Typically those killed by guns are not the gun owner itself, where as those killed by alcohol, soda and the like is are the drinkers themselves.
First off, the clear majority of deaths by firearms in the US are suicides. The CDC statistics on this are unambiguous. While not every suicide by gun is by the gun owner a large percentage of these suicides are by the person who owns the gun. Furthermore a death by firearm is still a death by firearm. Does it really matter who the gun owner is? If someone else drives a car and kills someone with it, it isn't really very important that the driver wasn't the owner. Same with a firearm. Someone is dead and a firearm was involved.
Second, plenty of deaths relating to alcohol are due to things like drunk driving accidents. In a huge percentage of these cases the person killed was not the person drinking but it still is a death related to alcohol use. Like before, someone is dead and alcohol was involved.
No, they are not arguing that they are not subject to the rule of law. They are arguing that certain laws don't apply as written, and they have a case.
They are arguing that the laws relating to reasonable oversight of police activities don't apply to them. They are arguing very literally that they are not subject to rule of law. And while there may be details we are not aware of, on the face of it, it appears they have no case at all. The mere fact that the performance of a government activity is executed by a private firm should NEVER result in reduced scrutiny when it comes to a public interest as important as policing.
Contract requirements can compel the vendor to pretty much to anything they are willing to sign up for.
They are arguing that because the contract doesn't stipulate disclosure that reasonable oversight mandated by law for very good reasons no longer applies. This is a ridiculous argument. They are arguing that laws that are not stated in a contract do not apply. Furthermore no contract can compel a vendor to violate the law.
There is no law that limits what they can agree to with regards to disclosure.
They can agree to whatever they want in the contract and IT DOESN'T MATTER if it contradicts the law. Disclosure of certain police activities is mandated by laws (up to and including the Constitution) which supersede any contract.
Libertarians want to reduce state interference in private affairs, including private businesses.
Which is fine as a principle but is almost the very definition of a two edged sword. There often are VERY good reasons why we insist on certain government involvement in more than a few private affairs. The tricky bit is keeping that beast on a short leash. Privacy is fine until it starts to affect other people.
Libertarians want to reduce state interference in private affairs, including private businesses.
Here's where the two edged sword comes in. You risk trading a government master for a private one possibly with less accountability. It's fine to keep the government out of your private business affairs until your private business affairs start to cause problems for others (intentionally or unintentionally). Governments have generally better accountability controls than private businesses do (which is a disturbing thought) in lots of cases.
The kind of crony-capitalism and delegation of state power to private businesses ("privatization", government "outsourcing") you increasingly see in the US, advocated by Democrats and Republicans alike, represents core abuses of government power that libertarians oppose.
First off, I don't think Libertarians as a group are any more ethically upstanding than Democrats or Republicans. Give Libertarians power and you'll get corrupted outcomes. The only difference will be in the fine details.
Whether the government directly controls an activity or contracts the actual performance of it is a fairly trivial distinction that is easily addressed - basically the same rules should apply either way. It gets murkier when the government abdicates responsibility for a task altogether trusting to market forces or other mechanisms to ensure a well functioning society. This has to be addressed on a case by case basis and there is no over simplified "government = bad" answer.
IRS as 501(c)(3) non-profits, but to use it as a tool to hide information would be incredibly stupid because 501(c)(3) status means you must release more information about your internal workings than a normal private corporation would need to disclose.
Not true in a lot of cases. I've been on the board of a 501c3 and I'm also a corporate accountant. Our normal disclosure requirements for the non-profit were fairly minimal and certainly less than most of the companies I've been involved in. You are correct in some cases but not universally so.
And, BTW, most Libertarians do agree, that law-enforcement is the government's function — the sole one, perhaps.
Any libertarian that actually thinks law enforcement is the only job of a government is an idiot. The first job of a government is to create the laws. You cannot enforce laws if you cannot create them. Second, it is impossible to administer any government without some form of revenue and this means taxation. Third, there are numerous market failures that simply cannot be efficiently handled by a market place. Military, certain bits of infrastructure, health care for certain at-risk groups, administration of certain public goods, etc. All of these go well beyond mere law enforcement. Law enforcement is a component of all these items but it's hardly the entirety of it.
Oh, it may be provided by private companies, but those must be hired by and operate on the authority of the local governments.
...and subject to the same laws as it would be if it were not a private company. FTFY. Private companies should never get a free pass when acting in a governmental capacity.
In short either they are government, and open to all of this, or they are private and fucked up the contract. Either case they can get sued.
Doesn't matter what the contract says. If they are acting on behalf of the government then they ARE the government and should be subject to the same rules and scrutiny. What the contract says is irrelevant if it contradicts the relevant laws because then the contract is void.
Either they are vigilantes or they are in violation of disclosure regulations. In both cases they should be in legal hot water.
This is simply a contracting issue. The state can put disclosure and transparency requirements in the contract, the private company can agree or not get the contract.
Whether or not they put it in a contract is irrelevant. A contract is void if it contradicts the law and the argument they are making pretty clearly contradicts the law in all likelihood. The argument this company is making is that they are not subject to rule of law, specifically the oversight that applies to law officers and their activities. Essentially they are arguing that the law doesn't apply to them because the check is from a private company even though the activities are unambiguously on the behalf of the government.
Basically if their argument is correct then they are private citizens engaging in vigilante activities and they should be in jail. If their argument is wrong then they are in violation a host of other laws and they should be in jail. Either way it has nothing to do with contract law.
The Legislative branch does make statuatory laws; regulations are not really law but the how the law is applied.
You seem to believe that statutory laws are fully formed when written. They aren't. Regulations ARE a form of lawmaking. The statutes generally provide the framework but limited detail, the regulations provide the specific details of how to implement the framework and case law settles any disputes about the interpretation of the statute or the regulation. The executive branch typically has vast flexibility in implementing regulations because statutes are rarely very detailed. Regulations carry the full weight of law unless overruled by a statute or case law, and even then it sometimes doesn't matter since the executive branch can often simply ignore or work around the dictates of the other branches. If you think regulations and their enforcement (or non-enforcement) is not lawmaking in every sense that matters then I think you really need to get clued in on how power actually works in the real world.
It seems to me that judges should be ruling based on the law, not perceived ancillary social influences.
For lower courts that is (largely) true but for SCOTUS it is not. The Constitution is not 100% black and white and many aspects of it are open to interpretation. The job of SCOTUS (and lower federal courts to some extent) is to provide that interpretation when there is a disagreement. This interpretation effectively is identical to making legislation. Furthermore interpretations over time tend to reflect the morals and social influences of the day. Cases like Dred Scott v Sandford once upheld interpretations of the law that today would be considered reprehensible. At some level the decisions that SCOTUS judges make reflects their belief systems, particularly on hot button topics like abortion where decisions are based more on personal morality than objective evidence. That's why we have 9 judges instead of just one.
Legislative makes the law, and judicial merely determines if actions are legal or not legal? Quaint, no?
Each branch of the government makes certain types of laws. The Legislative branch makes statues, the Executive branch makes regulations and the Judiciary makes case law. All three are necessary and proper to the functioning of civil society. All three are laws in every sense that matters. If any branch of the government was unable to make laws then that branch of government would be powerless against the other branches. Checks and balances only work if you can make laws.
Erm, ofc China and Japan can force the USA to pay their depts.
They cannot force the US to do anything.
First: international law.
Which law? Who is going to enforce it? This isn't like the bank foreclosing on your house. You can't force a nation state to do anything they are unwilling to do. You especially cannot force the country with the largest economy and the most powerful military to do anything they don't want to do. The only thing that can pressure the US is to make borrowing more expensive and nobody is doing that. Countries buy US debt because it is still considered safer than all of the other alternatives.
Second: trade embargoes.
Are you familiar with the phrase "cutting off your nose to spite your face"? China and Japan depend heavily on exports so anytime they embargo anything they are simply hurting themselves in the process. China needs the US more than the US needs China. Same with Japan. Nobody wins in a trade embargo but the smaller economy generally looses more than the bigger one.
Third: war.
Are you stupid or just a troll? What nation do you think is going to go to war with the US? The last country that tried to fight the US directly was Iraq and that didn't work out so well for them militarily. China isn't so stupid. If there is one military in the world you don't want to fuck with, it is the US military. We spend WAY too much money on it and our military is ridiculously effective as a result.
However with so much debts China simply can ruin your economy.
And their own in the process. There is nothing China can really do that wouldn't hurt China more than it would hurt the US. Sure, China could tank the world economy if their leaders were feeling suicidal but I'm pretty confident that isn't likely to happen.
I disagree with why he did it. He could have easily jammed 911 calls, ambulance transmissions to hospitals, law enforcement, first responder requests/communications, etc. Not to mention all the people he blocked who were not driving, i.e. passengers. He unilaterally decided that his needs were more important than everyone else's. As far as I'm concerned he should see some jail time in addition to a huge fine. This is not a small deal.
From what I can tell, at any given time a huge fraction of drivers are either texting, or holding onto their phone and talking.
That's true but it doesn't give anyone the right to go all vigilante about the problem.
All he has to do is claim he was acting in self defense to prevent an idiot driving while on a cell phone from causing an accident around him.
There is a saying we have in manufacturing that "local maximums make global minimums". Just because it is optimal for one part of the system doesn't mean it is globally optimal. His jamming activities could easily interfere with 911 or emergency broadcasts or ambulance transmissions or cell phones that have nothing to do with anyone driving. He's basically deciding unilaterally that his needs should be placed ahead of everyone else's. It's self indulgent and potentially dangerous. We regulate the airwaves and how people can use them for VERY good reasons. Reasons that are much more important than his little temper tantrum.
Umm.. hate to break it to you, but the U.S. government *IS* bankrupt.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. [/InigoMontoya] Our debt to GDP ratio isn't even the highest it ever has been. Back in the 1945s we had a debt to GDP ratio of around 113%. Right now our debt to GDP ratio is about 101%. Not good but we've literally seen worse. That number could easily be drawn down if we had some leaders who were interested in actually leading.
Furthermore ALL of the debt the US has is denominated in US dollars. Though it would be a terrible idea, the US can essentially print the money if they wanted to. People make a big deal about the fact that the US owes China (and Japan too) a trillion dollars. However think about that. China can't dump the debt, they can't demand repayment or foreclose on anything, and there isn't even anyone who is willing or able to buy that much debt. They are stuck with it at least for quite a few years. They've bought it to protect their currency and to maintain their low exchange rate to support their export economy. China can't really do much about the debt without screwing themselves in the process.
If you don't call 17+ TRILLION DOLLARS in the hole, and not to mention an uncountable number of trillions in unfunded "entitlements" bankrupt, I don't know what to tell you...
I call it irresponsible. I don't call it bankrupt because it isn't. Bankrupt means you are UNABLE to pay your debts. The US government is perfectly able, it is just unwilling. We have a bunch of irresponsible leaders (on both sides) who put ideology and power above all else and we keep electing them for some reason. The problem could be solved by some combination of reducing spending and raising taxes. Pick the combination that makes you happiest, but the only items that truly matter are the military, medicare/medicaid and social security since together they account for around 3/4 of the budget. I'd start with the military since we spend WAY too much on "defense" for no sane reason and it accounts for close to a quarter of government spending. Any budget that doesn't address military and medicare spending/revenue is nothing more than political propaganda.
The word "patent" itself means expose and make accessible. The patent system was created to spread information while keeping the inventor protected. Otherwise, the inventor would not share his method with anyone else.
Patents are (supposed to be) for tangible expressions of ideas. Once the idea is expressed, most of them are easy to copy. Without some protection against others copying the original work, there is no economic incentive to work on certain problems because it gives an insurmountable price advantage to the copier. This IS the free rider problem. Even better patents (ideally) harnesses free riders to productive work by making the results of the invention public so others can build on the works in the future. It accelerates getting the information into the public by the same method it mitigates the free rider problem in permitting the inventor to benefit from their efforts. It's a fairly ingenious solution actually. But make no mistake that the entire purpose of patents is to advance society though mitigation of the free rider problem.
The classic example is making a medicine. Doing a chemical analysis and manufacturing a pill is a trivial exercise and costs very little. The research to determine whether a drug is effective however is complicated and very expensive. That cost has to be recouped and if someone else can easily copy their work that someone else has an insurmountable price advantage. $Reseach + $Production >> $Copying + $Production. Always. Why would any sane person invest large sums in research if their work can be trivially copied and their prices undercut as a result?
The free rider problem is a modern problem.
It most assuredly is not. The free rider problem has existed almost since the dawn of life on earth. I can show you examples in the animal and plant kingdoms. Parasites are a form of free rider. Some of the permutations of the problem are new but the problem itself is not new at all. The "solutions" such as patents are (relatively) modern innovations but the problem is nothing new at all.
The paper I cited explains how complaining about free riders doesn't make sense in regards to innovation.
The paper you cited is a long winded opinion piece. It contains no discernible actual research regarding the effects of the free rider problem on innovation.
Patents themselves convey control over something intangible.
What patents themselves are is irrelevant. The only questions are whether it mitigates the problem (free riders) that it was intended to mitigate and does minimal economic harm in the process.
I would recommend reading Against Intellectual Property.
No thanks. I briefly looked and I have zero interest in opinion pieces from someone pushing an ideological (libertarian) agenda. I think you are suffering from confirmation bias.
No system is by definition zero harm. That's where we draw the baseline.
No, you draw a baseline on the system you actually have and compare changes to that. Here in the real world we have a patent system and so that is the baseline for any analysis. If you want to assert that every possible system to combat the free rider problem is more harmful than no system at all, then you need to provide actual objective evidence for that hypothesis. Heck you might even be right. But you haven't done that and until you do this debate is finished as far as I'm concerned.
We should not only enforce fair pricing on interconnects (perhaps even require public data on them) but we should also be demanding that Quality of Service (QOS) is honored from end to end.
The word "fair" always worries me. Define what you mean by "fair"? Fair by what standard and to whom? I don't disagree with your general assertion but "fair" is such a nebulous abstract concept that it is effectively meaningless most of the time.
I think they are lovely. However they aren't particularly novel and rounded corners do have a functional aspect to them so they should in principle be ineligible for patent protection. I'd need a lot of convincing to think they are worthy of trade dress protection. At most I think they *might* qualify as a trademark but even there I'm a bit dubious.
Tragedy of the commons doesn't apply to the intangible.
I wasn't talking about the tragedy of the commons. I was talking about the free rider problem which is not the same thing. Furthermore patents shouldn't apply to the intangible either so exactly what is your point?
If the patent system is a net harm, then doing nothing is a superior alternative.
Your logic is faulty and I don't accept your attempt to frame the question either. I disagree that the patent system is a net harm and you certainly haven't established that as a fact. There is a HUGE difference between showing that the patent system causes some harm (which it demonstrably does) and showing that it is a net harm. You have not shown in any way that it is a net harm.
But let's assume for a moment that the patent system as it stands is a net harm as you claim. If the patent system as it stands is a net harm, it does not follow that doing away with it in favor of no system at all is automatically less harmful. It's entirely possible that by doing away with the patent system and replacing it with nothing that you will do an even greater harm. Your logic only works if those are the only two alternatives and if you can somehow prove that any possible patent system would be inherently more damaging than no system at all. In reality there are many potential alternative systems to mitigate free riders. In addition to leaving the system as is, or abolishing it altogether, the patent system can be reformed in various ways or replaced with a different system that accomplishes the goal of mitigating the free rider problem.
Basically if you can find and prove that no system at all is a better way to mitigate the free rider problem then please publish your work, have it peer reviewed and collect your Nobel prize.
Certainly true that only products should be patentable, and never business methods or technologies.
You have to be a little careful there because some products are essentially processes made tangible such as machines to build other products. I think it would be better to say that only novel tangible goods that have actually been produced should be eligible for a patents. If you cannot make one even in crude prototype form, it is science fiction and should not be patent eligible. The good seeking patent protection should be made available to the patent examiner in order to receive a patent. No math, algorithm, software, firmware, chemicals found in nature, intangible idea or process or conceptual tangible goods that have not actually been made should be eligible for patent protection. Creative intangible and written works including software, firmware, music, literature, art and video can be adequately covered by copyright.
It's clear that the patent system has serious problems. Patents on software or algorithms or business methods are absurd. However before we go ahead and abolish patents altogether, what is your proposed alternative solution to the free rider problem? Patents were created as a means to mitigate that specific problem. If you have no alternative to solve the free rider problem that is better than a well executed patent system (our current one is not well executed), then your argument is a non-starter. If you do have a solution to the free rider problem then let us know so we can alert the Nobel committee that they owe you a prize.
And before anyone says it, just abolishing patents and doing nothing else is NOT a better system even as screwed up as our patent system has become. If you need evidence of this, please show me how many inventions that would be patentable in the US or Europe that were invented in places without a patent system. Drugs, vehicles, integrated circuits, etc. You will find that places without something resembling a patent system also have a rather low rate of invention. While this is evidence based on a correlation, the correlation is VERY strong. Without some way to mitigate the free rider problem there is limited incentive to solve certain types of problems.
Unless we abolish patents, our children and grandchildren are going to be living in a world that is scarcely more technically advanced than our own is now.
Oh cut out the hyperbole. Technology is advancing very quickly even in the face of an arguably broken patent system. There is no evidence that our rate of technological advancement is slowing down.
Study: Patent Trolls Cost Companies $29 Billion Last Year
While I'm not arguing that patent trolls aren't a real problem (they are), $29 billion is pocket change compared to what companies made off of patented products last year. Intel alone had $52 billion in revenue last year, virtually all of it from patented products. Patented inventions account for literally Trillions of dollars of economic benefit to society, much of which would not exist without some sort of system resembling patents. For many types of inventions, it is virtually impossible to bring products to market in the face of the free rider problem. The solution to the free rider problem doesn't have to be patents in their current form but there does have to be some sort of solution to that problem. Simply tossing out patents without some alternative way to mitigate the free rider problem will almost certainly do more harm than good.
But the concept of suddenly (and surprisingly) being "eaten" by something (even accidentally) you can't really fight or escape from is a fairly horrifying one for most people.
It's not hard to imagine all sorts of horrifyingly unpleasant ways to die. Doesn't make them any more likely. Sharks kill so few people it's barely even worth worrying about. If someone is worried about their personal safety around sharks there is a 100% foolproof way to avoid them - stay out of the water. People seriously lose their damn minds when it comes to absurdly unlikely dangers like shark attacks. I worry about a shark attack about as much as I worry about an alien invasion.
Personally I find the idea of dying slowly from some debilitating disease like ALS or cancer to be a far more horrifying and likely prospect.
Nobody buys a motorcycle because they are concerned about their safety, the idea that somehow harleys are extra dangerous is asinine.
Harley's aren't extra dangerous, they are just extra annoying. There is NO reason for any street legal motorcycle to be as loud as your typical harley. None. They are tuned needlessly loud - to the point where they can damage hearing. They almost certainly violate most noise ordinances. In fact their noise level is so high that if one is operating near you, you can barely hear anything else including some things you might actually want to hear. People who ride bikes tuned that loud are self indulgent assholes who have no consideration for anyone around them.
Motorcycles are dangerous, in large part because car drivers are often distracted and don't notice bikes on the road around them.
Motorcycles are dangerous for several reasons. 1) They have essentially no protective shell or other safety equipment comparable to that in a car. If you hit something the only thing between you and whatever you hit is whatever clothing/helmet you are wearing. This rarely ends well for the rider. 2) Motorcycles have an extremely high power/weight ratio. This means they are fast - your typical crotch rocket is MUCH faster than any car you can buy. Too often the person riding the bike cannot handle its full capabilities. 3) Motorcycles are small and easy to overlook even by attentive drivers much less the distracted texting-while-driving assholes you often find on the road. 4) Too many motorcycle riders do not ride sufficiently cautiously or defensively. They tend to be ridden by young men who are seeking thrills and who think they are bulletproof. I've seen jackasses literally doing wheelies while passing me on a highway. 5) Bikes have fewer wheels and thus are inherently less stable than a vehicles with more points of contact with the road. A 2X4 laying across a road is no big deal for a typical car but can easily result in a motorcycle wreck.
You'll notice that noise isn't mentioned above. Noise doesn't make a motorcycle safer nor more dangerous except in rare circumstances. There is no credible evidence that I'm aware of that harley riders get in accidents at a rate that is statistically significantly different (better or worse) than other motorcycle riders. If the noise was related to safety in any way, you would expect to see a difference in accident rates.
Does anyone know if if the settlement is supposed to in any way be punitive?
Settlements are almost by definition not punitive. It's an agreement between the two parties. The defendant gives less than what might happen if there was an actual ruling by a judge/jury. The plaintiff takes a certain but lesser amount rather than taking an all or nothing risk with a ruling.
So that settlement works out to roughly $5000 per worker before lawyer's fees, which are sure to be substantial. Sounds a bit light to me, especially given the amount of cash the relevant companies have in the bank.
Slashdot Mirror
Typically those killed by guns are not the gun owner itself, where as those killed by alcohol, soda and the like is are the drinkers themselves.
First off, the clear majority of deaths by firearms in the US are suicides. The CDC statistics on this are unambiguous. While not every suicide by gun is by the gun owner a large percentage of these suicides are by the person who owns the gun. Furthermore a death by firearm is still a death by firearm. Does it really matter who the gun owner is? If someone else drives a car and kills someone with it, it isn't really very important that the driver wasn't the owner. Same with a firearm. Someone is dead and a firearm was involved.
Second, plenty of deaths relating to alcohol are due to things like drunk driving accidents. In a huge percentage of these cases the person killed was not the person drinking but it still is a death related to alcohol use. Like before, someone is dead and alcohol was involved.
No, they are not arguing that they are not subject to the rule of law. They are arguing that certain laws don't apply as written, and they have a case.
They are arguing that the laws relating to reasonable oversight of police activities don't apply to them. They are arguing very literally that they are not subject to rule of law. And while there may be details we are not aware of, on the face of it, it appears they have no case at all. The mere fact that the performance of a government activity is executed by a private firm should NEVER result in reduced scrutiny when it comes to a public interest as important as policing.
Contract requirements can compel the vendor to pretty much to anything they are willing to sign up for.
They are arguing that because the contract doesn't stipulate disclosure that reasonable oversight mandated by law for very good reasons no longer applies. This is a ridiculous argument. They are arguing that laws that are not stated in a contract do not apply. Furthermore no contract can compel a vendor to violate the law.
There is no law that limits what they can agree to with regards to disclosure.
They can agree to whatever they want in the contract and IT DOESN'T MATTER if it contradicts the law. Disclosure of certain police activities is mandated by laws (up to and including the Constitution) which supersede any contract.
Libertarians want to reduce state interference in private affairs, including private businesses.
Which is fine as a principle but is almost the very definition of a two edged sword. There often are VERY good reasons why we insist on certain government involvement in more than a few private affairs. The tricky bit is keeping that beast on a short leash. Privacy is fine until it starts to affect other people.
Libertarians want to reduce state interference in private affairs, including private businesses.
Here's where the two edged sword comes in. You risk trading a government master for a private one possibly with less accountability. It's fine to keep the government out of your private business affairs until your private business affairs start to cause problems for others (intentionally or unintentionally). Governments have generally better accountability controls than private businesses do (which is a disturbing thought) in lots of cases.
The kind of crony-capitalism and delegation of state power to private businesses ("privatization", government "outsourcing") you increasingly see in the US, advocated by Democrats and Republicans alike, represents core abuses of government power that libertarians oppose.
First off, I don't think Libertarians as a group are any more ethically upstanding than Democrats or Republicans. Give Libertarians power and you'll get corrupted outcomes. The only difference will be in the fine details.
Whether the government directly controls an activity or contracts the actual performance of it is a fairly trivial distinction that is easily addressed - basically the same rules should apply either way. It gets murkier when the government abdicates responsibility for a task altogether trusting to market forces or other mechanisms to ensure a well functioning society. This has to be addressed on a case by case basis and there is no over simplified "government = bad" answer.
IRS as 501(c)(3) non-profits, but to use it as a tool to hide information would be incredibly stupid because 501(c)(3) status means you must release more information about your internal workings than a normal private corporation would need to disclose.
Not true in a lot of cases. I've been on the board of a 501c3 and I'm also a corporate accountant. Our normal disclosure requirements for the non-profit were fairly minimal and certainly less than most of the companies I've been involved in. You are correct in some cases but not universally so.
And, BTW, most Libertarians do agree, that law-enforcement is the government's function — the sole one, perhaps.
Any libertarian that actually thinks law enforcement is the only job of a government is an idiot. The first job of a government is to create the laws. You cannot enforce laws if you cannot create them. Second, it is impossible to administer any government without some form of revenue and this means taxation. Third, there are numerous market failures that simply cannot be efficiently handled by a market place. Military, certain bits of infrastructure, health care for certain at-risk groups, administration of certain public goods, etc. All of these go well beyond mere law enforcement. Law enforcement is a component of all these items but it's hardly the entirety of it.
Oh, it may be provided by private companies, but those must be hired by and operate on the authority of the local governments.
...and subject to the same laws as it would be if it were not a private company. FTFY. Private companies should never get a free pass when acting in a governmental capacity.
In short either they are government, and open to all of this, or they are private and fucked up the contract. Either case they can get sued.
Doesn't matter what the contract says. If they are acting on behalf of the government then they ARE the government and should be subject to the same rules and scrutiny. What the contract says is irrelevant if it contradicts the relevant laws because then the contract is void.
Either they are vigilantes or they are in violation of disclosure regulations. In both cases they should be in legal hot water.
This is simply a contracting issue. The state can put disclosure and transparency requirements in the contract, the private company can agree or not get the contract.
Whether or not they put it in a contract is irrelevant. A contract is void if it contradicts the law and the argument they are making pretty clearly contradicts the law in all likelihood. The argument this company is making is that they are not subject to rule of law, specifically the oversight that applies to law officers and their activities. Essentially they are arguing that the law doesn't apply to them because the check is from a private company even though the activities are unambiguously on the behalf of the government.
Basically if their argument is correct then they are private citizens engaging in vigilante activities and they should be in jail. If their argument is wrong then they are in violation a host of other laws and they should be in jail. Either way it has nothing to do with contract law.
The Legislative branch does make statuatory laws; regulations are not really law but the how the law is applied.
You seem to believe that statutory laws are fully formed when written. They aren't. Regulations ARE a form of lawmaking. The statutes generally provide the framework but limited detail, the regulations provide the specific details of how to implement the framework and case law settles any disputes about the interpretation of the statute or the regulation. The executive branch typically has vast flexibility in implementing regulations because statutes are rarely very detailed. Regulations carry the full weight of law unless overruled by a statute or case law, and even then it sometimes doesn't matter since the executive branch can often simply ignore or work around the dictates of the other branches. If you think regulations and their enforcement (or non-enforcement) is not lawmaking in every sense that matters then I think you really need to get clued in on how power actually works in the real world.
It seems to me that judges should be ruling based on the law, not perceived ancillary social influences.
For lower courts that is (largely) true but for SCOTUS it is not. The Constitution is not 100% black and white and many aspects of it are open to interpretation. The job of SCOTUS (and lower federal courts to some extent) is to provide that interpretation when there is a disagreement. This interpretation effectively is identical to making legislation. Furthermore interpretations over time tend to reflect the morals and social influences of the day. Cases like Dred Scott v Sandford once upheld interpretations of the law that today would be considered reprehensible. At some level the decisions that SCOTUS judges make reflects their belief systems, particularly on hot button topics like abortion where decisions are based more on personal morality than objective evidence. That's why we have 9 judges instead of just one.
Legislative makes the law, and judicial merely determines if actions are legal or not legal? Quaint, no?
Each branch of the government makes certain types of laws. The Legislative branch makes statues, the Executive branch makes regulations and the Judiciary makes case law. All three are necessary and proper to the functioning of civil society. All three are laws in every sense that matters. If any branch of the government was unable to make laws then that branch of government would be powerless against the other branches. Checks and balances only work if you can make laws.
Erm, ofc China and Japan can force the USA to pay their depts.
They cannot force the US to do anything.
First: international law.
Which law? Who is going to enforce it? This isn't like the bank foreclosing on your house. You can't force a nation state to do anything they are unwilling to do. You especially cannot force the country with the largest economy and the most powerful military to do anything they don't want to do. The only thing that can pressure the US is to make borrowing more expensive and nobody is doing that. Countries buy US debt because it is still considered safer than all of the other alternatives.
Second: trade embargoes.
Are you familiar with the phrase "cutting off your nose to spite your face"? China and Japan depend heavily on exports so anytime they embargo anything they are simply hurting themselves in the process. China needs the US more than the US needs China. Same with Japan. Nobody wins in a trade embargo but the smaller economy generally looses more than the bigger one.
Third: war.
Are you stupid or just a troll? What nation do you think is going to go to war with the US? The last country that tried to fight the US directly was Iraq and that didn't work out so well for them militarily. China isn't so stupid. If there is one military in the world you don't want to fuck with, it is the US military. We spend WAY too much money on it and our military is ridiculously effective as a result.
However with so much debts China simply can ruin your economy.
And their own in the process. There is nothing China can really do that wouldn't hurt China more than it would hurt the US. Sure, China could tank the world economy if their leaders were feeling suicidal but I'm pretty confident that isn't likely to happen.
I can't say I disagree with why he did it
I disagree with why he did it. He could have easily jammed 911 calls, ambulance transmissions to hospitals, law enforcement, first responder requests/communications, etc. Not to mention all the people he blocked who were not driving, i.e. passengers. He unilaterally decided that his needs were more important than everyone else's. As far as I'm concerned he should see some jail time in addition to a huge fine. This is not a small deal.
From what I can tell, at any given time a huge fraction of drivers are either texting, or holding onto their phone and talking.
That's true but it doesn't give anyone the right to go all vigilante about the problem.
I feel bad for this guy,
I don't. He's a self indulgent asshole.
All he has to do is claim he was acting in self defense to prevent an idiot driving while on a cell phone from causing an accident around him.
There is a saying we have in manufacturing that "local maximums make global minimums". Just because it is optimal for one part of the system doesn't mean it is globally optimal. His jamming activities could easily interfere with 911 or emergency broadcasts or ambulance transmissions or cell phones that have nothing to do with anyone driving. He's basically deciding unilaterally that his needs should be placed ahead of everyone else's. It's self indulgent and potentially dangerous. We regulate the airwaves and how people can use them for VERY good reasons. Reasons that are much more important than his little temper tantrum.
Umm.. hate to break it to you, but the U.S. government *IS* bankrupt.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. [/InigoMontoya] Our debt to GDP ratio isn't even the highest it ever has been. Back in the 1945s we had a debt to GDP ratio of around 113%. Right now our debt to GDP ratio is about 101%. Not good but we've literally seen worse. That number could easily be drawn down if we had some leaders who were interested in actually leading.
Furthermore ALL of the debt the US has is denominated in US dollars. Though it would be a terrible idea, the US can essentially print the money if they wanted to. People make a big deal about the fact that the US owes China (and Japan too) a trillion dollars. However think about that. China can't dump the debt, they can't demand repayment or foreclose on anything, and there isn't even anyone who is willing or able to buy that much debt. They are stuck with it at least for quite a few years. They've bought it to protect their currency and to maintain their low exchange rate to support their export economy. China can't really do much about the debt without screwing themselves in the process.
If you don't call 17+ TRILLION DOLLARS in the hole, and not to mention an uncountable number of trillions in unfunded "entitlements" bankrupt, I don't know what to tell you...
I call it irresponsible. I don't call it bankrupt because it isn't. Bankrupt means you are UNABLE to pay your debts. The US government is perfectly able, it is just unwilling. We have a bunch of irresponsible leaders (on both sides) who put ideology and power above all else and we keep electing them for some reason. The problem could be solved by some combination of reducing spending and raising taxes. Pick the combination that makes you happiest, but the only items that truly matter are the military, medicare/medicaid and social security since together they account for around 3/4 of the budget. I'd start with the military since we spend WAY too much on "defense" for no sane reason and it accounts for close to a quarter of government spending. Any budget that doesn't address military and medicare spending/revenue is nothing more than political propaganda.
The word "patent" itself means expose and make accessible. The patent system was created to spread information while keeping the inventor protected. Otherwise, the inventor would not share his method with anyone else.
Patents are (supposed to be) for tangible expressions of ideas. Once the idea is expressed, most of them are easy to copy. Without some protection against others copying the original work, there is no economic incentive to work on certain problems because it gives an insurmountable price advantage to the copier. This IS the free rider problem. Even better patents (ideally) harnesses free riders to productive work by making the results of the invention public so others can build on the works in the future. It accelerates getting the information into the public by the same method it mitigates the free rider problem in permitting the inventor to benefit from their efforts. It's a fairly ingenious solution actually. But make no mistake that the entire purpose of patents is to advance society though mitigation of the free rider problem.
The classic example is making a medicine. Doing a chemical analysis and manufacturing a pill is a trivial exercise and costs very little. The research to determine whether a drug is effective however is complicated and very expensive. That cost has to be recouped and if someone else can easily copy their work that someone else has an insurmountable price advantage. $Reseach + $Production >> $Copying + $Production. Always. Why would any sane person invest large sums in research if their work can be trivially copied and their prices undercut as a result?
The free rider problem is a modern problem.
It most assuredly is not. The free rider problem has existed almost since the dawn of life on earth. I can show you examples in the animal and plant kingdoms. Parasites are a form of free rider. Some of the permutations of the problem are new but the problem itself is not new at all. The "solutions" such as patents are (relatively) modern innovations but the problem is nothing new at all.
The paper I cited explains how complaining about free riders doesn't make sense in regards to innovation.
The paper you cited is a long winded opinion piece. It contains no discernible actual research regarding the effects of the free rider problem on innovation.
Patents themselves convey control over something intangible.
What patents themselves are is irrelevant. The only questions are whether it mitigates the problem (free riders) that it was intended to mitigate and does minimal economic harm in the process.
I would recommend reading Against Intellectual Property.
No thanks. I briefly looked and I have zero interest in opinion pieces from someone pushing an ideological (libertarian) agenda. I think you are suffering from confirmation bias.
No system is by definition zero harm. That's where we draw the baseline.
No, you draw a baseline on the system you actually have and compare changes to that. Here in the real world we have a patent system and so that is the baseline for any analysis. If you want to assert that every possible system to combat the free rider problem is more harmful than no system at all, then you need to provide actual objective evidence for that hypothesis. Heck you might even be right. But you haven't done that and until you do this debate is finished as far as I'm concerned.
We should not only enforce fair pricing on interconnects (perhaps even require public data on them) but we should also be demanding that Quality of Service (QOS) is honored from end to end.
The word "fair" always worries me. Define what you mean by "fair"? Fair by what standard and to whom? I don't disagree with your general assertion but "fair" is such a nebulous abstract concept that it is effectively meaningless most of the time.
Where do you stand on rounded corners?
I think they are lovely. However they aren't particularly novel and rounded corners do have a functional aspect to them so they should in principle be ineligible for patent protection. I'd need a lot of convincing to think they are worthy of trade dress protection. At most I think they *might* qualify as a trademark but even there I'm a bit dubious.
Tragedy of the commons doesn't apply to the intangible.
I wasn't talking about the tragedy of the commons. I was talking about the free rider problem which is not the same thing. Furthermore patents shouldn't apply to the intangible either so exactly what is your point?
If the patent system is a net harm, then doing nothing is a superior alternative.
Your logic is faulty and I don't accept your attempt to frame the question either. I disagree that the patent system is a net harm and you certainly haven't established that as a fact. There is a HUGE difference between showing that the patent system causes some harm (which it demonstrably does) and showing that it is a net harm. You have not shown in any way that it is a net harm.
But let's assume for a moment that the patent system as it stands is a net harm as you claim. If the patent system as it stands is a net harm, it does not follow that doing away with it in favor of no system at all is automatically less harmful. It's entirely possible that by doing away with the patent system and replacing it with nothing that you will do an even greater harm. Your logic only works if those are the only two alternatives and if you can somehow prove that any possible patent system would be inherently more damaging than no system at all. In reality there are many potential alternative systems to mitigate free riders. In addition to leaving the system as is, or abolishing it altogether, the patent system can be reformed in various ways or replaced with a different system that accomplishes the goal of mitigating the free rider problem.
Basically if you can find and prove that no system at all is a better way to mitigate the free rider problem then please publish your work, have it peer reviewed and collect your Nobel prize.
Certainly true that only products should be patentable, and never business methods or technologies.
You have to be a little careful there because some products are essentially processes made tangible such as machines to build other products. I think it would be better to say that only novel tangible goods that have actually been produced should be eligible for a patents. If you cannot make one even in crude prototype form, it is science fiction and should not be patent eligible. The good seeking patent protection should be made available to the patent examiner in order to receive a patent. No math, algorithm, software, firmware, chemicals found in nature, intangible idea or process or conceptual tangible goods that have not actually been made should be eligible for patent protection. Creative intangible and written works including software, firmware, music, literature, art and video can be adequately covered by copyright.
It's time to abolish patents completely.
It's clear that the patent system has serious problems. Patents on software or algorithms or business methods are absurd. However before we go ahead and abolish patents altogether, what is your proposed alternative solution to the free rider problem? Patents were created as a means to mitigate that specific problem. If you have no alternative to solve the free rider problem that is better than a well executed patent system (our current one is not well executed), then your argument is a non-starter. If you do have a solution to the free rider problem then let us know so we can alert the Nobel committee that they owe you a prize.
And before anyone says it, just abolishing patents and doing nothing else is NOT a better system even as screwed up as our patent system has become. If you need evidence of this, please show me how many inventions that would be patentable in the US or Europe that were invented in places without a patent system. Drugs, vehicles, integrated circuits, etc. You will find that places without something resembling a patent system also have a rather low rate of invention. While this is evidence based on a correlation, the correlation is VERY strong. Without some way to mitigate the free rider problem there is limited incentive to solve certain types of problems.
Unless we abolish patents, our children and grandchildren are going to be living in a world that is scarcely more technically advanced than our own is now.
Oh cut out the hyperbole. Technology is advancing very quickly even in the face of an arguably broken patent system. There is no evidence that our rate of technological advancement is slowing down.
Study: Patent Trolls Cost Companies $29 Billion Last Year
While I'm not arguing that patent trolls aren't a real problem (they are), $29 billion is pocket change compared to what companies made off of patented products last year. Intel alone had $52 billion in revenue last year, virtually all of it from patented products. Patented inventions account for literally Trillions of dollars of economic benefit to society, much of which would not exist without some sort of system resembling patents. For many types of inventions, it is virtually impossible to bring products to market in the face of the free rider problem. The solution to the free rider problem doesn't have to be patents in their current form but there does have to be some sort of solution to that problem. Simply tossing out patents without some alternative way to mitigate the free rider problem will almost certainly do more harm than good.
But the concept of suddenly (and surprisingly) being "eaten" by something (even accidentally) you can't really fight or escape from is a fairly horrifying one for most people.
It's not hard to imagine all sorts of horrifyingly unpleasant ways to die. Doesn't make them any more likely. Sharks kill so few people it's barely even worth worrying about. If someone is worried about their personal safety around sharks there is a 100% foolproof way to avoid them - stay out of the water. People seriously lose their damn minds when it comes to absurdly unlikely dangers like shark attacks. I worry about a shark attack about as much as I worry about an alien invasion.
Personally I find the idea of dying slowly from some debilitating disease like ALS or cancer to be a far more horrifying and likely prospect.
Nobody buys a motorcycle because they are concerned about their safety, the idea that somehow harleys are extra dangerous is asinine.
Harley's aren't extra dangerous, they are just extra annoying. There is NO reason for any street legal motorcycle to be as loud as your typical harley. None. They are tuned needlessly loud - to the point where they can damage hearing. They almost certainly violate most noise ordinances. In fact their noise level is so high that if one is operating near you, you can barely hear anything else including some things you might actually want to hear. People who ride bikes tuned that loud are self indulgent assholes who have no consideration for anyone around them.
Motorcycles are dangerous, in large part because car drivers are often distracted and don't notice bikes on the road around them.
Motorcycles are dangerous for several reasons. 1) They have essentially no protective shell or other safety equipment comparable to that in a car. If you hit something the only thing between you and whatever you hit is whatever clothing/helmet you are wearing. This rarely ends well for the rider. 2) Motorcycles have an extremely high power/weight ratio. This means they are fast - your typical crotch rocket is MUCH faster than any car you can buy. Too often the person riding the bike cannot handle its full capabilities. 3) Motorcycles are small and easy to overlook even by attentive drivers much less the distracted texting-while-driving assholes you often find on the road. 4) Too many motorcycle riders do not ride sufficiently cautiously or defensively. They tend to be ridden by young men who are seeking thrills and who think they are bulletproof. I've seen jackasses literally doing wheelies while passing me on a highway. 5) Bikes have fewer wheels and thus are inherently less stable than a vehicles with more points of contact with the road. A 2X4 laying across a road is no big deal for a typical car but can easily result in a motorcycle wreck.
You'll notice that noise isn't mentioned above. Noise doesn't make a motorcycle safer nor more dangerous except in rare circumstances. There is no credible evidence that I'm aware of that harley riders get in accidents at a rate that is statistically significantly different (better or worse) than other motorcycle riders. If the noise was related to safety in any way, you would expect to see a difference in accident rates.
Does anyone know if if the settlement is supposed to in any way be punitive?
Settlements are almost by definition not punitive. It's an agreement between the two parties. The defendant gives less than what might happen if there was an actual ruling by a judge/jury. The plaintiff takes a certain but lesser amount rather than taking an all or nothing risk with a ruling.
So that settlement works out to roughly $5000 per worker before lawyer's fees, which are sure to be substantial. Sounds a bit light to me, especially given the amount of cash the relevant companies have in the bank.
The sound and the fury are great; there is no denying that.
I'll deny it. The "sound and fury" are obnoxious. There is NO need for it. It is wasteful and self indulgent.