... I suppose food labeling won't be required to show that this is added...
I have an issue with a kneejerk reaction to add labeling. Mainly, the vast majority of people don't read the labels. So adding a warning does little. Furthermore, its getting to the point that so many warnings are being put on consumer goodss, that the warnings get lost in a sea of noise. Take a simple electronic device such as a radio, it typically comes with a small booklet full of warnings. Honestly, when was the last time anyone on Slashdot read those warnings. To me, it is far more effective to insist that adequate testing is conducted to ensure that something is safe. Beyond that, adding another warning, to the long lists of warnings I see everyday, will accomplish nothing.
Your example on data protection has merit. I would agree that EU laws on data protection are generally better than in the US. On the other hand, many liberals state that the Scandanavian countries have a fairer economic system. One in which it is better to be poor. However, according to this Swedish study
Poverty is a highly relative concept. As we saw in the preceding section, for example,
40 per cent of all Swedish households would rank among low-income households in the
USA, and an even greater number in the poorer European countries would be classed as
low income earnings by the American definition
As you note, you can cherry pick arguments to make any country look good or bad...:-)
...I've often read that European laws offer their citizens greater protection than the US...
When you compare two countries laws, there are always instances where country A is better than country B. And other instances where the opposite is true. For example, see the many European criticisms of the Patriot Act. One the other hand, I note the recent foiled plot in England, the British police used powers that are likely unconstitutional in the US. It is not hard to find similar examples. Look at the recent slashdot discussion on evolution. Many people pinged on US atitutdes, ignoring surveys in Europe showing similar atitudes My point being, neither Europe or the US has a monopoly on good laws or atitudes.
How can we reconcile the report mentioned above, with this report In the linked report "Just under half of Britons accept the theory of evolution as the best description for the development of life, according to an opinion poll."
"Global Warming vs Global Climate Changes," the fact is many climate scientists that believe in global warming prefer phrases such as global climate change. Global warming does not necessarily mean the world gets warmer everywhere. Some places can get colder. Look up what happens to Europe if the Gulf Stream is stopped by global warming. Thus the argument that global climate change is more accurate.
"War Against Middle East vs War on Terror," the facts are that the war against Islamic terrorism is much bigger than the Mid East. Take for example the Bali bombing. Or the Madrid bombing. Or the London subway bombing. Or the...
...as ridiculous as the Bush administration inviting him to the Whitehouse Correspondents Dinner and expecting him to shower the President with praise...
You do realize that the Bush administration did not invite Colburn. He was invited by the organizers of the Whitehouse Correspondents Dinner, which represents the White House press corps. And that the guest speaker is expected to roast the President (whoever that may be).
Reading the article, he got in trouble for recording conversations, not for taking video pictures. In his state, it against the law to record conversations without warning all participants. The legal question will be whether the warning stickers on the outside of his house are sufficient.
...Holy shit! No wonder the Pentagra^H^Hon is worried, after all, rock music is the tool of the devil, and we can't...
I'm not sure whether you're joking or serious... but you do realize the Pentagon has a sense of humor. I read in one article Psyop troops played the theme from "Team America: World Police" when the troops invaded Fallujah. Gramted, a bizarre sense of humor, but a sense of humor.
I prefer a wine-tasting approach. Take a bite, swirl it around in my mouth, and spit it on the floor. Although my family does complain about the teeth marks on all our produce.
...it's my understanding that even that's nothing like the schools in America...
Don't get to carried away with news stories. As with most things in big cities all over the world, there are bad areas and there are good areas. The bad areas stay away from, the good areas are pretty safe.
My daughter currently attends elementary school in a major metropolitan area in US. Since she has been there, the two big horror stories is one year a kid sat on a sink in the bathroom and broke it. Another year, some kids threw some toilet paper around bathroom. Big deal over the toilet paper. The kids had to draw posters about respecting school property. They had an all school assembly to discuss the problem. Etc. Etc.
Is her school representative of all schools in the US? No. Are there really bad schools? Without a doubt. All I ask, is don't lump all American schools into one category. It is a big, diverse country.
Your statement gives the schools too much power. Certainly the Supreme Court has, in my mind, given contradictory decisions. For example, the Supreme Court has allowed mandatory drug tests of students and censoring of student newspapers within limits. On the other hand, in the Tinker vs. Des Moines decision, the Supreme Court ruled "[i]t can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate." My point, is that minor students in school have fewer rights than adults, they do not have zero rights.
I think you're putting too much faith in the EU. Granted they have better data protection than the US in some ways. However, if you read the stories regarding the EU decision, it is not over. The EU said the current legal justification would not work, and told the parties involved to try again. The US Ambassador has already stated that the US will work with the afflected parties to come up with an acceptable justificiation.
In reality, I would guess that many foreign countries already have access to this information. If you read about the EU agreement, it has to do with access to databases already maintained by the airlines - the so-called Passenger Name Record (PNR). A quick google will show that the PNR contains the type of data you would expect an airline to keep - your name, address, phone number, booking agent, destination, number of bags, etc. And I would guess that many airlines, particularly those owned by the state, share this data with their government. In reality, this is more about when the data is turned over than anything else. Once you land in any country you have to go thru customs, giving your name, address, birthdate, passport, number of bags, destination, etc.
Not being a UK citizen, I wonder how well the UK police actually monitor the cameras they have. In the US, where most such cameras are used by private security, they're not monitored very well. In my office building, for example, cameras are located throughout the facility. And the camera feeds go directly to the security desk, which I walk past several times a day. In my experience, the guards rarely are watching the camera feeds. On the other hand, when we did have some items stolen, the camera tapes were reviewed to ID the crook. See also the post-911 investigation which used camera tapes. Or the Oklahoma City bombing which used the tapes. In the UK, how much is active monitoring, and how much is using tapes to gather evidence after the crime occurred?
Your words "effectively compulsory" are more accurate. However to me, it is a semantic argument because the "real world" difference between "compulsory" and "effectively compulsory" is a nuance. And when we are talking about human rights, I do not believe a nuance should allow the decision.
I believe you are taking a rather narrow definition of compulsory. In the strictist sense of the word, you not required to have it. However, according to the Austrialian government only 11 percent of health care dollars in Australia come from private insurance. What reasonably sane person is going to cut themselves off from the government health care and refuse a national ID card?
The man with the sig - "I was in the park the other day wondering why frisbees get bigger and bigger the closer they get - and then it hit me." - doesn't see the humor in "Wow! Brazil is big"... I question your neutrality.
Let me get this straight - you propose to train TSA inspectors to find bombs and weapons by showing them pictures of dildos and vibrators? [sarcasm] Clearly showing them pictures of the things they are suppose to find is a bad idea.[/sarcasm]
Look at it realistically. You run a commericial company with a website. For your out-of-state customers, you have to put ratings on your webpages. Will you create a separate set of pages for your in-state customers without ratings? Doubling your workload? No. You create on set of webpages with ratings.
1) The US is not the world, so your laws can go hang.
Just one question... Do you feel the same way about France when it considers censoring US sites? Or German censorship of US sites? Or Australia censorship? Etc. Etc.
Slashdot Mirror
FYI, I realize Sweden and Norway are different countries.
How can we reconcile the report mentioned above, with this report In the linked report "Just under half of Britons accept the theory of evolution as the best description for the development of life, according to an opinion poll."
Some of your examples are poor.
"Global Warming vs Global Climate Changes," the fact is many climate scientists that believe in global warming prefer phrases such as global climate change. Global warming does not necessarily mean the world gets warmer everywhere. Some places can get colder. Look up what happens to Europe if the Gulf Stream is stopped by global warming. Thus the argument that global climate change is more accurate.
"War Against Middle East vs War on Terror," the facts are that the war against Islamic terrorism is much bigger than the Mid East. Take for example the Bali bombing. Or the Madrid bombing. Or the London subway bombing. Or the...
Reading the article, he got in trouble for recording conversations, not for taking video pictures. In his state, it against the law to record conversations without warning all participants. The legal question will be whether the warning stickers on the outside of his house are sufficient.
I prefer a wine-tasting approach. Take a bite, swirl it around in my mouth, and spit it on the floor. Although my family does complain about the teeth marks on all our produce.
My daughter currently attends elementary school in a major metropolitan area in US. Since she has been there, the two big horror stories is one year a kid sat on a sink in the bathroom and broke it. Another year, some kids threw some toilet paper around bathroom. Big deal over the toilet paper. The kids had to draw posters about respecting school property. They had an all school assembly to discuss the problem. Etc. Etc.
Is her school representative of all schools in the US? No. Are there really bad schools? Without a doubt. All I ask, is don't lump all American schools into one category. It is a big, diverse country.
I think you're putting too much faith in the EU. Granted they have better data protection than the US in some ways. However, if you read the stories regarding the EU decision, it is not over. The EU said the current legal justification would not work, and told the parties involved to try again. The US Ambassador has already stated that the US will work with the afflected parties to come up with an acceptable justificiation.
It might be a bad guess for the EU, but I bet I'm right for the Chinese national airlines and a few others.
In reality, I would guess that many foreign countries already have access to this information. If you read about the EU agreement, it has to do with access to databases already maintained by the airlines - the so-called Passenger Name Record (PNR). A quick google will show that the PNR contains the type of data you would expect an airline to keep - your name, address, phone number, booking agent, destination, number of bags, etc. And I would guess that many airlines, particularly those owned by the state, share this data with their government. In reality, this is more about when the data is turned over than anything else. Once you land in any country you have to go thru customs, giving your name, address, birthdate, passport, number of bags, destination, etc.
Not being a UK citizen, I wonder how well the UK police actually monitor the cameras they have. In the US, where most such cameras are used by private security, they're not monitored very well. In my office building, for example, cameras are located throughout the facility. And the camera feeds go directly to the security desk, which I walk past several times a day. In my experience, the guards rarely are watching the camera feeds. On the other hand, when we did have some items stolen, the camera tapes were reviewed to ID the crook. See also the post-911 investigation which used camera tapes. Or the Oklahoma City bombing which used the tapes. In the UK, how much is active monitoring, and how much is using tapes to gather evidence after the crime occurred?
Your words "effectively compulsory" are more accurate. However to me, it is a semantic argument because the "real world" difference between "compulsory" and "effectively compulsory" is a nuance. And when we are talking about human rights, I do not believe a nuance should allow the decision.
The man with the sig - "I was in the park the other day wondering why frisbees get bigger and bigger the closer they get - and then it hit me." - doesn't see the humor in "Wow! Brazil is big"... I question your neutrality.
Let me get this straight - you propose to train TSA inspectors to find bombs and weapons by showing them pictures of dildos and vibrators? [sarcasm] Clearly showing them pictures of the things they are suppose to find is a bad idea.[/sarcasm]
Look at it realistically. You run a commericial company with a website. For your out-of-state customers, you have to put ratings on your webpages. Will you create a separate set of pages for your in-state customers without ratings? Doubling your workload? No. You create on set of webpages with ratings.