We are tossing a 19 year old kid into the system for 2 and 1/2 years over shining a light.
Go to a farm, collect some cowpies, process them until you have a few pounds of potassium nitrate. Go to a supermarket and pick up some charcoal, grind it up. Travel to the nearest active volcano and scoop up some of that nice natural yellow powder (sulphur). Mix it all together, put it into a steel-walled box with a hole for a fuse, place it against the wall of somebody you don't like and light the fuse.
Why have I been arrested? All I was doing was playing with these natural ingredients!
A possible approach is some variation of a welding helmet. Those things can respond in 50 microseconds, and go clear again as soon as the dangerous light stops.
According to http://www.uni-duesseldorf.de/WWW/MedFak/LaserMedizin/hering/laserpointer/Laserpointer_endanger_retina.pdf blink response time is 250 ms, which is probably longer than the laser can be held on-target. The damage is already done. The pilot's dark-adapted eyes, even if not damaged, will not again be dark-adapted for at least a minute. Scattering may well assure that both the pilot and co-pilot (if any) are effectively blinded.
It's easiest to do this on landing approach, precisely when it's most dangerous.
The idea of "making an example" of someone while punishing others at a different level, or not punishing others, is unjust on its face. People shining a laser at an aircraft should be tried at least for reckless endangerment and at most for attempted murder, depending upon circumstances (actually, for murder if someone dies), and punished accordingly.
How many people do you know whose labor isn't worth $22 per hour? Most children, most illiterate adults, many lazy people. Should those people be paid more than they're worth? Will they be?
With a $22/hour minimum wage unemployment will skyrocket. The unemployed, some of whom previously produced something, now produce nothing and become a burden on society. With GDP down, everyone becomes poorer. The newly unemployed, looking for a way to fill their hours, turn to destructive mischief, left-wing politics, and despair.
Incidentally, from a historical standpoint unions have favored minimum wage as it enriches unions and increases their political power. Blacks suffer disproportionately under minimum wage laws, and minimum wage laws are responsible for the astonishingly high unemployment among black youth.
If you hate blacks and the poor, love unions and turmoil, high minimum wage is for you.
Most big cities become big by being natural trade hubs, such as ports (New York, San Francisco) or transportation pinch points (Chicago?). Once established, workers of all sorts are attracted; as they become crowded the middle class moves to suburbs. Left behind are the poor in slums, vulnerable to political envy messages, and the rich in protected enclaves, some of whom lust for power. Because cities are densely populated it's easy to sell the message that everybody depends on everybody else; and because water, sewer and streets in cities are easily taken over or created by the government its easy to believe that more and more things should be.
The geographical advantages and the advantage of making use of advanced infrastructure already in place are powerful attractors that can overcome a substantial amount of taxation and regulation. The burden can become too great, and we're seeing that now in Detroit where the combination of bad politics and the decline of American auto manufacturers is overcoming the advantages of being near Lake Michigan, Chicago, and sources of iron ore.
New Hampshire is already heavily politically polluted by its propinquity to Massachusetts. Please do not encourage more shit heads to move here from Boston and Cambridge.
if you have any debt whatsoever, you are running at a deficit
Wrong so many ways. Deficit in government-speak means more money is being spent than taken in for the current fiscal year. Debt means the current amount owed, roughly equal to the sum of all preceding deficits.
In personal finance, net debt means owing more than cash-on-hand, although it's better to consider debt to be long-term plus recirculating short-term debt (the latter being that portion of the credit card bill that isn't paid off each month.) Here again, deficit is the measure of how much a person is losing financial ground on a monthly or yearly basis.
I can't judge whether most Americans are net debtors or are losing ground, but the idea that all Americans are either is simply false, because I'm not and I know others who aren't, either.
In my view, the correct solution to the American problem is to break the country up. You could have these smaller states which deal with most matters, and they could unite for certain common goods like defence. [sic]
Any person voting for a law must write it out longhand under video surveillance, in front of witnesses Bills may not reference other documents, except for bills repealing other bills, which may repeal by referring to the bill number.
According to a 2010 research study by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, producing fuel from algae grown in ponds at scale would cost between $240 and $332 per barrel.
Three years ago I tried Ubuntu. A month later, an automatic update made the system unbootable. I switched to the KDE spin of Fedora. I find that Gnome makes a mess of the desktop.
Do choose a popular distro so that there's a good chance that problems you find will already have a published solution.
Alternative energy is good for the planet and good for us.
You're assuming that all forms of alternative energy are low pollution. Let's consider burning peat, that's an alternative. Or keeping a few bags of radium around the house for heat.
Slashdot Mirror
Go to a farm, collect some cowpies, process them until you have a few pounds of potassium nitrate. Go to a supermarket and pick up some charcoal, grind it up. Travel to the nearest active volcano and scoop up some of that nice natural yellow powder (sulphur). Mix it all together, put it into a steel-walled box with a hole for a fuse, place it against the wall of somebody you don't like and light the fuse.
Why have I been arrested? All I was doing was playing with these natural ingredients!
The light that returns to your eye from star pointing is just that which reflects off dust or other tiny stuff in the air: not much.
A possible approach is some variation of a welding helmet. Those things can respond in 50 microseconds, and go clear again as soon as the dangerous light stops.
According to http://www.uni-duesseldorf.de/WWW/MedFak/LaserMedizin/hering/laserpointer/Laserpointer_endanger_retina.pdf blink response time is 250 ms, which is probably longer than the laser can be held on-target. The damage is already done. The pilot's dark-adapted eyes, even if not damaged, will not again be dark-adapted for at least a minute. Scattering may well assure that both the pilot and co-pilot (if any) are effectively blinded.
It's easiest to do this on landing approach, precisely when it's most dangerous.
Add to that jail sentence a year of community service catering to the whims of a petulant blind person.
The idea of "making an example" of someone while punishing others at a different level, or not punishing others, is unjust on its face. People shining a laser at an aircraft should be tried at least for reckless endangerment and at most for attempted murder, depending upon circumstances (actually, for murder if someone dies), and punished accordingly.
Aerogels should be considered structures, like a house.
How many people do you know whose labor isn't worth $22 per hour? Most children, most illiterate adults, many lazy people. Should those people be paid more than they're worth? Will they be?
With a $22/hour minimum wage unemployment will skyrocket. The unemployed, some of whom previously produced something, now produce nothing and become a burden on society. With GDP down, everyone becomes poorer. The newly unemployed, looking for a way to fill their hours, turn to destructive mischief, left-wing politics, and despair.
Incidentally, from a historical standpoint unions have favored minimum wage as it enriches unions and increases their political power. Blacks suffer disproportionately under minimum wage laws, and minimum wage laws are responsible for the astonishingly high unemployment among black youth.
If you hate blacks and the poor, love unions and turmoil, high minimum wage is for you.
Most big cities become big by being natural trade hubs, such as ports (New York, San Francisco) or transportation pinch points (Chicago?). Once established, workers of all sorts are attracted; as they become crowded the middle class moves to suburbs. Left behind are the poor in slums, vulnerable to political envy messages, and the rich in protected enclaves, some of whom lust for power. Because cities are densely populated it's easy to sell the message that everybody depends on everybody else; and because water, sewer and streets in cities are easily taken over or created by the government its easy to believe that more and more things should be.
The geographical advantages and the advantage of making use of advanced infrastructure already in place are powerful attractors that can overcome a substantial amount of taxation and regulation. The burden can become too great, and we're seeing that now in Detroit where the combination of bad politics and the decline of American auto manufacturers is overcoming the advantages of being near Lake Michigan, Chicago, and sources of iron ore.
New Hampshire is already heavily politically polluted by its propinquity to Massachusetts. Please do not encourage more shit heads to move here from Boston and Cambridge.
There aren't as many as 10 Congressmen who are trustworthy.
An electric voting system has already been rejected by Congress once. Any change would have to be forced on them.
LBJ in 1968 was so unpopular that he withdrew from his reelection bid early in the primary process. Now that's losing.
Wrong so many ways. Deficit in government-speak means more money is being spent than taken in for the current fiscal year. Debt means the current amount owed, roughly equal to the sum of all preceding deficits.
In personal finance, net debt means owing more than cash-on-hand, although it's better to consider debt to be long-term plus recirculating short-term debt (the latter being that portion of the credit card bill that isn't paid off each month.) Here again, deficit is the measure of how much a person is losing financial ground on a monthly or yearly basis.
I can't judge whether most Americans are net debtors or are losing ground, but the idea that all Americans are either is simply false, because I'm not and I know others who aren't, either.
You mean like this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_the_United_States
Compromise is not a good thing. We're in the mess we're in now because our rights have been compromised.
Any person voting for a law must write it out longhand under video surveillance, in front of witnesses Bills may not reference other documents, except for bills repealing other bills, which may repeal by referring to the bill number.
This one isn't paywalled: http://www.theglobalist.com/storyid.aspx?StoryId=9505
Lying in the sun causes sunburn and skin cancer.
http://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Biofuels/Why-are-we-not-Drowning-in-Algae-Biofuel.html
Let them drink coke.
Three years ago I tried Ubuntu. A month later, an automatic update made the system unbootable. I switched to the KDE spin of Fedora. I find that Gnome makes a mess of the desktop.
Do choose a popular distro so that there's a good chance that problems you find will already have a published solution.
Whoosh!
You are conflating economics (the study of the effectiveness of human productive action) with some narrow-minded economists.
You're assuming that all forms of alternative energy are low pollution. Let's consider burning peat, that's an alternative. Or keeping a few bags of radium around the house for heat.