Regardless of what you think about the man's politics or the success (or lack thereof) of his administration, there's no denying that Jimmy Carter is one of the smartest and most well-educated men to occupy the Oval Office in recent memory. Jimmy Carter has a master's degree in Nuclear Physics and used to design nuclear submarines. In contrast, GWB can't even pronounce "Nuclear".
I've gotten around web filters by running squid on my ssh server, and then tunneling the squid port (3128, IIRC) to localhost on the filtered machine. Then, all I have to do is change the browser's proxy settings to point to localhost:3128. It's a little slow, but you can surf with near-total anonymity.
Of course if you can't change browser proxy settings, this technique won't work for you.
If I were a parent in these school districts, I would refuse to allow my kids to have the school computers. And if there was ANY detrimental effect on their grades or education, I'd file a lawsuit. These heavy handed policies endanger the future of students in those districts.
I have to agree with you 100% on that.
Actually, if shit like this were happening at my son's school, I'd pull him out of there and homeschool him.
Title 10, Section 113 of the US Code:
(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are -
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
One could convincingly argue that the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) removes the "able bodied" restriction, and that various other statutes and SC rulings eliminate the gender and age based restrictions.
The government dosen't need to jail you to silence you. All they need to do is get their friends (read: masters) in Big Media to portray you as a loonie, or dig up some irrelevant piece of dirt from your past to assassinate your character.
It's much easier to shut someone by marganilizing them than it is by jailing them. Throw someone in jail and you can create a martyr. Smear them on national TV and you create a laughingstock.
Let's see if we can get the concept through your microscopic pea brain:
You are talking about THE WAY THINGS ARE. I am talking about THE WAY THINGS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE. The gaping disparity between the two demonstrates that the system is defective.
It's really nice that you can cite the case where the meaning of the word "obvious" was redefined to have a different meaning than what the rest of the English-speaking world uses. All that means we can use it to pinpoint exactly when and where things went wrong, and that we know what ruling we need to have overturned if we want the current farce to come to an end.
The fact that it's the currently the law of the land doesn't change the fact that it's a BAD ruling which is largely reponsible for the current fucked up state of affairs. Dred Scott was the law of the land for many years as well, that doesn't mean that it was ever RIGHT.
As far as I'm concerned, we can put Grahame v. Deere up on the list of the Top 10 Revisionist Supreme Court Rulings, right alongside the others which have changed the legal definitions for key words and phrases like "unreasonable search", "probable cause", and "infringed" to mean something completely different than what they mean in common usage. The Supreme Court occasinally makes spectacuarly boneheaded decisions. Dred Scott was one, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company was another; Grahame v. Deere belongs right up there with them.
I prefer to read the OED to get my definitions of words in the English language.
Try that in traffic court, Mr. MENSA. They'll even laugh at you there.
This isn't a court of law, numbnuts. I'm not presenting a legal case -- I'm presenting an argument that the system is BROKEN and needs to be changed. Perhaps if judges and lawyers would start reading the same dictionary the rest of the English speaking world uses, instead of twisting and obfuscating words for their own self-serving ends and playing pedantic naval-gazing word games, we might have a justice system that actually dispensed justice on a reliable basis.
If I were going to court, I'd hire a lawyer and let him pervert the English language on my behalf. That doesn't make it right, or ethical -- that's just how the game is currently played. The point I'm trying to make is that we need to CHANGE THE RULES OF THE GAME.
A courtroom is not SUPPOSED to be some strange bizzaroland parallel dimension where simple words have different meanings than they do everywhere else, where the rules of logic and common sense take a back seat to mindless unreasoned tradition, and where the same old mistakes are unquestioningly repeated over and over ad nauseum. Unfortunately, that is exactly what the courts have become. That is why the system needs to be changed.
Not that I'm holding my breath for things to change, except for the worse. Injustice and corruption are becoming the norm, rather than the exception. The trend to subvert and ignore the Constitution will continue to accelerate. The legal system will continue to wallow in it's own filth until it finally chokes on it and brings the whole house of cards tumbling down.
Also, before you start sounding like an expert what with the reference to "the patent clause of the Constitution", you might want to contemplate the genuine expertise that others might have. Just a thought
Let's see:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
-- Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution (Powers of Congress)
Pretty fucking simple, don't you think? It doesn't take a rocket scientist (or a patent attorney) to understand those 27 words. Indeed, it takes a lawyer to willfuly misunderstand and twist those words into something completely different than what they are.
The framers intent is crystal clear, explicitly spelled out in small, easy to understand words. Patents and copyrights exist for the sole purpose of encouraging progress in the useful arts and sciences -- this is (or should be) the USPTO's "mission statement". The current state of affairs shows how far from this simple statement of intent we have drifted, and how far out of touch the USPTO and patent law in general has become with it's Constitutional authority and common sense in general.
you would discover that your understanding of the term "obvious" is completely incorrect. It isn't "a sleazy lawyer" who decided that "obvious" means "already been done", it was judges on the Federal circuit.
So in your world Judges aren't lawyers? Wow. I want to move there.
In the real world we have a joke: "What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 50? Your Honor."
You are correct but you do not know or do not understand how that standard is applied.
Yes, I do understand: it is applied in an arbitrary and capricious manner based on the past mistakes of long-dead judges and juries, resulting in a system which contridicts both common sense and the plain language of the Constitution.
The main thing that matters in any legal proceding is who's lawyer is better able to bamboozle the judge and jury. Right and Wrong, truth, and even the law itself, are secondary to how good a snow job the opposing lawyers can pull off. Given the way our system works, once one lawyer successfuly bamboozles a judge & jury into buying his cock & bull story, it makes it easier for other lawyers to pull the same scam on other judges & juries.
You are confusing the definition of "obvious" in general use with the definition of "obvious" in the patent system.
Again, thank you for proving MY point. Only lawyers could obfuscate and distort the meaning of a simple word like "obvious" so completely. Is it any wonder to you why lawyers are so despised when they twist the well-understood meanings of simple, everyday words into something completely different?
Read MPEP 2143-2144, and read Graham v. Deere.
I prefer to read the OED to get my definitions of words in the English language. How about if lawyers start using the same language as the rest of us, and stop playing self-serving word games?
I could give a flying fuck what the patent examiner's manual has to say, and my only interest in Graham v. Deere is to hold it up as an example of how a single bad ruling can poison the legal system for years afterwards. Holding up the patent manual as if it were Holy Gospel does nothing to change the fact it is an piece of crap which needs to be flushed.
You are confusing the LETTER of the law with the INTENT of the law. A law, like a piece of software, which does not correctly implement it's specification and doesn't produce the intended results is broken and needs to be re-written. The specification for patent law is quoted above from the Constitution. If the laws and regulations which implement this specifi
A list of email addresses known to be read by real children? That sounds like a pedophile's wet dream.
This list is custom-made for abuse, especially when you consider that many people use the same nickname in multiple places -- email, instant messanger, blogs, etc.
"we" don't know the first thing about how the patent system works
Yes, we do. It's arbitrary, capricious, corrupt, deeply flawed, and runs contrary to common sense. Anyone who's read the patent clause of the Constitution can tell you that the US patent system, as currently implemented, runs completely contrary to the framer's expressed intent for granting patents.
The accepted definition of "obvious" is, well, obvious, and it it's the definition the patent office uses. Only a sleazy lawyer would take the non-obvious position that "obvious" == "already been done".
IIRC, the actual standard for patantability is is being "non-obvious TO A SKILLED PRACTICIONER OF THE ART". There are many, many software patents that are PAINFULLY obvious to any average programmer. When you can be granted a patent on a trivial and blindingly obvious variation of a basic textbook technique, or for tacking the words "on the internet" on to an existing process, there's something VERY wrong with the system.
Scalia, Rehnquist, and Thomas the defenders of the Rule of Law? Don't make me laugh. Those three have proven themselves time and again to be anything but that.
Exactly which "rule of law" were they defending in their dissent to Rasul v. Bush, where they wiped their asses with the Fifth Amendment?
But we need people who are bright, can understand local politics and react intelligently to the nasty tactical issues urban combat involves
Those people are called "officers" (and, occasionally, "senior NCOs").
Private Rockhead doesn't need to know any of that, he just needs to do what his lieutenant and/or platoon sergeant tell him to do. After 15 years, Private Rockhead might accquire some sense and get promoted to Sergeant Rockhead
"correctly" these days tends to mean "in line with the intent of Congress"
Which, unfortunately, is their job
Funny, I don't see those words in Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution.
While the concept of Judicial Review isn't explicitly in the Constitution (it is a precedent set by Marbury v. Madison) it is well in keeping with the framers' intent that there be a system of checks and balances between the three branches of government.
But right now I think it's mostly theoretical
It doen't matter if the law has been widely abused or not -- it's still a bad and unconstitutional law and should be struck down BEFORE it is abused.
ANY unconstitutional law which is allowed to stand weakens the Constitution and the protections it grants to the People.
Even the most optimistic (realistic) numbers for ethanol fuel I've seen only give a 5-10% return on energy investment -- in order to get the equivilent of 20 gallons of gas from ethanol, you need to burn 18 or 19 gallons of real gas. And that's the OPTIMISTIC estimates -- pessimistic ones, which factor in second-order energy costs like transportation and capital equipment, show a NEGATIVE energy RoI.
To get anything resembling a useful fuel yield, you would need to use animal power to plant & harvest the corn crop, abandon the use of petrochemical-based fertilizers, and use solar power to distil the ethanol.
[Solaris] is relatively unfriendly as a desktop OS
Now there's a diplomatic answer. If anything, that's an outright understatement. Solaris kicks ass as a server OS. Linux isn't even in the same league when it comes to high-end enterprise features. When Linux can support 64+ processors and high-availability clustering as well as Solaris, then there's room for comparison.
However, for anything other than running a server, Solaris is decidedly user-unfriendly.
Dissent is dead and buried. Sure, while you might not automatically be arrested attending a protest, you can be guaranteed that the people in power will ignore you, and that their cronies and financiers (who control the media) will either marginalize you and your cause or portray you in the worst possible light.
You guys should start fighting for your rights before they're taken away from you
I agree 100%. However, human nature being what it it, that will never happen. The vast majority of people never act proactively and are content with the status quo.
Let's say you have a city near a volcano. The volcano starts smoking and making signs that it will erupt soon. In that situation, you would think that most people would move away before the shit hit the fan, or at least make some kind of preparation. Wrong -- history has shown time and again that the vast majority will do nothing until the eruption has started, and then flee in panic.
OTOH, I'd probably consider that not so bad a place to terminate, and the whole arrangement would probably work out to be a positive situation down the road.
Funny you say that, because that's exactly my experience. I was terminated from my old job, which I hated anyway, for violating thier policy against using web mail.
While it was a bit annoying at the time, it turned out to be the best thing that happened to me. I should have quit that job months before, but even though I hated it there, I stuck with it out of inertia. Among the advantages my new employer offers:
More money
Less stress
Reasonable expectations as to what can be accomplished in a work day
Being treated like a human being instead of a code monkey
Promises of annual raises and bonuses are actually honored
No uncompensated overtime
Working for the betterment of mankind instead of making some rich bastard richer and subsidizing my boss's payments on his new Porsche.
Slashdot Mirror
Regardless of what you think about the man's politics or the success (or lack thereof) of his administration, there's no denying that Jimmy Carter is one of the smartest and most well-educated men to occupy the Oval Office in recent memory. Jimmy Carter has a master's degree in Nuclear Physics and used to design nuclear submarines. In contrast, GWB can't even pronounce "Nuclear".
Of course if you can't change browser proxy settings, this technique won't work for you.
Actually, if shit like this were happening at my son's school, I'd pull him out of there and homeschool him.
It's much easier to shut someone by marganilizing them than it is by jailing them. Throw someone in jail and you can create a martyr. Smear them on national TV and you create a laughingstock.
The final nail has been driven in to the coffin of Fair use.
You are talking about THE WAY THINGS ARE. I am talking about THE WAY THINGS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE. The gaping disparity between the two demonstrates that the system is defective.
It's really nice that you can cite the case where the meaning of the word "obvious" was redefined to have a different meaning than what the rest of the English-speaking world uses. All that means we can use it to pinpoint exactly when and where things went wrong, and that we know what ruling we need to have overturned if we want the current farce to come to an end.
The fact that it's the currently the law of the land doesn't change the fact that it's a BAD ruling which is largely reponsible for the current fucked up state of affairs. Dred Scott was the law of the land for many years as well, that doesn't mean that it was ever RIGHT.
As far as I'm concerned, we can put Grahame v. Deere up on the list of the Top 10 Revisionist Supreme Court Rulings, right alongside the others which have changed the legal definitions for key words and phrases like "unreasonable search", "probable cause", and "infringed" to mean something completely different than what they mean in common usage. The Supreme Court occasinally makes spectacuarly boneheaded decisions. Dred Scott was one, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company was another; Grahame v. Deere belongs right up there with them.
This isn't a court of law, numbnuts. I'm not presenting a legal case -- I'm presenting an argument that the system is BROKEN and needs to be changed. Perhaps if judges and lawyers would start reading the same dictionary the rest of the English speaking world uses, instead of twisting and obfuscating words for their own self-serving ends and playing pedantic naval-gazing word games, we might have a justice system that actually dispensed justice on a reliable basis.If I were going to court, I'd hire a lawyer and let him pervert the English language on my behalf. That doesn't make it right, or ethical -- that's just how the game is currently played. The point I'm trying to make is that we need to CHANGE THE RULES OF THE GAME.
A courtroom is not SUPPOSED to be some strange bizzaroland parallel dimension where simple words have different meanings than they do everywhere else, where the rules of logic and common sense take a back seat to mindless unreasoned tradition, and where the same old mistakes are unquestioningly repeated over and over ad nauseum. Unfortunately, that is exactly what the courts have become. That is why the system needs to be changed.
Not that I'm holding my breath for things to change, except for the worse. Injustice and corruption are becoming the norm, rather than the exception. The trend to subvert and ignore the Constitution will continue to accelerate. The legal system will continue to wallow in it's own filth until it finally chokes on it and brings the whole house of cards tumbling down.
Let's see:
-- Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution (Powers of Congress)
Pretty fucking simple, don't you think? It doesn't take a rocket scientist (or a patent attorney) to understand those 27 words. Indeed, it takes a lawyer to willfuly misunderstand and twist those words into something completely different than what they are.
The framers intent is crystal clear, explicitly spelled out in small, easy to understand words. Patents and copyrights exist for the sole purpose of encouraging progress in the useful arts and sciences -- this is (or should be) the USPTO's "mission statement". The current state of affairs shows how far from this simple statement of intent we have drifted, and how far out of touch the USPTO and patent law in general has become with it's Constitutional authority and common sense in general.
So in your world Judges aren't lawyers? Wow. I want to move there.
In the real world we have a joke: "What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 50? Your Honor."
Yes, I do understand: it is applied in an arbitrary and capricious manner based on the past mistakes of long-dead judges and juries, resulting in a system which contridicts both common sense and the plain language of the Constitution.
The main thing that matters in any legal proceding is who's lawyer is better able to bamboozle the judge and jury. Right and Wrong, truth, and even the law itself, are secondary to how good a snow job the opposing lawyers can pull off. Given the way our system works, once one lawyer successfuly bamboozles a judge & jury into buying his cock & bull story, it makes it easier for other lawyers to pull the same scam on other judges & juries.
Again, thank you for proving MY point. Only lawyers could obfuscate and distort the meaning of a simple word like "obvious" so completely. Is it any wonder to you why lawyers are so despised when they twist the well-understood meanings of simple, everyday words into something completely different?
I prefer to read the OED to get my definitions of words in the English language. How about if lawyers start using the same language as the rest of us, and stop playing self-serving word games?
I could give a flying fuck what the patent examiner's manual has to say, and my only interest in Graham v. Deere is to hold it up as an example of how a single bad ruling can poison the legal system for years afterwards. Holding up the patent manual as if it were Holy Gospel does nothing to change the fact it is an piece of crap which needs to be flushed.
You are confusing the LETTER of the law with the INTENT of the law. A law, like a piece of software, which does not correctly implement it's specification and doesn't produce the intended results is broken and needs to be re-written. The specification for patent law is quoted above from the Constitution. If the laws and regulations which implement this specifi
This list is custom-made for abuse, especially when you consider that many people use the same nickname in multiple places -- email, instant messanger, blogs, etc.
The accepted definition of "obvious" is, well, obvious, and it it's the definition the patent office uses. Only a sleazy lawyer would take the non-obvious position that "obvious" == "already been done".
IIRC, the actual standard for patantability is is being "non-obvious TO A SKILLED PRACTICIONER OF THE ART". There are many, many software patents that are PAINFULLY obvious to any average programmer. When you can be granted a patent on a trivial and blindingly obvious variation of a basic textbook technique, or for tacking the words "on the internet" on to an existing process, there's something VERY wrong with the system.
Exactly which "rule of law" were they defending in their dissent to Rasul v. Bush, where they wiped their asses with the Fifth Amendment?
Private Rockhead doesn't need to know any of that, he just needs to do what his lieutenant and/or platoon sergeant tell him to do. After 15 years, Private Rockhead might accquire some sense and get promoted to Sergeant Rockhead
ANY unconstitutional law which is allowed to stand weakens the Constitution and the protections it grants to the People.
Even the most optimistic (realistic) numbers for ethanol fuel I've seen only give a 5-10% return on energy investment -- in order to get the equivilent of 20 gallons of gas from ethanol, you need to burn 18 or 19 gallons of real gas. And that's the OPTIMISTIC estimates -- pessimistic ones, which factor in second-order energy costs like transportation and capital equipment, show a NEGATIVE energy RoI.
To get anything resembling a useful fuel yield, you would need to use animal power to plant & harvest the corn crop, abandon the use of petrochemical-based fertilizers, and use solar power to distil the ethanol.
Corelation != causation.
However, for anything other than running a server, Solaris is decidedly user-unfriendly.
The WASPS have the gold. If you want them to give you some of it, you have to play thier game by their rules.
Does it suck? Yes. Is it fair or right? No. But life comes with no guarantees that it will be fair, right, or not suck.
Dissent is dead and buried. Sure, while you might not automatically be arrested attending a protest, you can be guaranteed that the people in power will ignore you, and that their cronies and financiers (who control the media) will either marginalize you and your cause or portray you in the worst possible light.
Let's say you have a city near a volcano. The volcano starts smoking and making signs that it will erupt soon. In that situation, you would think that most people would move away before the shit hit the fan, or at least make some kind of preparation. Wrong -- history has shown time and again that the vast majority will do nothing until the eruption has started, and then flee in panic.
While it was a bit annoying at the time, it turned out to be the best thing that happened to me. I should have quit that job months before, but even though I hated it there, I stuck with it out of inertia. Among the advantages my new employer offers: