Preventing climate change isn't a long-term option.
Sure it is. But we don't have to do it all with trying to pump (or stop pumping) into the atmosphere. The sun IS getting hotter (and bigger). When life first started (a couple of billion years ago), Earth was at the outside edge of the "temperate zone" in its orbit around the sun. That is, it's warm enough so plenty of water is liquid, but cool enough that not all the water is in thick water vapor blanket around the planet. The warmer Earth gets, the more water hangs out in the atmosphere, and the hotter the Earth gets.
Anyway, we are now at the *inside* edge of the temperate zone, and the sun is still growing. The long-term climate control plan is to attach some rockets to a big comet or asteroid, and get it sweeping close to Earth's orbit so it pulls it further out from the sun, by just a little bit. This could be a permanent option - set it up to tug Earth every few years ot so just enough to compensate for the growth of the sun, plus any extra radiative forcing effect of the greenhouse gasses going into the atmosphere.
Not only do we get a stable climate, the CO2 levels can be allowed to increase enough to provide a boost for our plants and crops, so we can use renewable sources of energy as the fossil fuels run out. With 1800-2000 ppm of CO2, switchgrass and corn will grow like crazy, so we would have plenty of arable land for both food and biofuels.
From what I've heard, there was a period of time during which CO2 levels were way way higher than they are now -- and that was in the middle of an ice age. Is this a correct claim? If so, how does it square with the current greenhouse gas models? I could easily be on crack here, cannot find reference to it on google.
The people who will be worst hit are the internet startups, who still dont have a solid business model to come up with the extra access payments.
You're right that it has not been a prominent part of the discussion, but it has certainly not been overlooked. I touched on some aspects of this in my letter to Eric Cantor.
Dude, why would you post this on slashdot? Where the hell did you come from, anyway? Go write for a technical journal or something - nobody wants to see your "reasoned argument" around here.
Frickin' killjoy.
Re:They already pay their "fair share".
on
Net Neutrality or Not?
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
I call bullshit. Your entire argument is based on the assumption that ISPs are over-selling bandwidth (surprise, surprise), and by a tremendous amount (2GB PER MONTH?? insanity). So, basically, you are saying that since the telecoms have lied to their customers and defrauded the public, they should now be able to gouge everyone else to pay for building capacity. This is so flawed I don't even know where to begin.
First of all, both ends pay for bandwidth, but *content providers always pay more*, because they require more bandwidth. And in most cases, the big content providers are *already paying* for the backbone, because they are buying their connection from the backbone owners - in many cases multiple backbone owners - for the bandwidth.
You also forgot option #4, which is what the telecoms really want to do: don't build anything, just give priority to the your content provider partners, and sell your own video - for extra! So it's really #1 AND #3, except your customers new charges are for a whole other service: IPTV!!
The other flaw is that all that backbone and infrastructure that was built today was paid for by allowing telecoms to charge monopoly prices, providing tax breaks and incentives, etc.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the telecoms simply cannot be trusted. This is not the first time we have heard the telecoms tell congress "Hey, you must do [insert what they ask for here] so that we can build more capacity!" Well, guess what? *THEY NEVER BUILT IT*! At my house - in a densely populated, affluent area, - I can't even have ANY broadband access except cable, because Verizon won't upgrade their switches - but this is what they promised last time congress gave them what they wanted (favorable treatment, special dispensation, monopoly access to me and many other customers). Instead, they just pocketed the profits. They will do it again.
Why is the US #10 in broadband deployment, even though we started out on top? Because the telecoms are buying congress and selling us out - while NOT building the infrastructure they keep promising.
... I assume you are paid or have something to gain by supporting the loss of network neutrality, because everyone else with your viewpoint does, or is simply ignorant of the issues.
This guy is obviously one of those freaky "libertarian" types that keeps throwing out issues that the Republicans and Democrats have agreed not to get into, and confusing the voters so they don't know which side to choose in the partisan battles. Just ignore him.
This is all either because of the right-wing's focus on pro-business monetary success... or because the left-wing has taken over college campuses. Discuss.
Nobody, but nobody, is calling for the Soviet model for the Internet.
I don't know - after all of the abuses of the telcos, I'm thinking it's time to support it. Declare that all that "last mile" of copper is critical infrastructure, and take it away from the telcos. Let them compete with for who gets to offer services over those lines - but they don't own them anymore. Run it like the highway system. Feds fund the backbone, states and localities run the rest. There are a lot of details to work out, like how to implement the funding (taxes) to pay for maintenance, how line sharing is handled, etc. I hate the way government run programs work, but what could be worse than the telcos at this point?
It's not as easy as you seem think. I've been sending mails to them about this issue since it first started getting attention in Washington, but it doesn't seem to have much effect (I guess I'm not sending enough "campaign contributions" with my letters). When my congress critter voted "No" to the amendment today, I fired off another letter, but he's not likely to read that one either.
I hope someone mods you up because that was very inciteful. The incumbent local carriers (can't really call them baby bells anymore) are well-versed in maximizing profit, and they realize that the best profits come only in monopoly markets.
I'll give you a great example. Most people I know have 2 choices for broadband: cable and DSL. I have only 1, even though I live in a very affluent, densely populated area. What's the issue? Cavalier Telephone. Cavalier is a small telephone service provider that competes with Verizon and offers discount, full-service POTS. They take advantage of the sharing rules that require Verizon to rent them their copper infrastructure at the rate Verizon charges itself. So Verizon stops upgrading. Most exchanges in the area are on newer switches, but the older switches (circa 1960's) - like the one my lines are on - can't support the line sharing. So Verizon eats the extra expense of maintaining those old switches, can't offer DSL themselves on those switches... but they don't have to share. They know that having a monopoly on POTS service in an area is worth more than the ability to offer additional services like DSL.
The Barton bill gives the Federal Communications Commission authority to enforce net neutrality principles and set fines of up to $500,000 for violations.
What a joke. Even if the monopoly-friendly FCC ever decided to impose these fines, it would become nothing but a minor line-item on the telcos' multi-billion dollar balance sheets, and they filter, block, and shut down anything they want.
You assert that everyone is paying their fair share. Perhaps not. Few people consume all the bandwidth they could and conversely the heavy users are getting a cheap ride since most (home) internet use is a flat fee that varies little (less than a factor of 2). So most folks don't pay more if you use more.
The proplem with your argument is it is still very consumer-centric. Stop thinking of the Internet as a resource - that's how the cable and DSL providers want you to think, and it's not right. The Internet is both ways. Right now I get 4Mbit download and 256 up. Of course I don't often use the download bandwidth I'm allowed, but that's not really the limiting factor - it's that upload bandwidth that's scarce (although my TOS says I can't run a server, VPN, etc., but that's another issue). Now, I *can* pay more for the "Pro" version - that will give me 384 up (I think there's also a 512 option). So, more money, more bandwidth.
Part of the issue is that the ISPs are actually over-selling their bandwidth. They know that every customer can't get 4Mbit all at the same time, but they know from usage patterns that only a certain percentage will be trying to max out their downloads, and that percentage can get bursts close to the max for short periods.
So the tragedy of the commons never really comes into play. All of the bandwidth really is paid for - it really is scarce. The ISPs offer more than they can really provide, but if more people start consuming more, the ISP has to add bigger pipes and charge more for it, or lower caps.
Sorry, but bandwidth is not free, no matter how you look at it.
Eric Cantor is my representative in the House, and he voted "No" to the "net neutrality" amendment. Here is the text of my letter to him:
June 8, 2006
The Honorable Eric Cantor U.S. House of Representatives 329 Cannon House Office Building Washington, DC 20515-4607
Dear Congressman Cantor:
As your constituent, I am very concerned about the efforts of the telephone and cable companies to fundamentally alter the way the Internet works, and urge you to do all you can to protect the Internet as we know it and to stand up for the principle of "net neutrality."
It seems that you do not agree with this sentiment, since you help to defeat the "Markey of Massachusetts Amendment" (HR 5252). My only conclusion must be that you are poorly informed about the issue, and have allowed the incumbent telephone and cable companies to unduly influence you. Make no mistake - this is one of the most important issues of our time, and the plans of these communication companies will destroy our public infrastructure. I work in the field of Information Technology, and I have a clear understanding of both sides of the issue. Frankly, you have supported the wrong side.
I am a conservative person, and am always opposed to intrusive government regulation, especially at the national level. Unfortunately, the ISP industry does not respond well to market pressures, since most services exist as monopolies or near-monopolies, and were supported as monopolies by federal laws for many years. The market will not be able to keep the damage in check. The Internet will fundamentally change, and very much for the worse.
This is not about Google, Amazon and eBay wanting a "free ride". I understand why they support network neutrality regulation, but they are the few supporters with the deep pockets to make their opinion heard. The real losers will be the small businesses and individual citizens. I'm sure you have heard about Web Loggers or "bloggers" on the Internet. They are the freedom-minded individuals that create news and opinion websites on small budgets, and report on current issues. It was the bloggers that first revealed that the National Guard documents about President Bush, reported on 60 Minutes, were actually a hoax. Without net neutrality, these small voices will be silenced. Most are small, unfunded writers with opinions, started websites out of their own pockets. ISPs will now be allowed to silence these small voices.
My wife is very fond of researching products before she purchases them. She will go to forum sites and discussion boards on the Internet, where she can read the experiences and opinions of other people. When access to content can be strictly controlled by the big ISPs, manufacturers will be able to pay to have these websites effectively blocked, or throttled to such a degree that they are effectively useless.
The Internet is NOT television, Representative Cantor, and it should not be run like television, but the ISPs will now be given the ability to do that. I have several hundred channels of content available on my television today, and there is nothing to watch. Sure, there are be a few independent voices out there, but they are of such poor quality and so full of static that they are be unwatchable. So what do I do? I just turn it off. It appears that this will happen to the Internet, too. Do you want everyone so frustrated with the Internet that they will just turn it off?
The Internet produced one of the greatest communication revolutions of our time. It connects people with people. Not everyone can afford to produce a slick television show or advertisement and pay for air time, but anyone can put up a web site and have their message available to the world. No more. Since the big 5 media companies will want all the bandwidth they can buy to push our their content, and Google, Amazon, and eBay paying the ISPs for some of the extra left, all the small voice will be drowned out.
Please reconsider your stance. You may be given a chance to make the right decision next time.
Um, in all seriousness, it seems like the only home chemists these days are cooking meth.
Which is the real issue, and it has been getting worse and worse over the years. It's about the drug war effort - the terror war has just widened the net a bit.
The DEA started using desperate measures some time ago. When ecstasy hit the street back in the '80s, (and was perfectly legal), they got a law quickly passed that allowed them to "administratively" ban any chemical on an "emergency" basis. This authority has been expanded to the point where you might as well think of any new chemical as illegal until some government agency "authorizes" its distribution under some onerous regulation or another.
The current focus of the DEA's expanded control of everything is its effort to ban all "precursors". Lysergic Acid has been strictly controlled for many years (despite its relatively benign nature), and anyone that attempts to buy it goes on a government list. They have now moved on to things like sudafed (a precursor for making meth). You now have to provide a picture ID, all your identifying information, and deal with strict limits on the amount you can buy. Yes, your name will be submitted to a government agency. And this for an over-the-counter decongestant. Oh, and congress never passed a law to impose these restrictions - it was done "administratively", or by executive order or something.
It's all about control, really. Most pharmacists are deathly afraid of the DEA, as they are watched very closely. The casualties of the drug war are truely enormous.
I'm a functional (Haskell, LISP) programmer as well as being well versed in OO (C++ & Java mainly) and I've just started my first AJAX project and I've hopped from IDE TO ide including plain vim, Eclipse with ADT & WDT, Mozilla with Venkman debugger and (gasp horror) Visual Studio 2005 and I still find it harder than anything else I've done in terms of code-navigation and debugging
Word.
There just *is no* decent environment for doing this kind of stuff (Ajax/DOM). I was actually impressed with Visual Studio as a development tool until I started trying to code some interactive AJAX-style stuff. I'm still using the "2003" version (and won't be upgrading), and if you hop through a few hoops you *can* get it to do some javascript debugging along with IE, but it will stop on any error, and refuse to continue or allow you to edit. You have to stop the debugger, go find the code it complained about, edit, restart, repeat.
Of course if you want to write for multiple browsers, you have to find another way to debug for mozilla, etc. Firefox with the "Web Developer" extension is *very* handy, and I make extensive use of it as well as "DOM Inspector" and "View Rendered Source Chart", but it's not really like having an IDE, it's closer to trial and error.
I'm hoping I can move away from.NET after this project - maybe with PHP5 and Eclipse I can come up with a more rational environment for developing this stuff.
Most of the sane, reasonable people at the top of this country's armed forces were pushed into retirement in favor of Bush/Rumsfield cronies.
Actually, the brain drain started under Clinton, beginning with the Tailhook scandal, sensitivity training for officers, "don't ask, don't tell", and various other "feel good" regulations that decimated the discipline needed to maintain an effective fighting force.
It may seem like a nice idea for everyone to be kind and understanding and sensitive to everybodies feelings, but you can't be expected to win an armed conflict by smiling at the enemy and putting flowers in your hair.
If I obtain a negotiated license from a label to perform a work publicly through a digital transmission, with the label's full contractual understanding that the transmission will use no digital restrictions management, then who is the plaintiff?
The US Department of Justice. And they better damn well enforce it in ever instance, otherwise the law could be seen as violating the Constitution's Equal Protection guarantee.
Some idiot must have deployed Symantec AV and/or Client Security on all the PCs at the IRS. I guess those IRS guys finally got pissed off enough at Symantec's crappy software always slowing down and crashing their computers, so they decided to get even... Can't say I blame them.
I use a few hacks on most of my websites - but I kind of have to, to get them to render in IE correctly. It's not as bad as it used to be, and I could probably eliminate some of them if I used a little less javascript or... hey - wait a minute - this is talking about web site *attacks*! Not hacks on websites.
The bill of rights was added to the constitution under duress - the constitutional congress didn't put those things in because these things were implied, since the constitution spelled out what the federal government was allowed to do - and they weren't allowed any powers not explicitly granted therein.
That said, congress *is* granted some rights to regulate elections in Article I, Section 4:
The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.
Although that speaks nothing to the *campaigning* for election, it has been stretched beyond recognition by creeping additional laws and a supreme court anxious to exert its own authority, much like the justification for regulating everything under the sun by claiming a "significant impact" principle on the regulation of interstate commerce.
But let's be clear - the more we buy into the notion that the bill of rights spells out the *only* rights we have, the more power the government will grab - and the erosion of those rights will also continue. How long before those rights are restricted to such a degree that they are meaningless?
Wow. You're really stretching. Why so intent on looking for pessimistic view of this story? Can't you accept that sometimes beaurocrats can actually make the *right* decision from time to time. Sure, it's rare - but maybe this time the right decision was so obvious that even an idiot can see it.
B) The DLC is not the DNC - the DLC is the conservative wing of the democratic party.
So? They are democrats. Are you saying that only specific Democrat's opinions should matter? Which ones? Why? How do you get this message to the voters?
C) Moonie papers are not a reliable source
WTF? What are you talking about? Who's a moonie? Are you just trying to discredit the sources I sited by using some obscure association? Why? The point was that the *perception* is that Democrats (all of them, since most centrist voters - the ones that count - don't dig very deep into party politics and the little power struggles within them) are weaker on national security than the republicans. Find your own opinion polls if you don't like the opinions I sited - what do they say?
[democratic posturing]
yea, yea. Here's a clue: "How to win friends and influence people, step 1: don't call them idiots".
I do agree that the democratic politicians in washington are doing a piss-poor job of representing democratic ideals and communicating the message.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure it is. But we don't have to do it all with trying to pump (or stop pumping) into the atmosphere. The sun IS getting hotter (and bigger). When life first started (a couple of billion years ago), Earth was at the outside edge of the "temperate zone" in its orbit around the sun. That is, it's warm enough so plenty of water is liquid, but cool enough that not all the water is in thick water vapor blanket around the planet. The warmer Earth gets, the more water hangs out in the atmosphere, and the hotter the Earth gets.
Anyway, we are now at the *inside* edge of the temperate zone, and the sun is still growing. The long-term climate control plan is to attach some rockets to a big comet or asteroid, and get it sweeping close to Earth's orbit so it pulls it further out from the sun, by just a little bit. This could be a permanent option - set it up to tug Earth every few years ot so just enough to compensate for the growth of the sun, plus any extra radiative forcing effect of the greenhouse gasses going into the atmosphere.
Not only do we get a stable climate, the CO2 levels can be allowed to increase enough to provide a boost for our plants and crops, so we can use renewable sources of energy as the fossil fuels run out. With 1800-2000 ppm of CO2, switchgrass and corn will grow like crazy, so we would have plenty of arable land for both food and biofuels.
It's practically a free lunch.
Probably not it's been disputed.
You're right that it has not been a prominent part of the discussion, but it has certainly not been overlooked. I touched on some aspects of this in my letter to Eric Cantor.
Frickin' killjoy.
First of all, both ends pay for bandwidth, but *content providers always pay more*, because they require more bandwidth. And in most cases, the big content providers are *already paying* for the backbone, because they are buying their connection from the backbone owners - in many cases multiple backbone owners - for the bandwidth.
You also forgot option #4, which is what the telecoms really want to do: don't build anything, just give priority to the your content provider partners, and sell your own video - for extra! So it's really #1 AND #3, except your customers new charges are for a whole other service: IPTV!!
The other flaw is that all that backbone and infrastructure that was built today was paid for by allowing telecoms to charge monopoly prices, providing tax breaks and incentives, etc.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the telecoms simply cannot be trusted. This is not the first time we have heard the telecoms tell congress "Hey, you must do [insert what they ask for here] so that we can build more capacity!" Well, guess what? *THEY NEVER BUILT IT*! At my house - in a densely populated, affluent area, - I can't even have ANY broadband access except cable, because Verizon won't upgrade their switches - but this is what they promised last time congress gave them what they wanted (favorable treatment, special dispensation, monopoly access to me and many other customers). Instead, they just pocketed the profits. They will do it again.
Why is the US #10 in broadband deployment, even though we started out on top? Because the telecoms are buying congress and selling us out - while NOT building the infrastructure they keep promising.
This is all either because of the right-wing's focus on pro-business monetary success... or because the left-wing has taken over college campuses. Discuss.
I don't know - after all of the abuses of the telcos, I'm thinking it's time to support it. Declare that all that "last mile" of copper is critical infrastructure, and take it away from the telcos. Let them compete with for who gets to offer services over those lines - but they don't own them anymore. Run it like the highway system. Feds fund the backbone, states and localities run the rest. There are a lot of details to work out, like how to implement the funding (taxes) to pay for maintenance, how line sharing is handled, etc. I hate the way government run programs work, but what could be worse than the telcos at this point?
Nope, sorry, not even close. Only 60,252,722 voted against Bush in 2004, and it was even less in 2000...
It's not as easy as you seem think. I've been sending mails to them about this issue since it first started getting attention in Washington, but it doesn't seem to have much effect (I guess I'm not sending enough "campaign contributions" with my letters). When my congress critter voted "No" to the amendment today, I fired off another letter, but he's not likely to read that one either.
Cool! Hook me up with an anonymous proxy, will you? We'll test out those transatlantic pipes, too!
I'll give you a great example. Most people I know have 2 choices for broadband: cable and DSL. I have only 1, even though I live in a very affluent, densely populated area. What's the issue? Cavalier Telephone. Cavalier is a small telephone service provider that competes with Verizon and offers discount, full-service POTS. They take advantage of the sharing rules that require Verizon to rent them their copper infrastructure at the rate Verizon charges itself. So Verizon stops upgrading. Most exchanges in the area are on newer switches, but the older switches (circa 1960's) - like the one my lines are on - can't support the line sharing. So Verizon eats the extra expense of maintaining those old switches, can't offer DSL themselves on those switches... but they don't have to share. They know that having a monopoly on POTS service in an area is worth more than the ability to offer additional services like DSL.
According to Wired,
What a joke. Even if the monopoly-friendly FCC ever decided to impose these fines, it would become nothing but a minor line-item on the telcos' multi-billion dollar balance sheets, and they filter, block, and shut down anything they want.
The proplem with your argument is it is still very consumer-centric. Stop thinking of the Internet as a resource - that's how the cable and DSL providers want you to think, and it's not right. The Internet is both ways. Right now I get 4Mbit download and 256 up. Of course I don't often use the download bandwidth I'm allowed, but that's not really the limiting factor - it's that upload bandwidth that's scarce (although my TOS says I can't run a server, VPN, etc., but that's another issue). Now, I *can* pay more for the "Pro" version - that will give me 384 up (I think there's also a 512 option). So, more money, more bandwidth.
Part of the issue is that the ISPs are actually over-selling their bandwidth. They know that every customer can't get 4Mbit all at the same time, but they know from usage patterns that only a certain percentage will be trying to max out their downloads, and that percentage can get bursts close to the max for short periods.
So the tragedy of the commons never really comes into play. All of the bandwidth really is paid for - it really is scarce. The ISPs offer more than they can really provide, but if more people start consuming more, the ISP has to add bigger pipes and charge more for it, or lower caps.
Sorry, but bandwidth is not free, no matter how you look at it.
Eric Cantor is my representative in the House, and he voted "No" to the "net neutrality" amendment. Here is the text of my letter to him:
June 8, 2006
The Honorable Eric Cantor
U.S. House of Representatives
329 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515-4607
Dear Congressman Cantor:
As your constituent, I am very concerned about the efforts of the telephone and cable companies to fundamentally alter the way the Internet works, and urge you to do all you can to protect the Internet as we know it and to stand up for the principle of "net neutrality."
It seems that you do not agree with this sentiment, since you help to defeat the "Markey of Massachusetts Amendment" (HR 5252). My only conclusion must be that you are poorly informed about the issue, and have allowed the incumbent telephone and cable companies to unduly influence you. Make no mistake - this is one of the most important issues of our time, and the plans of these communication companies will destroy our public infrastructure. I work in the field of Information Technology, and I have a clear understanding of both sides of the issue. Frankly, you have supported the wrong side.
I am a conservative person, and am always opposed to intrusive government regulation, especially at the national level. Unfortunately, the ISP industry does not respond well to market pressures, since most services exist as monopolies or near-monopolies, and were supported as monopolies by federal laws for many years. The market will not be able to keep the damage in check. The Internet will fundamentally change, and very much for the worse.
This is not about Google, Amazon and eBay wanting a "free ride". I understand why they support network neutrality regulation, but they are the few supporters with the deep pockets to make their opinion heard. The real losers will be the small businesses and individual citizens. I'm sure you have heard about Web Loggers or "bloggers" on the Internet. They are the freedom-minded individuals that create news and opinion websites on small budgets, and report on current issues. It was the bloggers that first revealed that the National Guard documents about President Bush, reported on 60 Minutes, were actually a hoax. Without net neutrality, these small voices will be silenced. Most are small, unfunded writers with opinions, started websites out of their own pockets. ISPs will now be allowed to silence these small voices.
My wife is very fond of researching products before she purchases them. She will go to forum sites and discussion boards on the Internet, where she can read the experiences and opinions of other people. When access to content can be strictly controlled by the big ISPs, manufacturers will be able to pay to have these websites effectively blocked, or throttled to such a degree that they are effectively useless.
The Internet is NOT television, Representative Cantor, and it should not be run like television, but the ISPs will now be given the ability to do that. I have several hundred channels of content available on my television today, and there is nothing to watch. Sure, there are be a few independent voices out there, but they are of such poor quality and so full of static that they are be unwatchable. So what do I do? I just turn it off. It appears that this will happen to the Internet, too. Do you want everyone so frustrated with the Internet that they will just turn it off?
The Internet produced one of the greatest communication revolutions of our time. It connects people with people. Not everyone can afford to produce a slick television show or advertisement and pay for air time, but anyone can put up a web site and have their message available to the world. No more. Since the big 5 media companies will want all the bandwidth they can buy to push our their content, and Google, Amazon, and eBay paying the ISPs for some of the extra left, all the small voice will be drowned out.
Please reconsider your stance. You may be given a chance to make the right decision next time.
Nice idea, but too late. I keep all my bookmarks on del.icio.us now. It would be nice if they offered a better way to make off-line backups, though.
Which is the real issue, and it has been getting worse and worse over the years. It's about the drug war effort - the terror war has just widened the net a bit.
The DEA started using desperate measures some time ago. When ecstasy hit the street back in the '80s, (and was perfectly legal), they got a law quickly passed that allowed them to "administratively" ban any chemical on an "emergency" basis. This authority has been expanded to the point where you might as well think of any new chemical as illegal until some government agency "authorizes" its distribution under some onerous regulation or another.
The current focus of the DEA's expanded control of everything is its effort to ban all "precursors". Lysergic Acid has been strictly controlled for many years (despite its relatively benign nature), and anyone that attempts to buy it goes on a government list. They have now moved on to things like sudafed (a precursor for making meth). You now have to provide a picture ID, all your identifying information, and deal with strict limits on the amount you can buy. Yes, your name will be submitted to a government agency. And this for an over-the-counter decongestant. Oh, and congress never passed a law to impose these restrictions - it was done "administratively", or by executive order or something.
It's all about control, really. Most pharmacists are deathly afraid of the DEA, as they are watched very closely. The casualties of the drug war are truely enormous.
Word.
There just *is no* decent environment for doing this kind of stuff (Ajax/DOM). I was actually impressed with Visual Studio as a development tool until I started trying to code some interactive AJAX-style stuff. I'm still using the "2003" version (and won't be upgrading), and if you hop through a few hoops you *can* get it to do some javascript debugging along with IE, but it will stop on any error, and refuse to continue or allow you to edit. You have to stop the debugger, go find the code it complained about, edit, restart, repeat.
Of course if you want to write for multiple browsers, you have to find another way to debug for mozilla, etc. Firefox with the "Web Developer" extension is *very* handy, and I make extensive use of it as well as "DOM Inspector" and "View Rendered Source Chart", but it's not really like having an IDE, it's closer to trial and error.
I'm hoping I can move away from .NET after this project - maybe with PHP5 and Eclipse I can come up with a more rational environment for developing this stuff.
That's because you forgot to include your campaign contribution check.
Actually, the brain drain started under Clinton, beginning with the Tailhook scandal, sensitivity training for officers, "don't ask, don't tell", and various other "feel good" regulations that decimated the discipline needed to maintain an effective fighting force.
It may seem like a nice idea for everyone to be kind and understanding and sensitive to everybodies feelings, but you can't be expected to win an armed conflict by smiling at the enemy and putting flowers in your hair.
The US Department of Justice. And they better damn well enforce it in ever instance, otherwise the law could be seen as violating the Constitution's Equal Protection guarantee.
Some idiot must have deployed Symantec AV and/or Client Security on all the PCs at the IRS. I guess those IRS guys finally got pissed off enough at Symantec's crappy software always slowing down and crashing their computers, so they decided to get even... Can't say I blame them.
uhh... Nevermind.
No, you got it completely wrong. It's much funnier with the graphic anyway.
That said, congress *is* granted some rights to regulate elections in Article I, Section 4:
Although that speaks nothing to the *campaigning* for election, it has been stretched beyond recognition by creeping additional laws and a supreme court anxious to exert its own authority, much like the justification for regulating everything under the sun by claiming a "significant impact" principle on the regulation of interstate commerce.
But let's be clear - the more we buy into the notion that the bill of rights spells out the *only* rights we have, the more power the government will grab - and the erosion of those rights will also continue. How long before those rights are restricted to such a degree that they are meaningless?
Wow. You're really stretching. Why so intent on looking for pessimistic view of this story? Can't you accept that sometimes beaurocrats can actually make the *right* decision from time to time. Sure, it's rare - but maybe this time the right decision was so obvious that even an idiot can see it.
30 years ago was 1976, not 1972
B) The DLC is not the DNC - the DLC is the conservative wing of the democratic party.
So? They are democrats. Are you saying that only specific Democrat's opinions should matter? Which ones? Why? How do you get this message to the voters?
C) Moonie papers are not a reliable source
WTF? What are you talking about? Who's a moonie? Are you just trying to discredit the sources I sited by using some obscure association? Why? The point was that the *perception* is that Democrats (all of them, since most centrist voters - the ones that count - don't dig very deep into party politics and the little power struggles within them) are weaker on national security than the republicans. Find your own opinion polls if you don't like the opinions I sited - what do they say?
[democratic posturing]
yea, yea. Here's a clue: "How to win friends and influence people, step 1: don't call them idiots".
I do agree that the democratic politicians in washington are doing a piss-poor job of representing democratic ideals and communicating the message.
So are you.