I imagine corporations will fight back legally if/when their employees start getting hacked by the FBI.
Why would a corporation care? One must either have something to hide or be upset at unwarranted searches as a matter of principle to be bothered. And only the latter reason would drive someone to actively fight it — those with anything to hide will quietly (re)hide it elsewhere.
Though I don't share the disdain towards KKKorporations, that some people exhibit, I am not under an illusion, they'll make a principled stand on anything, that does not affect their bottom line either.
Couldn't the same argument be made that a person of the Earth made enough money to visit the ISS, what's your excuse for not having that much money?
An old saying (by Confucius, I think) goes like this: "It is a shame to be rich in a poorly-governed country. It is also a shame to be poor in a well-governed one."
In most cases, public utilities have a much lower cost structure than private enterprise.
Citations?
But what they don't want is to have lower cost providers step in and pick off the marginal territories while they are holding them back.
Do you have any proof to this conspiracy theory?
Nobody (in private business) likes to maintain infrastructure, keep the snow plowed and potholes fixed. But that's what municipalities are good for.
Actually, no, they are pretty bad it — and the bigger the city, the worse they are.
This is why Comcast and TWC wan to merge.
The would-be merger has no relevance to the situation — thanks to the previous governmental idiocy of allowing monopolies in cable TV, the two companies do not serve the same markets anywhere in the nation.
In some states, building municipal broadband is prohibited altogether.
And a good thing that is. If it were a good idea — something enough people want bad enough to be willing to pay for it — it would not have required tax monies.
I wish, the same principle (hi, Mr. Okkam), were applied more often.
She did it by going to Texas, making her fortune in the electronics business, and paying for her trip to the International Space Station.
Now, if an immigrant from a 3rd-world country — coming here with little English and knowledge of culture, can do it, what is the excuse of the natively born-and-raised Americans?
Whom can they blame for being unable to afford whatever they want by age of 40?
Well, it is exactly those policies, that made them a pariah of the world (except, of course, Russia) and caused the very poverty, that forced them cancel the space-program.
Spaceflight is one of the few remaining areas of "friendly rivalry" where everybody still cheers for the other teams' success
That may be so between Europe and US. Russia — and knowing Russian I know it for sure — stopped cheering American successes about 10 years ago. USSR never did either — when the Moon-landing was watched world-wide by everyone with a TV, USSR's television was broadcasting a ballet — the news appeared in news-papers the next day, but there certainly was no "cheering" of the other team's success.
I dare speculate, the official Iran today are much the same. As the old Russian saying goes: "tell me, who your friend is, and I'll say, who you are."
I take it you don't remember what it was like when those were all held by single entities.
I do remember it, and I mentioned that unfortunate state as one, brought about by an earlier attempt by our government to regulate cable companies. In exchange for the regulation they wrestled monopoly powers — and ran with it (like AT&T did decades before that).
That mistake was corrected in the 90ies, though the problems caused by earlier government stupidityremain. To now point at them and argue, we need more governmental control (as duckintheface is doing above), requires a very special kind of stupid.
Does anyone think the sponsors of this legialation have serioulsly considered the issues of user access and cost?
I sure do think so.
the mantra of "free markets"
Yes, leave it to Illiberals to criticize free markets. Government take-over did so well for railroads, public transport, and telephone-service, what could possibly be wrong about adding Internet to the mix?
This has resulted in a protected monopoly for these ISPs. [...] treat the ISPs as utilities so that their rates will be controlled
If "Consolidate Your Debt" was a special subject for them, I wonder, how many proposals of that kind the assholes had to sift through to find messages from real comrades.
E.g., the IRA, the LRA, the Nagaland rebels in India, Lebanese Christian Militia groups, the US based Christian Militia groups such as those involved for Ruby Ridge, and Waco, and even some lone-wolf radicalized persons such as the ones responsible for the 2011 Norway attacks
Nope. These guys may be Christian and they may be terrorists/criminals/nasty, but they aren't Christian terrorists — that is, they are fighting their fights — and committing their outrages — for a variety of reasons, but not because a scripture tells them to.
on top of the clichéd plethora of abortion bombers...
Same thing — you can be a good Christian and not bomb abortion clinics. In fact, you can even disapprove of such bombings done by others. But you can not be a good Muslim and tolerate mocking of the Prophet.
That's the fundamental difference, which you refuse to acknowledge despite overwhelming evidence. Thanks for playing.
I'm not sure you are entirely on logical footing here. Theologians are those that study the bible as a professional career, probably not a large overlapping set of folks to those that are Christian criminals [...] When I claimed most theologians interpret these things, I meant those that study the bible as a professional career.
Theologians — of any religion — can not be too far from the body of ordinary faithful — that's what I meant. They would have a deeper (and better?) understanding of the faith, but they should not be completely at odds with the common folks — if only because the commoners get their information about their faith from theologians themselves and the clergy the theologians helped train.
Again, as cited by the article you linked, you conveniently omitted the opinion of Muslim extremists on the internet qualifier
I omitted it to account for the nature of the source — if The Guardian is willing to admit that some Muslims are saying evil things, the reality must be that most of them do.
Citation of statistically valid poll required please... (to paraphrase your rules).
Sorry, I'm not in any hurry — not until you post your own substantiations, which I requested before.
Mohammed was an illiterate prophet who allegedly received the word of god and communicated it to scribes which is recorded as the Koran.
Whether it was Mohammed himself or some scribe(s) taking artistic license to embellish Mohammed's words to better suit his (their) liking is immaterial. What matters is that a) the book is much stricter about its prohibitions than the earlier scriptures; b) millions of Muslims consider Koran as the God's word entirely.
Thus it is much more difficult (impossible?) for a Muslim to remain a good Muslim while ignoring parts of Koran, than for a Christian to remain a good Christian while ignoring parts of the Bible.
The above theoretical observation is perfectly confirmed by the everyday practice. Your only explanation for this experimental confirmation is that the "Muslim extremists" are being "extremists" because of cultural shortcomings. You wrote earlier in this thread: "You are comparing the common practice of westernized Christians to that of radical Muslims." Well, the similarly "radical Christians" are nowhere to be found. Either Christianity really is better than Islam, or the majority-Muslim peoples are somehow culturally deficient...
As I already noted, I don't see, how you can pick the latter option without facing (semi-)credible accusations of racism. Is there some other "middle", that I excluded? I don't see it...
in Acts 5, the apostles clearly state that "We must obey god rather than men."
But those are not the Lord's words, are they? Not even any of His prophets'... So, it is possible for a Christian to ignore them as a mistaken (or imprecise) opinion of a fallible human.
The take-way by most Christian theologians on this topic is that the bible says you should always honor the laws of man, but you must fear and obey God's word when it conflicts.
That's the thing — it can be (and is) argued both ways. Which theologists constitute a majority? You say, "most" choose God's law, but the overwhelming evidence points the other way — and did for centuries already: there are very few cases, when a Christian criminal claimed to be following his faith in contradiction to the secular law. Islamic clergy and ordinary faithful, on the other hand, are quite anonymous in that the only acceptable political order is Theocracy with Sharia being the law. Today the overwhelming opinion of Muslims is approving of the Paris murders. States and organizations condemned them (whether sincerely or not will never be known), but the ordinary Muslims are rejoicing. Are you going to call them all "uncivilized" — and still avoid accusations of racism?
It is these old testament books that have the aformentioned description of religious law and punishments.
Except Koran — which is the God's word entirely — adds quite a few of its own...
And not just in this regard, BTW. For example, portraying of humans and even animals is forbidden by the two earlier religions too. As is worshiping anything other than the imaginary. But Mohammed, having seen the sort of idolatry Christians succumb to with their icons and "holy relics", has made his laws a lot stricter. Generally, this fact is recognized, viewed as a good thing, and causes no controversy (except when the followers destroy ancient statues on these grounds).
Why can't the same people admit, that Islam is also a lot less forgiving about people criticizing or otherwise "disrespecting" Islam, than Christianity and Judaism are?
They certainly don't appear to be talking about things that are generally offensive, but specific, targeted harassment
It is a slippery slope regardless. And we know, where it leads — Illiberals have been advocating banning "hate speech" for years. Guess who will be deciding, which speech is hateful? Ministry of Truth can't be far behind...
you shouldn't worry about the torrent of abuse directed towards you on every site you visit. Right?
Are we to assume that because France is having trouble, the EFF should stop
Yes, actually. The events in France demonstrate, what happens, when somebody considers himself justified to do anything other than talk back in response to whatever speech he may find offensive.
I'd rather suffer being offended once in a while, than see the First Amendment get watered down the way the Second and the Fourth have already been...
However, the saving grace for Christianity is that it always left "Caesar's to Caesar" and preached obeying secular powers. As in: "yeah, we really should stone him, but that's illegal, so we will not".
Islam dispenses with such wussiness — it allows only one social order: a Sharia-based Theocracy... And even France already has entire enclaves where local government is run not by French laws, but those given by a pedophile living 1300 years ago...
Read your own comment more carefully. You said nothing about "threatening to shoot".
You are right. I did say "threaten to shoot", but in a different sub-thread.
Threatening to shoot a robber unless he gives you his wallet would be
Why? Why is it Ok to shoot him, but not Ok to demand his wallet? And what is the actual difference — as far as the analogy is concerned? You are threatening the robber with severe punishment to stop him from robbing you. How can a robbery-victim be possibly blamed for doing anything in his power (from lying to to killing the robber) to stop the robbery?
though I'm not sure that "fraud" is the correct word.
Yes, you are sure, "fraud" is not the correct word. Because it is not.
As for welfare, just let me quote him: "It is a duty certainly to give our sparings to those who want [...]
Whose duty? Your quote does not say — and for a good reason. Because in that letter, which you trumpet here with such spectacular aplomb, Jefferson talks not about government, but about charities: missionary and Bible societies.
So fuck off and learn your history.
Yeah, somebody here really does need to learn history. And manners...
Basics? You mean "exactly what I got but nothing else?
Have you anything other than strawmen? By "basics" Libertarians mean enforcement of laws (civil and criminal) and defense from other countries. Which means, the government should maintain police, courts and the rest of justice system, and military. Nothing else.
no, the US was not founded on libertarian principles.
Said the man after repeatedly demonstrating ignorance of those same principles! Yes, the US was founded on these principles — nothing else is entrusted to government in the Constitution. Certainly not the help for the "needy". John Madison, in fact, is on record being quite explicit about it:
I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.
You are entitled to your opinion on whether or not such expenditures would be a good thing. But you are not entitled to your own history — the US was founded on Libertarian principles.
so reducing free education is a step towards a hereditary oligarchy exploiting masses of poor people.
Nonsense. Henry Ford was a son of immigrants, who died when he was a child. He supported himself and family by freaking farming before becoming an engineer. Wright brothers were hardly from a rich family either. Thomas Edison was the youngest of seven siblings.
All of them were remarkably successful — without Federal Department of Education or mandatory (and tax-paid) public school system.
Yes, you think that you'll be slaveowners in the new capitalistic paradise, not slaves.
Another nonsense. No, we know that we will be (are!) slaves in the socialist "paradise" — taxed at ever-growing rates with things we need (in the opinion of Obamas and Cyberaxes of this world) provided to us for "free".
I stand for a _limited_ involvement of government - it should provide free education
Why? What sort of justification is there for confiscating money from Peter to pay for Paul's education — while mandating, what courses Paul must take in exchange? Whose liberty are you — a self-proclaimed "Liberal" — supporting here? Peter's or Paul's?
provide free education (possibly even higher education), universal healthcare, reasonable infrastructure and environment, and various means of support for those who need it.
What argument can you put forth for free education and healthcare, that can not also be made for shelter, food, and entertainment? And, given your advocacy for all of these things to be paid for by taxes, how can you call such governmental involvement "limited"?
So, having called yourself "Liberal" and proclaiming support for "limited" government involvement, you are immediately demonstrated to be neither supportive of liberty nor willing to limit government's involvement in citizens' lives.
Did I say, you aren't right in the head and are self-inconsistent? You are...
And Soviet-style states also seems to be incompatible with social liberalism.
Soviet-style states are the only possible outcome of government providing everything "for free". With each additional thing being offered to "the needy" at somebody else's expense, the country makes one more step towards a Soviet-style state — it is inevitable as predicted by theory and abundantly demonstrated in practice (Venezuela being only the most recent example).
I'm on about the fun fact about tort — you don't need to have done anything illegal to find yourself liable. For example, it is perfectly legal to server boiling coffee to your customers — but if they manage to burn themselves with it, they may have a tort claim against you.
And the other way around — smoking or drinking in public may be illegal, but, them being victimless crimes, no civil liability exists to anyone, even if the government successfully prosecutes you criminally.
What I said in my (highly-moderated) post is that "It is not illegal to lie". An AC replied, that such lying may constitute make you civilly liable. I contend, that the reply was irrelevant.
Of course, Marx's socialism doesn't work well in _practice_.
Of course, it does not! But providing "free" education — as TFA quotes Obama suggesting — would be yet another step towards that socialism (a.k.a. "communism-lite").
We, Libertarians, would like the country to move in the opposite direction — away from the Socialism — and you are calling us names. Something is seriously messed up in your head — you aren't self-consistent.
Slashdot Mirror
And I'm sure, it is the "handed over" part, that upset Airbus — not so much the snooping itself.
Why would a corporation care? One must either have something to hide or be upset at unwarranted searches as a matter of principle to be bothered. And only the latter reason would drive someone to actively fight it — those with anything to hide will quietly (re)hide it elsewhere.
Though I don't share the disdain towards KKKorporations, that some people exhibit, I am not under an illusion, they'll make a principled stand on anything, that does not affect their bottom line either.
No, it is up to us, citizens — corporate CEOs included...
And for such people the answer to my question is: themselves.
An old saying (by Confucius, I think) goes like this: "It is a shame to be rich in a poorly-governed country. It is also a shame to be poor in a well-governed one."
Citations?
Do you have any proof to this conspiracy theory?
Actually, no, they are pretty bad it — and the bigger the city, the worse they are.
The would-be merger has no relevance to the situation — thanks to the previous governmental idiocy of allowing monopolies in cable TV, the two companies do not serve the same markets anywhere in the nation.
And a good thing that is. If it were a good idea — something enough people want bad enough to be willing to pay for it — it would not have required tax monies.
I wish, the same principle (hi, Mr. Okkam), were applied more often.
Ah! He got me, he got me! Please, please, do not report my thought-crime to the authorities — I'll do anything!..
Now, if an immigrant from a 3rd-world country — coming here with little English and knowledge of culture, can do it, what is the excuse of the natively born-and-raised Americans?
Whom can they blame for being unable to afford whatever they want by age of 40?
Well, it is exactly those policies, that made them a pariah of the world (except, of course, Russia) and caused the very poverty, that forced them cancel the space-program.
That may be so between Europe and US. Russia — and knowing Russian I know it for sure — stopped cheering American successes about 10 years ago. USSR never did either — when the Moon-landing was watched world-wide by everyone with a TV, USSR's television was broadcasting a ballet — the news appeared in news-papers the next day, but there certainly was no "cheering" of the other team's success.
I dare speculate, the official Iran today are much the same. As the old Russian saying goes: "tell me, who your friend is, and I'll say, who you are."
I do remember it, and I mentioned that unfortunate state as one, brought about by an earlier attempt by our government to regulate cable companies. In exchange for the regulation they wrestled monopoly powers — and ran with it (like AT&T did decades before that).
That mistake was corrected in the 90ies, though the problems caused by earlier government stupidity remain. To now point at them and argue, we need more governmental control (as duckintheface is doing above), requires a very special kind of stupid.
I sure do think so.
Yes, leave it to Illiberals to criticize free markets. Government take-over did so well for railroads, public transport, and telephone-service, what could possibly be wrong about adding Internet to the mix?
Yes, an earlier mistake of our government letting corporations have monopolies (of cable TV) still needs to be dealt with. But the price-control you are advocating in the next paragraph only makes things worse. Because the incumbents are much better versed in dealing with the government regulators, than a newcomer will ever be.
And, while you are accusing Republicans of baby-eating, it is the Democrats who are owned by the Big Cable.
So, free market in content is a good mantra, but free market in service provision is bad? Or did you change your mind by the end of typing your post?
If "Consolidate Your Debt" was a special subject for them, I wonder, how many proposals of that kind the assholes had to sift through to find messages from real comrades.
Nope. These guys may be Christian and they may be terrorists/criminals/nasty, but they aren't Christian terrorists — that is, they are fighting their fights — and committing their outrages — for a variety of reasons, but not because a scripture tells them to.
Same thing — you can be a good Christian and not bomb abortion clinics. In fact, you can even disapprove of such bombings done by others. But you can not be a good Muslim and tolerate mocking of the Prophet.
That's the fundamental difference, which you refuse to acknowledge despite overwhelming evidence. Thanks for playing.
Theologians — of any religion — can not be too far from the body of ordinary faithful — that's what I meant. They would have a deeper (and better?) understanding of the faith, but they should not be completely at odds with the common folks — if only because the commoners get their information about their faith from theologians themselves and the clergy the theologians helped train.
I omitted it to account for the nature of the source — if The Guardian is willing to admit that some Muslims are saying evil things, the reality must be that most of them do.
Sorry, I'm not in any hurry — not until you post your own substantiations, which I requested before.
Whether it was Mohammed himself or some scribe(s) taking artistic license to embellish Mohammed's words to better suit his (their) liking is immaterial. What matters is that a) the book is much stricter about its prohibitions than the earlier scriptures; b) millions of Muslims consider Koran as the God's word entirely.
Thus it is much more difficult (impossible?) for a Muslim to remain a good Muslim while ignoring parts of Koran, than for a Christian to remain a good Christian while ignoring parts of the Bible.
The above theoretical observation is perfectly confirmed by the everyday practice. Your only explanation for this experimental confirmation is that the "Muslim extremists" are being "extremists" because of cultural shortcomings. You wrote earlier in this thread: "You are comparing the common practice of westernized Christians to that of radical Muslims." Well, the similarly "radical Christians" are nowhere to be found. Either Christianity really is better than Islam, or the majority-Muslim peoples are somehow culturally deficient...
As I already noted, I don't see, how you can pick the latter option without facing (semi-)credible accusations of racism. Is there some other "middle", that I excluded? I don't see it...
That's what I for one think of this entire newfangled "internet" thing, thank you very much...
But those are not the Lord's words, are they? Not even any of His prophets'... So, it is possible for a Christian to ignore them as a mistaken (or imprecise) opinion of a fallible human.
That's the thing — it can be (and is) argued both ways. Which theologists constitute a majority? You say, "most" choose God's law, but the overwhelming evidence points the other way — and did for centuries already: there are very few cases, when a Christian criminal claimed to be following his faith in contradiction to the secular law. Islamic clergy and ordinary faithful, on the other hand, are quite anonymous in that the only acceptable political order is Theocracy with Sharia being the law. Today the overwhelming opinion of Muslims is approving of the Paris murders. States and organizations condemned them (whether sincerely or not will never be known), but the ordinary Muslims are rejoicing. Are you going to call them all "uncivilized" — and still avoid accusations of racism?
Except Koran — which is the God's word entirely — adds quite a few of its own...
And not just in this regard, BTW. For example, portraying of humans and even animals is forbidden by the two earlier religions too. As is worshiping anything other than the imaginary. But Mohammed, having seen the sort of idolatry Christians succumb to with their icons and "holy relics", has made his laws a lot stricter. Generally, this fact is recognized, viewed as a good thing, and causes no controversy (except when the followers destroy ancient statues on these grounds).
Why can't the same people admit, that Islam is also a lot less forgiving about people criticizing or otherwise "disrespecting" Islam, than Christianity and Judaism are?
It is a slippery slope regardless. And we know, where it leads — Illiberals have been advocating banning "hate speech" for years. Guess who will be deciding, which speech is hateful? Ministry of Truth can't be far behind...
Right.
Strawman.
Yes, actually. The events in France demonstrate, what happens, when somebody considers himself justified to do anything other than talk back in response to whatever speech he may find offensive.
I'd rather suffer being offended once in a while, than see the First Amendment get watered down the way the Second and the Fourth have already been...
However, the saving grace for Christianity is that it always left "Caesar's to Caesar" and preached obeying secular powers. As in: "yeah, we really should stone him, but that's illegal, so we will not".
Islam dispenses with such wussiness — it allows only one social order: a Sharia-based Theocracy... And even France already has entire enclaves where local government is run not by French laws, but those given by a pedophile living 1300 years ago...
You are right. I did say "threaten to shoot", but in a different sub-thread.
Why? Why is it Ok to shoot him, but not Ok to demand his wallet? And what is the actual difference — as far as the analogy is concerned? You are threatening the robber with severe punishment to stop him from robbing you. How can a robbery-victim be possibly blamed for doing anything in his power (from lying to to killing the robber) to stop the robbery?
Yes, you are sure, "fraud" is not the correct word. Because it is not.
Whose duty? Your quote does not say — and for a good reason. Because in that letter, which you trumpet here with such spectacular aplomb, Jefferson talks not about government, but about charities: missionary and Bible societies.
Yeah, somebody here really does need to learn history. And manners...
Please, don't hate.
Have you anything other than strawmen? By "basics" Libertarians mean enforcement of laws (civil and criminal) and defense from other countries. Which means, the government should maintain police, courts and the rest of justice system, and military. Nothing else.
Said the man after repeatedly demonstrating ignorance of those same principles! Yes, the US was founded on these principles — nothing else is entrusted to government in the Constitution. Certainly not the help for the "needy". John Madison, in fact, is on record being quite explicit about it:
You are entitled to your opinion on whether or not such expenditures would be a good thing. But you are not entitled to your own history — the US was founded on Libertarian principles.
Citations needed.
Nonsense. Henry Ford was a son of immigrants, who died when he was a child. He supported himself and family by freaking farming before becoming an engineer. Wright brothers were hardly from a rich family either. Thomas Edison was the youngest of seven siblings.
All of them were remarkably successful — without Federal Department of Education or mandatory (and tax-paid) public school system.
Another nonsense. No, we know that we will be (are!) slaves in the socialist "paradise" — taxed at ever-growing rates with things we need (in the opinion of Obamas and Cyberaxes of this world) provided to us for "free".
Why? What sort of justification is there for confiscating money from Peter to pay for Paul's education — while mandating, what courses Paul must take in exchange? Whose liberty are you — a self-proclaimed "Liberal" — supporting here? Peter's or Paul's?
What argument can you put forth for free education and healthcare, that can not also be made for shelter, food, and entertainment? And, given your advocacy for all of these things to be paid for by taxes, how can you call such governmental involvement "limited"?
So, having called yourself "Liberal" and proclaiming support for "limited" government involvement, you are immediately demonstrated to be neither supportive of liberty nor willing to limit government's involvement in citizens' lives.
Did I say, you aren't right in the head and are self-inconsistent? You are...
Soviet-style states are the only possible outcome of government providing everything "for free". With each additional thing being offered to "the needy" at somebody else's expense, the country makes one more step towards a Soviet-style state — it is inevitable as predicted by theory and abundantly demonstrated in practice (Venezuela being only the most recent example).
I'm on about the fun fact about tort — you don't need to have done anything illegal to find yourself liable. For example, it is perfectly legal to server boiling coffee to your customers — but if they manage to burn themselves with it, they may have a tort claim against you.
And the other way around — smoking or drinking in public may be illegal, but, them being victimless crimes, no civil liability exists to anyone, even if the government successfully prosecutes you criminally.
What I said in my (highly-moderated) post is that "It is not illegal to lie". An AC replied, that such lying may constitute make you civilly liable. I contend, that the reply was irrelevant.
Of course, it does not! But providing "free" education — as TFA quotes Obama suggesting — would be yet another step towards that socialism (a.k.a. "communism-lite").
We, Libertarians, would like the country to move in the opposite direction — away from the Socialism — and you are calling us names. Something is seriously messed up in your head — you aren't self-consistent.