So I don't claim to be an expert on this, but unless the videos and various accounts of residents nearby significant fracking sites are outright fabricating their stories as part of a massive conspiracy, their fucking tap water can burn seemingly indefinitely once fracking has sufficiently fucked up the local environment. That's pretty messed up. At the very least, the fracking companies should be required to provide a constant supply of clean, drinkable, non-flammable water in place of any water supply they're ruining. Further, they should compensate the homeowners for the additional risk of being surrounded by enough flammable gases that water ignites. Finally, once this whole earthquakes thing is settled, they may owe a lot of people a whole lot more in compensation.
And with all that said, I have no problem with the practice so long as residents are properly informed of the practice, its approval process, the risks involved, and the path to a quick and simple compensation method whereby they can be made whole in the event of any ill effects from the practice.
Consider for a moment if LA were to increase the minimum wage to $1,000/hr for all workers. What do you suppose would be the impact of that on jobs and the local economy?
Yes, and the riots in the streets of Paris combined with debts so bad the EU is rejecting their budgets and forcing them to reduce their spending ought to tell us all we need to know about that brilliant example.
What happens to those who were making $15/hr or $16/hr? They're likely frequenting places full of minimum wage workers and their costs will now rise - inevitably - to at least some degree because of this. Further, they've all now been reduced to minimum wage (or close thereto) by the stroke of a pen.
Beyond that, how many jobs will now cost enough that automating them starts to make good financial sense? How many people with little to no skills - especially those without a good education who are most in need of steady legal employment - will find that their lack of marketable skills make them not worth hiring at this higher price point?
This is the kind of feel-good thing that bring down the middle class, raises some in the lower class (those lucky enough to ride the wave), and leaves behind large swaths of the most vulnerable people. What's going to happen is that people with little to no marketable skills in surrounding areas will get hired at the state or Federal minimum wage, gain some valuable experience, become more valuable employees, and then move or commute into LA to take jobs from poor, undereducated residents. This is an anti-poor measure masquerading as a hand-up. It will drive the middle class further down the chain (by negatively impacting their purchasing power), reduce the number of available jobs for everyone (and especially for residents), and drive many of the poor right into the ground.
Mark my words, within 5 years of this taking effect, all or nearly all indicators of poverty will worsen in LA.
Did you think rights just floated down from the sky, mana from heaven?
No, they're inherent to the fact that we're living, sentient beings with dignity and value.
All rights are given.
No, rights cannot be "given" because something given can be taken away. Privileges are given and privileges can be taken away. Rights are inherent (see above) and can only be infringed inasmuch as we allow them to be.
That doesn't mean that, as you claim, there is no such thing as the word "rights" and every time anybody says "rights" they really meant "privileges."
Strawman; no such claim has been made. Precisely the opposite. On the other hand, sometimes people say "rights" when they mean "privileges" and vice versa.
It does mean that words have context, and that the meanings don't always align with extremist principles.
There's nothing extremist about living, sentient, valuable individuals having rights. Whether you believe they're inherent to the existence of that individual or endowed upon them by their creator is irrelevant. In either case, the individual is naturally provided with their rights as a fundamental component of their existence. Once this is understood and accepted, it becomes obvious why no law or act of violence can rob you of your rights; rather, merely infringe upon their free exercise. As limited creatures, we lack the requisite ability to alter the fundamental nature of mankind.
Put another way: you can prevent me from exercising my right to self-determination or my right to self-defense, but you cannot eliminate those rights. You can - at worst - kill me.
Inherently illegal isn't really a thing. Maybe you mean immoral?
No, I mean illegal. The US Constitution recognizes that there are things beyond the reach of any government's authority and by their very nature, such things cannot emanate from the government. Ergo, violation of such rights is inherently illegal regardless of what laws or judges or kings and queens might say or do.
In any case, courts in the US have been just fine with authorizing the killing of schoolchildren. None of the involved parties fried for it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G...
Regardless of the unfortunate case you cited and the suspicions that a grave injustice was done, capital punishment is not murder by its very definition. To clarify my example, the Supreme Court cannot order or authorize me to go out and kill random schoolchildren. They can order or authorize the capture and punishment of a person convicted of a capital crime, but they lack the requisite authority to allow or require that I go kill innocent people.
There are things the state cannot grant or authorize because they would violate the rights of the people. The US Constitution recognizes some of that (at least on paper; in practice...). The government lacks the requisite authority to authorize those rights to be denied or revoked.
When they do it anyway, all involved should be hauled off to prison, even if it takes an army of the people to do so.
It looks like they are trying to say that, in order to bulk collect data, they must have a specific search they are running that involves a specific telephone line. See SEC 201.
Can someone define "tangible things" as in "SEC. 103. Prohibition on bulk collection of tangible things" or "“(i) Emergency authority for production of tangible things."
Well I'm sure the Executive branch can define it for you, though you may find the particulars of their definition convoluted and self-serving.
No court can authorize an inherently illegal action. The Supreme Court of the United States can approve me murdering schoolchildren all it wants, but my ass will still fry for it (and rightfully so).
This is just like the old days where everyone (except the rich) in Russia got inferior quality (and quantity) stuff to avoid the evil western companies run by their evil capitalist masters. Now mind you, the moment the government stopped enforcing that restriction, it was as though floodgates had opened, but I'm sure this new era of restrictions will enjoy some popularity for a little while. Once that's over, few will have the guts to complain openly.
1) What's the difference? Do you anticipate that these companies will go out and mow lawns to make up for what the tax is costing? Any costs of doing business tacked on by the government get passed on to the customers; that's the way it works.
When we're talking about single-digit numbers, 63% simply isn't that big of a deal. Iceland had 1 intentional homicide in 2012. If they had 2 in 2013, that's a 100% increase in homicides in just one year.
Should their government panic and enact a large swath of draconian legislation aimed at curbing the epidemic of homicide sweeping the country? Let's have an honest discussion; shall we?
"Law-enforcement officials also don't want to reveal information that would give new ammunition to defense lawyers in prosecutions where warrants weren't used, according to officials involved in the discussions."
Find those officials and indict them. Get them to roll on others involved, get them to roll, so on and so forth until you have everyone from prosecutors to judges to field agents to police officers to administrators to politicians; indict the lot of them for a criminal conspiracy to violate the civil rights of thousands - if not millions - of Americans. Indict the manufacturer too and open all of them to civil suits by everyone involved. In fact, just launch one on behalf of everyone affected.
Put a few thousand people in prison, bankrupt manufacturers, towns, cities, police departments, and individuals, and watch this kind of shit stop real quick. Such action would force everyone else to very careful examine how they treat the civil rights of both suspects and regular people who might get caught up in the dragnet. It would demonstrate real and lasting consequences for knowingly violating the legal rights of the people. It would bring us closer to a more just and perfect union.
Or we could just quietly sweep it under the rug and unwind the most untenable abuses while making some fairly innocuous details available to the public in the name of transparency. I'm sure that'll also work.
Why do people always look to "gun-related" murder stats as though being murdered by a gun is somehow worse than being murdered by other means. The intentional homicide rate in the Netherlands in 2012 (latest easy to find stats) was 0.9. In Vermont, it was 1.3. Higher, yes, but since the numbers we're playing with are single-digits (8 in Vermont in 2012), that's rather skewed. Looking back at recent history, there were years where it was as high at 16 and as low as 6. If you go back into the 1960s, it was as low as 1 or 2, and now we're getting into Iceland territory.
The Netherlands is certainly its own country, but the better comparison to the United States is Europe as a whole. Europe comes in at 3.0 and the US comes in at 4.7. Again, looking at all intentional homicides; not just gun-related (because being murdered by a kitchen knife leaves you just as dead as being murdered by a.22). Higher, yes, but when you look at regions with analogous geographic sizes, populations, and cultural variations, the numbers don't express any ludicrously high differences.
Nobody shows up to just start opening fire on everyone involved when some art exhibit depicting Jesus in some terrible way is shown (though they may show up to damage the artwork). Piss Christ is just one example. The Misadventures of the Romantic Cannibals is another. South Park has done plenty of cartoons depicting Jesus in a less than respectful manner as has Family Guy, yet no murders. Leon Ferrari lived to a ripe old age despite his many works of blasphemy that even drew the ire of Pope Francis (Mary in a blender comes to mind). Yet again, some of the artwork was vandalized, but the man himself was never harmed. In fact, the threats he received were for his earlier political work (which drove him to exile). Ants of a Crucifix, Phallus-faced Jesus, Chris Ofili’s “The Holy Virgin Mary"; the list just goes on and on. Protests, lawsuits, condemnations, funding being pulled; these are the reactions from Christians.
But draw cartoons of Mohammed? Guys with guns show up to murder people.
It may or may not be a sign of "grave disrespect", but so what? Having your beliefs disrespected is part of life, whether you're a Muslim, Christian, Jew, Buddhist, or atheist.
No it isn't; not if you're one of these fanatical Muslims. If you're one of these fanatical Muslims, then having your beliefs disrespected means you're required by your god to bring divine vengeance down upon all involved. As others have said, this is what makes such persons incompatible with western civilization. Quite frankly, if you want to have any chance at a relatively peaceful western civilization, all those fitting into that group must be exterminated.
I think they're all childish idiots. The people attending that meeting, with their provoking "who can draw the best Mohammed cartoon." Come on, your days at high school are a very long time away and you should behave like an adult now.
Regardless of their motives, I'm glad they held this event. Two people who were ready, willing, and able to murder over cartoons being drawn were lured into a death trap. Good. Let them burn in Hell (if such a place/state exists).
The events may be childish, but when it brings out murderous fanatics and gets those fanatics killed before they can kill innocent people, then by all means hold them every day of the week and twice on Sunday. My good friend Darwin has informed me that eventually, we'll run out of murderous fanatics.
Now you're just picking up any little thing to criticize because I called you out on the strawman argument you made. You aren't looking to have any sort of substantive discussion - that much is obvious - so good day to you.
Slashdot Mirror
So I don't claim to be an expert on this, but unless the videos and various accounts of residents nearby significant fracking sites are outright fabricating their stories as part of a massive conspiracy, their fucking tap water can burn seemingly indefinitely once fracking has sufficiently fucked up the local environment. That's pretty messed up. At the very least, the fracking companies should be required to provide a constant supply of clean, drinkable, non-flammable water in place of any water supply they're ruining. Further, they should compensate the homeowners for the additional risk of being surrounded by enough flammable gases that water ignites. Finally, once this whole earthquakes thing is settled, they may owe a lot of people a whole lot more in compensation.
And with all that said, I have no problem with the practice so long as residents are properly informed of the practice, its approval process, the risks involved, and the path to a quick and simple compensation method whereby they can be made whole in the event of any ill effects from the practice.
Would a dose of common sense do?
Consider for a moment if LA were to increase the minimum wage to $1,000/hr for all workers. What do you suppose would be the impact of that on jobs and the local economy?
Yes, and the riots in the streets of Paris combined with debts so bad the EU is rejecting their budgets and forcing them to reduce their spending ought to tell us all we need to know about that brilliant example.
You're right, let's get ahead of the game now and make the minimum wage in LA $1,000/hr. Better yet, do it at the Federal level.
That should solve all the problems, right? Everyone will be rich!
No, the problem is that there is inflation. It's a tax on everyone that's been crushing the purchasing power of everyone but the rich for decades.
What happens to those who were making $15/hr or $16/hr? They're likely frequenting places full of minimum wage workers and their costs will now rise - inevitably - to at least some degree because of this. Further, they've all now been reduced to minimum wage (or close thereto) by the stroke of a pen.
Beyond that, how many jobs will now cost enough that automating them starts to make good financial sense? How many people with little to no skills - especially those without a good education who are most in need of steady legal employment - will find that their lack of marketable skills make them not worth hiring at this higher price point?
This is the kind of feel-good thing that bring down the middle class, raises some in the lower class (those lucky enough to ride the wave), and leaves behind large swaths of the most vulnerable people. What's going to happen is that people with little to no marketable skills in surrounding areas will get hired at the state or Federal minimum wage, gain some valuable experience, become more valuable employees, and then move or commute into LA to take jobs from poor, undereducated residents. This is an anti-poor measure masquerading as a hand-up. It will drive the middle class further down the chain (by negatively impacting their purchasing power), reduce the number of available jobs for everyone (and especially for residents), and drive many of the poor right into the ground.
Mark my words, within 5 years of this taking effect, all or nearly all indicators of poverty will worsen in LA.
Did you think rights just floated down from the sky, mana from heaven?
No, they're inherent to the fact that we're living, sentient beings with dignity and value.
All rights are given.
No, rights cannot be "given" because something given can be taken away. Privileges are given and privileges can be taken away. Rights are inherent (see above) and can only be infringed inasmuch as we allow them to be.
That doesn't mean that, as you claim, there is no such thing as the word "rights" and every time anybody says "rights" they really meant "privileges."
Strawman; no such claim has been made. Precisely the opposite. On the other hand, sometimes people say "rights" when they mean "privileges" and vice versa.
It does mean that words have context, and that the meanings don't always align with extremist principles.
There's nothing extremist about living, sentient, valuable individuals having rights. Whether you believe they're inherent to the existence of that individual or endowed upon them by their creator is irrelevant. In either case, the individual is naturally provided with their rights as a fundamental component of their existence. Once this is understood and accepted, it becomes obvious why no law or act of violence can rob you of your rights; rather, merely infringe upon their free exercise. As limited creatures, we lack the requisite ability to alter the fundamental nature of mankind.
Put another way: you can prevent me from exercising my right to self-determination or my right to self-defense, but you cannot eliminate those rights. You can - at worst - kill me.
Protip: If someone has to give them to you, they aren't rights; they're privileges.
Inherently illegal isn't really a thing. Maybe you mean immoral?
No, I mean illegal. The US Constitution recognizes that there are things beyond the reach of any government's authority and by their very nature, such things cannot emanate from the government. Ergo, violation of such rights is inherently illegal regardless of what laws or judges or kings and queens might say or do.
In any case, courts in the US have been just fine with authorizing the killing of schoolchildren. None of the involved parties fried for it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G...
Regardless of the unfortunate case you cited and the suspicions that a grave injustice was done, capital punishment is not murder by its very definition. To clarify my example, the Supreme Court cannot order or authorize me to go out and kill random schoolchildren. They can order or authorize the capture and punishment of a person convicted of a capital crime, but they lack the requisite authority to allow or require that I go kill innocent people.
There are things the state cannot grant or authorize because they would violate the rights of the people. The US Constitution recognizes some of that (at least on paper; in practice...). The government lacks the requisite authority to authorize those rights to be denied or revoked.
When they do it anyway, all involved should be hauled off to prison, even if it takes an army of the people to do so.
It looks like they are trying to say that, in order to bulk collect data, they must have a specific search they are running that involves a specific telephone line. See SEC 201.
Can someone define "tangible things" as in "SEC. 103. Prohibition on bulk collection of tangible things" or "“(i) Emergency authority for production of tangible things."
Well I'm sure the Executive branch can define it for you, though you may find the particulars of their definition convoluted and self-serving.
No court can authorize an inherently illegal action. The Supreme Court of the United States can approve me murdering schoolchildren all it wants, but my ass will still fry for it (and rightfully so).
This is just like the old days where everyone (except the rich) in Russia got inferior quality (and quantity) stuff to avoid the evil western companies run by their evil capitalist masters. Now mind you, the moment the government stopped enforcing that restriction, it was as though floodgates had opened, but I'm sure this new era of restrictions will enjoy some popularity for a little while. Once that's over, few will have the guts to complain openly.
1) What's the difference? Do you anticipate that these companies will go out and mow lawns to make up for what the tax is costing? Any costs of doing business tacked on by the government get passed on to the customers; that's the way it works.
They always need just a little bit more, don't they.
What needs to happen first is for major software vendors to begin supporting it. That's when you'll see enterprises at least begin to consider it.
MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE!
When we're talking about single-digit numbers, 63% simply isn't that big of a deal. Iceland had 1 intentional homicide in 2012. If they had 2 in 2013, that's a 100% increase in homicides in just one year.
Should their government panic and enact a large swath of draconian legislation aimed at curbing the epidemic of homicide sweeping the country? Let's have an honest discussion; shall we?
"Law-enforcement officials also don't want to reveal information that would give new ammunition to defense lawyers in prosecutions where warrants weren't used, according to officials involved in the discussions."
Find those officials and indict them. Get them to roll on others involved, get them to roll, so on and so forth until you have everyone from prosecutors to judges to field agents to police officers to administrators to politicians; indict the lot of them for a criminal conspiracy to violate the civil rights of thousands - if not millions - of Americans. Indict the manufacturer too and open all of them to civil suits by everyone involved. In fact, just launch one on behalf of everyone affected.
Put a few thousand people in prison, bankrupt manufacturers, towns, cities, police departments, and individuals, and watch this kind of shit stop real quick. Such action would force everyone else to very careful examine how they treat the civil rights of both suspects and regular people who might get caught up in the dragnet. It would demonstrate real and lasting consequences for knowingly violating the legal rights of the people. It would bring us closer to a more just and perfect union.
Or we could just quietly sweep it under the rug and unwind the most untenable abuses while making some fairly innocuous details available to the public in the name of transparency. I'm sure that'll also work.
Why do people always look to "gun-related" murder stats as though being murdered by a gun is somehow worse than being murdered by other means. The intentional homicide rate in the Netherlands in 2012 (latest easy to find stats) was 0.9. In Vermont, it was 1.3. Higher, yes, but since the numbers we're playing with are single-digits (8 in Vermont in 2012), that's rather skewed. Looking back at recent history, there were years where it was as high at 16 and as low as 6. If you go back into the 1960s, it was as low as 1 or 2, and now we're getting into Iceland territory.
The Netherlands is certainly its own country, but the better comparison to the United States is Europe as a whole. Europe comes in at 3.0 and the US comes in at 4.7. Again, looking at all intentional homicides; not just gun-related (because being murdered by a kitchen knife leaves you just as dead as being murdered by a .22). Higher, yes, but when you look at regions with analogous geographic sizes, populations, and cultural variations, the numbers don't express any ludicrously high differences.
Your equivocation is showing.
Nobody shows up to just start opening fire on everyone involved when some art exhibit depicting Jesus in some terrible way is shown (though they may show up to damage the artwork). Piss Christ is just one example. The Misadventures of the Romantic Cannibals is another. South Park has done plenty of cartoons depicting Jesus in a less than respectful manner as has Family Guy, yet no murders. Leon Ferrari lived to a ripe old age despite his many works of blasphemy that even drew the ire of Pope Francis (Mary in a blender comes to mind). Yet again, some of the artwork was vandalized, but the man himself was never harmed. In fact, the threats he received were for his earlier political work (which drove him to exile). Ants of a Crucifix, Phallus-faced Jesus, Chris Ofili’s “The Holy Virgin Mary"; the list just goes on and on. Protests, lawsuits, condemnations, funding being pulled; these are the reactions from Christians.
But draw cartoons of Mohammed? Guys with guns show up to murder people.
There's a fucking difference.
It may or may not be a sign of "grave disrespect", but so what? Having your beliefs disrespected is part of life, whether you're a Muslim, Christian, Jew, Buddhist, or atheist.
No it isn't; not if you're one of these fanatical Muslims. If you're one of these fanatical Muslims, then having your beliefs disrespected means you're required by your god to bring divine vengeance down upon all involved. As others have said, this is what makes such persons incompatible with western civilization. Quite frankly, if you want to have any chance at a relatively peaceful western civilization, all those fitting into that group must be exterminated.
I think they're all childish idiots. The people attending that meeting, with their provoking "who can draw the best Mohammed cartoon." Come on, your days at high school are a very long time away and you should behave like an adult now.
Regardless of their motives, I'm glad they held this event. Two people who were ready, willing, and able to murder over cartoons being drawn were lured into a death trap. Good. Let them burn in Hell (if such a place/state exists).
The events may be childish, but when it brings out murderous fanatics and gets those fanatics killed before they can kill innocent people, then by all means hold them every day of the week and twice on Sunday. My good friend Darwin has informed me that eventually, we'll run out of murderous fanatics.
Now you're just picking up any little thing to criticize because I called you out on the strawman argument you made. You aren't looking to have any sort of substantive discussion - that much is obvious - so good day to you.
Having fun with your straw man arguments?
Never stated nor implied that the US has a perfect history (or present); merely that most of the rest of the world is hardly a model.