'Nuclear Free' Maryland City Grants Waiver For HP

dcblogs writes "The City of Takoma Park, Md. this week granted a waiver to its public library to allow it to use some new HP hardware, whose products are otherwise banned under its 'nuclear free zone' ordinance. That law, adopted in 1983 one month after the Cold War-era movie 'The Day After' was aired, prohibits the city from buying equipment from any company connected to U.S. nuclear weapons production. The library bought new Linux-based, x86 systems from a Canadian vendor and didn't realize the vendor was using HP hardware. The hardware arrived in April and was unused until the Takoma Park city council granted it a waiver this week. The city's list of banned contractors was developed in 2004 by a now inactive group, Nuclear Free America, and hasn't been updated since."

Comments

Movies

[AkaKaryuu]

Movies, not reason, dictates their city policy.

Re:Movies

[Firethorn]

Not to mention -and has been since at least 1983.

If I was in that town I'd be pushing for it's repeal. Just like I pushed for getting rid of the ban on selling alcohol to indians in my old town. Yes, the law called them Indians.

Re:Movies

[jeffmeden]

Movies, not reason, dictates their city policy.

You should see the stockpile of shotguns and Patrick Swayze clones they have on hand just in case Red Dawn comes true...

Re:Movies

[SJHillman]

So given that Indians are no longer called Indians, does that mean that people descended from the indigenous population can be served but not the guys from India?

Re:Movies

[BackwardPawn]

In an ironic twist, they stockpiled plutonium in case someone's DeLorean got stuck 30 years in the past. They did get a waiver for it, though.

Re:Movies

[Ferzerp]

That word (catharsis) doesn't mean what you think it means.

Catharsis is a purging of built up emotion/tension. It has absolutely nothing to do with education of any sort.....

Re:Movies

[CrimsonAvenger]

I guess the Maryland Democrats who run this city experienced catharsis after viewing the destruction of a nuclear holocaust, and decided to no longer be part of any weapon manufacturing business.

Hmm, so the cure to war is to make sure that your side won't win if one happens?

I've always preferred the "If thou would have peace, prepare then for war" POV....

Re:Movies

[CanHasDIY]

I guess the Maryland Democrats who run this city experienced catharsis after viewing the destruction of a nuclear holocaust, and decided to no longer be part of any weapon manufacturing business.

Hmm, so the cure to war is to make sure that your side won't win if one happens?

I've always preferred the "If thou would have peace, prepare then for war" POV....

You don't need nukes for that; just look at Switzerland.

Apparently arming the shit out of your populace (with automatic rifles) is a far greater deterrent to being attacked than stockpiling nuclear weapons.

Re:Movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently arming the shit out of your populace (with automatic rifles) is a far greater deterrent to being attacked than stockpiling nuclear weapons.

Cool. Then we (US Americans) are covered on both counts.

Re:Movies

[93 Escort Wagon]

Yes, the law called them Indians.

Our largest local Indian confederation refers to itself as "Indians". The Indians I've known all call themselves Indians.

The people I've known that get worked up about using "Native American" tend to be white and middle-to-upper class.

Re:Movies

[Bootsy Collins]

Huh? Is this a troll?

The reason it isn't surprising that such a law was passed in Takoma Park is because since the early-60s, Takoma Park has been famous for being a very-left-leaning home for granola-munching ex-hippies who have become financially stable boomers. For decades it was referred to as the Berkeley of the East; people in DC still often call it "the People's Republic of Takoma Park." I can't think of a time when Takoma Park was a town of "dumb rednecks"; and even now, when it's less leftist than it used to be, it's still far more that way than any place else anywhere near DC.

Re:Movies

[Immerman]

And before that from Africa, along with every other human on the planet. The term "native" has to have some cuttoff date or it's completely useless, usually a few (or few dozen) generations suffices. Or are we now classifying every single US citizen an "African American"?

Re:Movies

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently arming the shit out of your populace (with automatic rifles) is a far greater deterrent

The guns don't really matter much, except that an invader would be forced to treat the populace as combatants and inflict a high civilian death toll. Switzerland avoids attack because it is vanishingly small, protected by mountain ranges and devoid of natural resources. Politically and militarily irrelevant, in other words.

Switzerland and its guns are like an 5lb dog barking at a 200lb mailman from behind a fence. The dog is brilliantly proud of itself when the mailman leaves the property.

This situation does not apply to nuclear armed states.

Re:Movies

[Anonymous Coward]

The people I've known that get worked up about it tend to be Indians, as in people from India. It's also confusing to pretty much anyone outside of the Americas, as people from India are pretty common while indigenous Americans don't go abroad as much. It can even get confusing in some parts of the US west coast where there are a lot of Indian immigrants. I don't think it's offensive; it just gets confusing if you spend a lot of time in California and Europe.

Re:Movies

[Hognoxious]

Good for you for having principals

He's a school district?

Re:Movies

[Khyber]

What's really shitty is that HP (not to defend them given my hatred of them) is mostly involved in a nuclear capacity with regards to medicine, not weaponry.

This is an undeserved reputation.

Re:Movies

[Zordak]

Section 1 of the 14th Amendment:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

The 14th Amendment was not part of the original Bill of Rights, which was only concerned with limiting the power of the federal government to infringe on people's rights. The states could do almost anything they wanted within the limits of their own state constitutions. The 13th (ending slavery), 14th (civil rights), and 15th (right to vote regardless of race) amendments were passed after the civil war, and the southern states were forced to ratify them as a condition of being re-admitted to the Union. Under the 14th Amendment, most of the Bill of Rights now applies to the individual states.

This law is almost certianly unconstitutional under the current 14th Amendment jurisprudence, but somebody would have to challenge it first. Since it's apparently not being enforced, it's not likely that anybody is going to bother with challenging it.

Re:Movies

[geminidomino]

Our lawyers will be contacting you shortly. Prepare to be both legally and bodily violated. We will make you sorry you were ever born.

XOXOXOX,
The Church of Scientology

Re:Movies

[Muad'Dave]

Negative: I am a Meat Popsicle.

Re:Movies

[Zordak]

While I agree with you personally, the ladies and gentlemen in the black robes do not. (Or more precisely, at least five of them have disagreed with us enough times.) I am often disturbed by the logical contortions those judges go through to justify institutional racism. (And it's not even "reverse racism." It's just racism.) How they think we can cure racism with more racism is a mystery to me.

Re:Restraint of trade

[Akzo]

Probably nothing, they can choose who they hire and purchase goods from legally.

Just need a couple amendments

[cellocgw]

Maybe they should extend the ban to companies involved with biowarfare (agar, petri dishes, thermal control chambers), or to cyberwarfare (Microsoft, RedHat, and your son's best friend who became a script kiddy last night).

Try to keep up, people.

[John Hasler]

"Nuclear free" is sooo 1980s. It's all about "greenness" now. You need to update your pc checklists monthly.

Seventh-day Adventist Church

[ShanghaiBill]

Takoma Park has long been a center for the Seventh Day Adventist Church, and 7DAs tend to be pacifists.

How about Taxes?

[bill_mcgonigle]

Do they refuse to accept tax payments from any residents who are employed by any company with ties to the nuclear industry? Because that would be blood money, yanno?

Takoma Park Kid

[sampson7]

Takoma Park has long been a center for the Seventh Day Adventist Church, and 7DAs tend to be pacifists.

Just FYI, Takoma Park's liberalness (which includes a bead store, vegan restaurants and the rest) has little to do with the Adventists, who aren't really a force in town. Instead, Takoma Park has a long hippy tradition and is filled with aging boomers who moved to the community because of its reputation as a liberal enclave. It's often referred to as the "Berkely of the East" and other such monickers.

My favorite nuclear free story growing up was that the police department looked for a while like it was going to have to buy Volvo squad cars, because every other major manufacturer had some toe hold in nuclear weapons. Not sure how they managed to avoid that, but they did. Similarly, when the transit authority wanted to build a major highway right through the middle of Takoma Park (which at that point was a sleepy middle class suburb full of WWII bungallos), the local community rallied together and killed the massive highway plan on the Maryland side of Washington, DC. Those techies in Northern Virginia who enjoy the Mixed Bowl during their morning commute see what could have happened to Maryland. Of course, nothing's that simple -- but it's refreshing that there's still a place that combates global warming by banning gasoline-powered lawn mowers.....

Takoma Park was a great place to grow up. Crazy as they are, it's refreshing to have such a community of idealists. Even though it seems like the whole community has gentrified over the last few years, I still love it, even as I've transitioned to the Dark Side (business! Eeek!)

Say what?

[Ancient_Hacker]

Say what? ANY company "involved"?

I suspect to make nuclear weapons, you need, like, EVERYTHING. Bricks, mortar, screwdrivers, voltmeters, paper, pencils, pens, pipes (lots of pipes), cars, gasoline, welding rods, drill presses, lathes, etc, etc, etc, etc..............

I think you'd be blocking the buying of almost everything, except maybe nail salon services.

What about smoke detectors?

[Anonymous Coward]

How do they handle smoke detection, since the radioactive americium detectors in them are all manufactured by defense contractors that also work with other nuclear materials, including bombs?

Old laws

[Firethorn]

This is why I like the idea of having ALL laws auto-sunset every 10 years(or so).
1. Keep legislatures busy re-approving old laws rather than passing new
2. Get a review of the old laws going.