Slashdot Mirror

Its easy to process all that worthless data: throw it away and document something useful. This sounds more like a goldmine for advertisers than anything else. Who knows how much money has already been wasted on this

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/stop-library-congress-wasting-money-archiving-twitter-posts/x6h3VYvr

There is currently a petition at we the people to shorten copyright terms to 10 years:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/shorten-excessive-copyright-terms/XMc72zjc

Agreed, but remember that copyright law _already_ applies to software and we seem to be doing okay on that front, mostly (perhaps due to the number of different ways to express an idea, relative to the number of ideas which is what patents try to cover).
And go sign https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/shorten-excessive-copyright-terms/XMc72zjc

So is the White House:
Petition to address specifics instead of blindly associating them.

OK, here it is: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/overhaul-petition-process/JggZYLmL
Short URL : http://wh.gov/Uyrx

White House Petition

Then we should classify them as a hate group and get it over with.

I bet this would be a better way to go about it.

There is a petition at the White House that if i were an american citizen I would sign to declare WBS a hate group:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/legally-recognize-westboro-baptist-church-hate-group/DYf3pH2d

This should be slashdoted.

We The People petition: Legally recognize westboro baptist church as a hate group

No. The idea that we can label any group as a "hate group" to limit Free Speech is disgusting and an affront to the very idea of a Free Society.
I don't care if you want to hate blacks or hate whites, hate atheists or hate some religious group. I don't care if you want to hate the troops or hate the people who don't want to serve, I don't car if you hate war or hate peace. It's your right to hate or love as you see fit, and to speak your mind without fear of retribution for those things.

I hate the WBBC, I hate what they stand for and hate what they do. In many cases I personally feel that their actions often cross the line from being speech to active harassment and intimidation, and for those things they should indeed be prosecuted. But they should not face Censure or additional penalties simply because you don't like their message.

If what they are doing makes you that angry, how about you get off your ass and stand across from them with a picket sign. These online petitions don't mean jack shit, they're just an empty gesture to make you feel good about not doing a damn thing.

We The People petition: Legally recognize westboro baptist church as a hate group

The White House plans to respond to each petition that crosses the signature threshold, which you can view on the Terms of Participation page. In a few rare cases (such as specific procurement, law enforcement, or adjudicatory matters), the White House response might not address the facts of a particular matter to avoid exercising improper influence. In addition, the White House will not respond to petitions that violate We the People’s Terms of Participation. In some cases, a single response may be used for similar petitions.

If they do not plan to respond to petitions, they should drop the claim that they plan to. This says nothing about a timeframe, though, so it is possible that they do plan to respond to the petitions, but not until we're in the year 2525.

There's only one thing to do! We need the Rebel Alliance!

Nice! Someone was thinking about humanity. I mean really! Build the evil death star??

There's only one thing to do!
We need the Rebel Alliance!

Let's start a petition asking to take our petitions seriously and not in the most condescending and patronizing manner possible.

There already is one, no duplicates allowed. Here is their response.

They are LYING, though

Getting back to the TSA example -- the response literally said "TSA is agile and awesome and by the way, here's our expansion plan for the next 10 years". They are not even pretending, since the response didn't even say "we hear you and we promise to address your concerns"

The situation has gotten so bad that they don't feel the need to even pay lip service and fake a response (notice I am not even talking about DOING something to address the petition).

Let's start a petition asking to take our petitions seriously and not in the most condescending and patronizing manner possible.

There already is one, no duplicates allowed. Here is their response.

But the NAACP is right that there are "racist elements" among the teabaggers. "You must expel the bigots and racists in your ranks or take full responsibility for all of their actions," NAACP president Benjamin Jealous has said." Note that Jealous did not say that all teabaggers are "bigots and racists," just certain "elements." There's a big difference there, but the hostile defensiveness of teabaggers is telling: either they don't want to own up to the racism and bigotry of their own kind, out of ignorant denial or willful suppression of the truth, or they agree with it but are smart enough not to be so outspoken about their real views.

Trying to defend oneself from slander and libel is "defensiveness", somehow just by itself confirming evidence of the baseless accusation that was made. What other response would they have liked better? Callous indifference? Cheering and hooting?

And the blogger never bothers to mention an example of this alleged racism.

Note who makes the accusation as well, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which is a group solely devoted to the furtherance of a particular ethnic group's interests (and I might add, a particular group of "colored people"). By the dubious logic of the NAACP, if they had been affiliated with the Tea Party, then they should have been expelled. Also note the classy use of the label, "teabaggers" by the blogger in question.

As to the logic of such ostracism, why should we be expelling bigots? Are their concerns and issues somehow less worthy than anyone else's? Why is it disturbing that someone has racist views, but not disturbing to ostracize that person and their concerns merely because they have racist views?This is a claim that someone doesn't matter merely because they hold racist or bigoted viewpoints.

This also is one of the worst manifestations of Democrat racism where racism of whites are quickly and severely criticized even in cases where it is purely imaginary, but racism of ethnic groups associated with Democrats, particularly Blacks and Hispanics, typically gets ignored, even when it's pretty high grade, such as the preacher of the church that President Obama had attended for 20 years. Or the various racist groups associated with the Democrats such as the New Black Panthers and La Raza.

First, the military, the police and the courts literally provide no value. (And don't tell me, "I bet you wouldn't say that to a soldier" because I am a veteran.) What they do is prevent destructive behavior through greater destruction. It's necessary for a free society to exist, but you and I aren't better off because someone else is wasting away in jail, we'd be better off if they had never committed the crime. Wars do *not* generate wealth, that's the Broken Window Fallacy.

So, which 98% of the government would you scrap?

Ah, the faux-Libertarian argument.

66% of the spending (Table 11.1) is not roads military and police, it is transferring wealth, literally writing checks to individuals. People think that politicians are bought, but really, politicians have been buying voters over the years.

Now while that has grown (as a % of GDP) from 2% to 66% over the years, and look at table 15.1 from the same. Government receipts have stayed steady as a % of GDP; even when the nation was united in WWII we were not able to significantly increase receipts to cover our spending.

The reality is that we have a crisis of spending too much. Our interest payments are continuing to increase, and if we fully lose our AAA rating, our government will stop providing all the services you value so much. We will spend all our money on interest payments, instead.

So if you believe in an active government that will continue to provide services, you should support efforts to balance the budget by cutting these programs.

Here, let me exchange the White House for you.

Do you see the difference between providing the medium and providing a link to it?

They don't need to lobby because Apple zealotry is unfortunately strong enough as it is.

I remember this being announced, but I'm not sure it's true right now. http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/advisory-boards/jobs-council/about/staff

Or bail them out?

We must bail them out.

They are too tasty to fail.

Or bail them out?

Why the hell not! I'll make the argument that Twinkie production is vital from a national security standpoint! Knowing that there won't be Twinkies to come home to is going to be a major blow to troop morale! So, everybody, while you still can buy a box of Twinkies and give it to the USO or other organization. For the troops. For America!

Or bail them out?

Well, petitions on change.org have no time limit, so you can take your time to get a bunch of signatures, then message all the signers to sign another similar petition on the White House Petition site, where the administration has committed to at least responding to all petitions that hit a certain threshold in a certain amount of time.

I love Texas! https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/peacefully-grant-state-texas-withdraw-united-states-america-and-create-its-own-new-government/BmdWCP8B

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/direct-new-delhi-regime-create-independent-nation-300-million-indias-untouchables/7WSsjJkD

If "extreme" petitions aren't to your liking,
you might prefer one calling for Pres, Obama
to:

"REVIVE & FUND U.S. R&D for
  Safer & Plutonium-Free Thorium-based
  (a k a LFTR) Energy technologies,
  & RECLASSIFY Thorium."

Read & - if you agree - Sign here:

+ https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/revive-fund-us-rd-safer-plutonium-free-thorium-based-k-lftr-energy-technologies-reclassify-thorium/Xdv6KfjL

Here, I made one. Probably not the most cleverly written but hey.

Singed up just so I could vote for this. Thanks!

Who's up for forming a lynch mob?

Why form a lynch mob? Just tell them to sue the people who run https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/ for patent infringement and see how well they do against the Secret Service.

Hence my petition. Get rid of (some of) the net receivers, gain some much-needed capital to help pay down the national debt in exchange, and as a side effect we have a smaller government to boot.

(For what it's worth, I don't expect to get more than a couple hundred signatures, tops.)

Here, I made one. Probably not the most cleverly written but hey.

Yes, that's the change we were looking for. Stealing republican ideas and taking credit for them. Look at how Obama handled single payer advocates and you'll see what a dishonest disgusting piece of shit he really is.

Yah, he sure is hiding that fact well by constantly saying, in public, that Obamacare is based on "ideas from both parties" and borrows "republican ideas" and by putting it on the Whitehouse website. Why, you'd actually have to read or watch something other than FOX News to uncover information that cleverly hidden.

The difference is with Obama it's the government/public agencies doing this, while under Romney it'll be private sector doing it and billing anyone who wants to know what they saw.

Well, there goes that "difference". You apparently haven't seen Obama's latest Executive Order.

Remember, folks, it's a "public-private partnership"; we don't call it fascism anymore!

I'm an American, and this pisses me off. This is so obviously stupid. We should not detain someone just because they disagree with us. We shouldn't even question them... There was NO reason to stop him getting on that plane. He was no threat to the plane, to the people, or to the country. Everyone can clearly see that this is just stupid.

My fellow Americans... Pony up.

Write your representatives.http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/

Write your Senators. http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Hell, write the President. http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

Please write and say... "Please stop being Stupid." Mention this incident. Keep it simple. Keep it polite.

Let me guess, you think Obama breaks into talking about how America won't back down from acts of terror when he's talking to a group about how we need better fuel economy in cars as well.

Well, Obama did start the thing off saying "Since our founding, the United States has been a nation that respects all faiths. We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others. But there is absolutely no justification to this type of senseless violence. None. The world must stand together to unequivocally reject these brutal acts."

It wasn't until he started talking about the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that he mentioned the terror. It's clear to me that he was speaking about 9/11 when he said it.

If you can grasp the concept of context, duh, yes, he was calling it an act of terrorism.

Well, the context is there in plain english. Perhaps you can point out where I'm wrong. Here is even a biased link that I think you might enjoy.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/09/12/remarks-president-deaths-us-embassy-staff-libya

Here's another hint for you. If they actually had killed the embassy staff because of outrage over an 'American' produced movie against muslimism, that would still be terrorism. It would just be a different motive for the terrorism than the war in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Actually, no. Terrorism as US law defines it needs a deliberate act or an intentional component. Some speculate that this is the reason why Obama didn't call it terrorism and why they went around apologizing for the first amendment for 2 weeks after the attacks. The fact of the matter is that even if Obama called it terrorism by any stretch of the imagination, they did it once then went around for several weeks claiming it was about a damn movie trailer. So it appears they changed their minds directly after it then changed them back when it became politically advantageous or something. My guess is that Obama was afraid of being called weak on terrorism if a terrorist act happened under his watch, something similar to the McCain campain's statements about being better suited to protecting America from terrorism.

But what we know now is that there was an act of terrorism. It was allowed to happen because of oversights and general misfeasance by government organizations with senior members of the administration saying they didn't know requests for extra security had been made under the administration, the administration appeared in public to blame it on our first amendment's protection of free speech, and eventually called it what it was.

If this isn't a sign of incompetence, I'm not sure what is.

Obama lied about what se said in a speech, and the moderator interrupted Romney to make the same claim!

The speech contents are here (click on "read the transcript"on the right side); the word "terror" was never mentioned nor was it claimed terrorism was the cause of the attack.

If you are tired of politicians that lie, perhaps you should not vote for one where the media willingly repeat and try to support the lies.

I tried to submit this for an article a couple of days ago, but I don't have enough pull/cachet/advertising skills to pull it off...

Found this petition to the Obama Administration created Sept 17 for prohibiting anything offensive of major religions: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/outlaw-offending-prophets-major-religions/94kL1tsN This is a dangerously slippery slope.

1. Using the words "utterly fail" doesn't matter when you are wrong: White House Budget. Yes, Congress enacts the budget. The President has the ability to use his office to shape the budget debate - a more powerful president can do so to a significant degree. A large part of the power that comes with the executive branch is the gravitas and social power it can potentially wield.

2. You are attempting to nitpick away from the point of my original post - that the parent post tried - and failed - to attack Obama's credibility and by extension offer cover to Romney's. Romney has worked hard at eroding any credibility he could have had on the budget through lies, obfuscation, and willful ignorance. Obama has, regardless of one's views of him as a politician and leader - maintained credibility. The only place he's arguably hurt his credibility is by buying into the conservative myth that austerity measures are either necessary or helpful (one need simply look at Europe to see what a catastrophic failure they have been). That is in an entirely different league from willfully and intentionally trying to hide the economic instability and class war engendering greed of the Romney/Ryan budget.

3. We keep getting shafted by politicians because we do not have an adequate feedback loop to punish the corrupt, we need to elect politicians as package deals (taking bad positions with the good), and we have a twisted two party system driven by corporate influence. Not because "99%" of the country believes campaign promises.

This is slashdot. What are you doing with a wife?

Also, I don't know about the others, but I'm pretty sure that Obama already has a wife. Link: http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/first-lady-michelle-obama

You'll notice that he doesn't post here.

Obama: "Mine will be the most transparent administration in history."

I'm pretty sure that is a misquote since googling it only turns up anti-obama sites. That's poor form if you want to show something actually hypocritical and not just more fauxbama stuff.

From whitehouse.gov:

My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

You should probably do a little more research yourself, before making such accusations.

BTW, 5 seconds and one Google search is all it took to find the above quote.

Obama: "Mine will be the most transparent administration in history."

I'm pretty sure that is a misquote since googling it only turns up anti-obama sites. That's poor form if you want to show something actually hypocritical and not just more fauxbama stuff.

Best I can make out, it refers to his promise to increase access to government records by putting lots of stuff into an internet database. I remember when it went online as the Open Government Initiative. You will see the word "Transparency" is the first ont he sub-heading of that page.

If you want to get a more grounded list of broken promises, try the Obameter. But, I want to point out that broken campaign promises aren't quite the same thing as "flip-flopping" which, in the GP's context of daily show clips, refers to taking up contradictory positions in public statements -- campaign promises are goals that may not be achieved due to circumstances beyond the candidate's control, flip-flops are 100% willful decisions to simply say different things.

If only there was some kind of website!

They do actually...
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/06/23/secret-life-white-house-bees

Here ya go! https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/hold-state-funeral-neil-armstrong-symbol-american-dream-and-inspiration-generations/f2Nkgn6G

I think Science Debate is the greatest thing to happen to those of interested in science and politics. When they got Obama and McCain to answer science questions in the 2008 election, I immediately cancelled my membership to the Union of Concerned Scientists and started donating to this grassroots organization.

I have one issue that I vote on, and that's science. It's the only issue I understand well enough to evaluate the candidates on. If they know their science or have advisors that understand science, then I will trust them with most everything else. I summarized Obama's 2008 responses here, McCain's here, and my calls for who won on each issue. Obama's responses won on most issues, but McCain did not do poorly. Since Obama has taken office, he has impressed me with his support of science with Data.gov, Science.gov, a Memorandum on Scientific Integrity, proposed major increases in science funding, and put the Office of Science and Technology Policy back in the Whitehouse.

These might seem like small accomplishments, but compared to the Dark Ages of the Bush Administration they were a breath of fresh air. Unless Romney answers the science debate questions this election cycle, I won't even consider him.

I think Science Debate is the greatest thing to happen to those of interested in science and politics. When they got Obama and McCain to answer science questions in the 2008 election, I immediately cancelled my membership to the Union of Concerned Scientists and started donating to this grassroots organization.

I have one issue that I vote on, and that's science. It's the only issue I understand well enough to evaluate the candidates on. If they know their science or have advisors that understand science, then I will trust them with most everything else. I summarized Obama's 2008 responses here, McCain's here, and my calls for who won on each issue. Obama's responses won on most issues, but McCain did not do poorly. Since Obama has taken office, he has impressed me with his support of science with Data.gov, Science.gov, a Memorandum on Scientific Integrity, proposed major increases in science funding, and put the Office of Science and Technology Policy back in the Whitehouse.

These might seem like small accomplishments, but compared to the Dark Ages of the Bush Administration they were a breath of fresh air. Unless Romney answers the science debate questions this election cycle, I won't even consider him.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

So, you promise the following:
"Giving all Americans a way to engage their government on the issues that matter to them."
But your promise is a lie.

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
John F. Kennedy

Are you advocating the violent overthrow of the United States Government?

Find me and ask me and I will tell you the answer.
But you can't find me.

I can find you.

So they pull this one just before getting to the 25,000 threshold. So what? That 25.000 threshold never meant anything! Never.

IIRC, the similar signature gathering for review of SOPA went far over 25,000, and the response was: Yeah, we 'reviewed" it. Now STFU and GTBW. Did you really think they would reverse a policy based on petitions at that site? Since its inception, have any proposals been reversed due to petitions at https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/?
See? We're good! We're giving you, the little people, a voice! [we won't listen to it, but here ya go]

meet the new boss, same as the old boss.