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2006's Bill of Wrongs
Jamie continued the never ending flow of year-end recap stories, this one is the Bill of Wrongs which lists the 10 most outrageous civil liberties violations of the year, according to Slate. Several of these aren't news to Slashdot readers, but it's still worth a read.
But how do you know if a restaurant serves transfats? The only way to protect consumers other than the outright ban would be to force all the restaurants to post the nutrition information of all their dishes (like the fast food chains are supposed to do). I would think that would be a more significant burden on the restaurants than the ban.
Check out the Committee on Government Reform, United States House of Representatives, Minority Office. This is the official view of congressional Democrats of what the administration has been doing wrong. They're the minority office, so they can't do much except update their web site.
On Tuesday, they become the Majority Office. Congressman Waxman becomes committee chair. Investigations will start shortly thereafter. We're going to see plenty of Administration officials being asked hard questions. Under oath. On TV. That's how Waxman works.
"As set forth in House Rule X, clause 4, the Committee on Government Reform may, at any time, conduct investigations of any matter regardless of whether another standing committee has jurisdiction over the matter."
Although I would agree that this is pretty much a Bush bashing article in its tone, I'm not sure if you can pick and choose your civil liberties defense depending upon which party you normally support. Your civil liberties are rights that can erode quickly without constant and vigorous vigilance.
I'm typically non-religious conservative/libertarian in my mindset, so I don't get into the Bush hating as much as the Moveon.org crowd; but I also see our rights shrinking across the board in the name of "fighting terrorism" and "protecting intellectual property"... I don't see these as good things.
It looks to me like fear and greed are overly dominating our rights to: travel unhindered, make free use of the products we buy, speak our minds, protest against perceived government and corporate wrongs, address real grievances in court, associate freely with whomever(adults) we wish in whatever manner we wish, etc.
I know it's harder to judge harshly the political party you normally support. When it comes to civil liberties, though, there are no political parties. There are the guys supporting them, and then there are the bad guys.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
When pressure came from Human Rights Watch the US government's response was to pass a "Prisoner rape elimination act" the chief result of which was to commission a study by one Mark Fleisher, who concludes that, get this:
So the way your government retreats from its threat of having some ethnic gang make you its bitch and infect you with Hepatitis C if not AIDS while sexually torturing you because you're a technologist who got out of line, is to claim that you aren't being raped, you are experiencing "sexual awakening".This should have topped the list and of course, since American technologists don't count (just look at the H-1b and outsourcing riots trashing their ability to support families) it didn't appear anywhere
Seastead this.
Given the attacks on the USA, can you really expect us not to be at least a little sensitive to the possibility? So we found out many of them weren't. That is why we released them.
Actually, we did not release most of the people who were released from Guantanamo Bay, we shipped them to other countries for "rendition" and those countries let them go. Furthermore, that court hasn't even been built, we haven't "found out" anything either way. Innocent until proven guilty is a great idea, shame the Republicans only believe in it when DeLay is getting hammered by their worldview.
Do you have proof they are injuring civil liberties out of mere selfish political drive?
What would that proof mean to you? That it's OK to "injure civil liberties" as long as you're not being selfish about it?
Not enough people are active enough to contribute to the voice of the country.
The voice of the country is perfectly healthy these days as long as you toe the party lines. Suggest after 9/11 that the pentagon was a valid military target, and even though it would have been the act of war that could have justified everything that followed, you end up getting death threats because that's not the politically expedient thing to suggest while the administration twists and grasps for any other excuse to go to war. In the years following that, over and over the same thing: if you don't say we're winning and things are going great, you're "aiding and abetting the enemy", grounds for a capital offense of treason, I believe. The only difference is that later, the threat was to use the power of government to execute you, rather than the suggestion that someone might break into your house at night and stab you in your sleep.
Since this is about "activist courts" I'll throw in the observation that Bush's "signing statements" have been every bit as activist as the justices he decries. "Legislating from the White House" has no basis whatsoever in the Constitution, which specifically gives him the power to veto bills he does not like. The rest, he has sworn to faithfully execute.
The rest of your post is the same pointless parroting "it couldn't have happened if the people didn't want it to". This, of course, can excuse anything from murder to p2p filesharing. The fact that we are "a nation of laws, not of men" is lost on you, Bush, and the rest of the die-hard Republicans. I'll believe that the "people wanted it to happen" when the Republicans obey the legally defined constitutional amendment process and set the laws of our nation to permit these things.
Until then, we're going to be stuck listening to the same blowhards that have been spouting off the last 5 years. They'll be begging the Democrats not to impeach Bush over "partisan bickering" and it will probably work. These masses will hear about how changing presidents mid-war will be a sign of weakness (just like any other company, if a person quitting mid project or getting hit by a bus kills the company, you were doing it wrong), and they'll believe it. These masses will be told that the people complaining about Joseph Padilla, Maher Arar, international wiretaps, domestic call tracking, torture, and so on and so forth... they all want the terrorists to win and Americans to die, and they'll buy it.
And so the world turns...
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
I'll go along with everything but the lowering of priority in gaining access to treatments. Of course, I smoke a pipe, so I'm not likely to see the problems A 2 pack-a-day smoker will.
But, it has to be part of an omnibus law; one that will apply the same restrictions to people who drink alchohol, eat red meat, ingest products made with high fructose corn syrup, etc.
I would also suggest that you restrict in a similar fashion people who are injured while driving a motor vehicle in speeds in excess of 30mph, bungee jumping, mountain climbing, scuba diving, flying, etc.
It's only fair; people who purposefully do things which endenger their health shouldn't have to be treated the same way Sane, healthy, non-risk takers do.
As this pretty much leaves the Amish, I imagine tax income would be seriously impacted, as it wouldn't be in the vast majority of peoples interest to pay taxes, since they wouldn't see any benefit.
On a unrelated note, can someone direct me to a forum or mailing list where I can talk about TOR development? I can't seem to find anyplace, and I have some things I want to try.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
That reminds me of this guy the featured on the Public Radio show "This American Life." He was convicted of a murder he did not commit, so during the penalty faze of his trial he did everything he could to get the death penalty. His logic, if he was wrongly convicted to life in prison, nobody would give a s**t and he would rot in jail forever. If he was wrongly sentenced to death, some liberal lawyer would take up his case and exonerate him. The amazing thing is the plan worked. He convinced the jury to fry him and he found a liberal lawyer to overturn his conviction.
San Francisco Photographers
"if people want to be hoes, that's their perogative. And no, "ho" does not just refer to women, so I'm not being a misogynist. Men can easily be (and often are) hoes. If you're in a long-term relationship and comfortable with the fact that a child could result if you take off your pants, then you are ready to have sex."
What a crock of shit. What happens if I don't want to be emotionally handcuffed to one person, I'm supposed to jerk off for the rest of my life? The term whore (or "ho" if you must) means doing something you don't like with your body for payment, ie: we all spend time "whoring". In the modern world, unwanted children come from a lack of intelligence, lack of education, lack of access to birth control or some combination of all three, they do not come from "sleeping around" even though sleeping with "someone" is normally a pre-requisite.
"Seriously people, it's not hard to keep it in your pants and keep your skirt to your knees."
Adults are pre-programmed to have sex in the same way they are pre-programmed to seek food and water but with a lower priority, adults can get all sorts of diseases from all three activities, they also don't react well when denied access to any of the activities ( again sex has a lower and more variable priority ).
Disclaimer: I caught the end of the "free love" orgy in the 70's, was married for 20yrs (90% happily), 2 adult kids (both now living with their lovers), got "snipped" but it felt like being "bricked", divorced the unfaithful alcoholic that is possesing my wife's body, had a long "midlife crisis" to the tune of "you and me baby are nothin' but mammals", and will soon be celebrating the 5th "anniversary" of my monogomous relationship with a new love (albeit seperated by 1km). I have no idea what will happen to my sex life in my remaining years, perhaps I will just get bored with sex and post two minute rants on slashdot instead.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.