Nixon went to China, I don't think he helped the government of China, but in any event China was one of the three superpowers and he was there to negotiate. (As I understand it he wanted to make sure that China and the USSR didn't become too cozy.) President Obama could have ignored Cuba, or at least stayed away; there is nothing of value at stake.

As I understand it, President Obama believes that normalizing relations with Cuba will, in the long run, benefit the people of Cuba. I truly hope that he is right and I am wrong about this. I would rather be wrong and have the people of Cuba benefit, than be right and have them continue to suffer.

But at the moment I agree with this piece: https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/03/21/i-was-a-prisoner-of-castros-regime-obamas-visit-to-cuba-is-a-mistake/

Bonus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitburg_controversy_(1985)

I read through that article. It doesn't seem relevant. The Bitburg thing was a unique scenario: Reagan was paying back a favor, nobody realized at first that there might be SS buried in the graveyard, the German people overwhelmingly were in favor of the visit going forward, Reagan changed his speech to address the controversy, and Reagan visited a concentration camp afterward.

If we were kicking anyone out this might make a difference...but we're not actually kicking anyone out so adding borders does not have any effect other than to annoy those of us who like traveling between countries here.

Agreed, but borders is a prerequisite. You can't complain that we're not kicking people out therefore we don't need borders, when we don't actually have well controlled borders to begin with. That logic doesn't work.

The terrorist attacks are like Anonymous attacks in that they are sometimes well coordinated and sometimes done by incompetent loners.

Even the loners are doing it for some ideology or in the name of some group, even if they're not actually part of it. The San Bernardino terrorists, afaik, were not "part" of ISIS, but the woman declared her allegiance to ISIS before they did it.

no, I have not actually heard anyone at all basing their position based on terrorism, other than to be more against Daesh than ever.

You must not read much news. I've seen it in every major newspaper, both in articles and in the comment section. Here's just one of many examples of what I said above: https://www.washingtonpost.com...

The entire line of reasoning is idiotic... you make decisions based on what's best for you, not some psychoanalysis of your enemy and what they want or don't want.

While I feel bad for the families of those who have been killed or wounded, the reality is that Daesh have managed to kill fewer people outside of the middle east than die in car crashes here in a month

More people die in car crashes than lots of stuff. Yet we regulate lots and lots of other stuff. Now unless you're going around saying "I'm not willing to put up with the inconveniences of food safety regulations just to save a handful of people from food poisoning, when CAR CRASHES kill so many more" then you're being awfully hypocritical.

Your argument is also very short-sighted... we already do a hell of a lot to fight against terrorism right now. We have multiple government agencies, civilian and military, dealing with terrorist groups and state sponsors. I think it's pretty remarkable, and no accident, that a wealthy terrorist group like ISIS hasn't gotten their hands on some nuclear bombs when there are suppliers from the former USSR, Pakistan, North Korea, and so on.

which is why I do not perceive Daesh's ability to do war against us here to be substantial enough to justify any significant changes in the way that I live my life (i.e. being willing to put up with more security theater that isn't useful for stopping Daesh anyway).

I agree about security theater, in the instances where it is theater, but let me ask you this. If you're not Muslim, and even if you are but you're not like a hardcore radical, how would it significantly change your life if we went around shutting down radical mosques, deporting every Muslim who ever said "Yes I would welcome sharia law in [some Western country]" or "Yes I support the death penalty for apostasy", refusing all refugees and immigrants from areas with strong ISIS influence, and so on? Seems like it would have absolutely no effect on most people, including Muslims.

You're at more risk from a teen driving a car, or second hand cigarette smoke.

Or even furniture.