Busy work and hard work are two entirely different things. Laying brick is hard work, door to door sales can be busy work. There is no comparison.
Busy work means a slight stress increase but makes the day go by fast. Most people prefer it. To a point anyway, the reason they are usually so busy is that stores are intentionally understaffed.
That is similar to the old myth white collar workers spread that a stressful job was worse than hard work. One of the many ways for someone in an air conditioned office filing a couple reports to justify having a salary dramatically out of proportion to his effort or the credit he really deserves for the work of those 'under' him.
Not all blue collar factory jobs are hard heavy work but the ones that aren't are usually dull, tedious, and repetitive. It isn't easy to repeatedly attach the same three bolts to part after part all day long or to operate a machine doing more or less the same.
"Solving the bird/bat problem for wind for example would be a big economic driver"
Let me do this so we can afford this fusion project. Look at the $20 fan in your house. The one that stands up and swivels from side to side. Now chuck a bird at it and imagine the air coming in instead of going out.
Problem solved. Put a movable fixed cage around your wind turbine. As for the poor birds and bats... wind turbines aren't really the only threat to their existence. The birds with big enough brains to not fly into the damn turbine will live, the not so bright ones won't. Thus environmental pressures guide mutations and evolution prevails.
"Take a look around at what cheap oil did. Cheaper energy means more concrete, more steel, more glass."
You do know those are all recyclable resources right?
As for the cost of recycling, the harder copper (or substitute recyclable resource x here) becomes to find or retrieve the more sense it makes (in practical and economic terms) to recycle. Since there is only so much Copper in the ground that is easily accessible we will reach that point eventually. In the meantime the technology for recycling will continue to advance. Increased consumption will only bring about viable recycling faster.
Frankly, I don't see any reason why recycling should be preferred over mining in the first place.
"Cheaper energy (clean or not) is the death knell for most of the other species on the the planet."
And? Its called evolution, if they can't adapt or evolve to natural changes (like those from other animals like us) then they SHOULD be hearing a death knell. Nature is not about preserving what is now, nature is the force of change and destruction. People are one of its instruments.
The only reason for people to be concerned with these things is that we need to try to avoid doing anything to wipe ourselves out. There is no need to adopt masochistic viewpoint that we must restrain our consumption if we can instead find ways to sustain it and achieve a balanced cycle.
"So, while I think it's important for people to have good working conditions, I really dont' understand why the average factory worker would get paid so much more than somebody who works in a retail store, or fast food joint. They really providing anything extra to any company."
The solution there lies somewhere in the middle. It may not take more knowledge to pound rocks with a sledge hammer all day than it does to make burgers at McDonalds but it is much harder and more tedious work. Factory work is worth more money than retail or fast food because it is harder work, plain and simple.
That said, the slave wages paid to fast food and retail employees are disgusting. Most executives have a job that is no harder than these people and they aren't even paid a living wage. Rather than paying a living wage that would keep employees the companies cater to higher turnover by eliminating fixed schedules and screw employees out of full time benefits and guaranteed hours by only hiring part time employees.
I don't think the retail and fast food employment model is something we want to see spread to any other industry in america. Unskilled labor should still be entitled to a full time and consistent schedule, part time should be A choice not the only choice.
"Perhaps you'd like to give up your 40 hours work weeks, week ends, OSHA regulations, retirement and disability insurance."
OSHA regulations aren't needed for unions and in most industries 40 hour work weeks are a thing of the past. Obviously employees want these things and to make $45/hr but that doesn't make it a feasible way to go about competitive car making. The fact is that an assembly line worker building a car isn't doing anything that should entitle them to more money than the guy operating a press in a printing company for $8-$15/hr.
That said, at least the automotive industry is a place where we are still producing something. We need to be using U.S. materials and U.S. cars to strengthen our industry. The problem with outsourcing everything some other country can do cheaper is that we don't make ANYTHING anymore and therefore the answer is to outsource everything. We are handing our economy to third world nations.
Seeing as civilian technologies have been demonstrated to get around the artificial limitation in the accuracy of GPS wouldn't it make more sense for the U.S. military to just allow access to the full precision signal to civilians?
"you advocate eliminating punishments which don't work, but then you want to remove people's digits for stealing, which won't work. History shows that; in societies where parts of people's bodies were removed for theft, theft still occurred."
Historically, there has been a society without theft under any system be it Monarchy, dictatorship, communist, democracy, republic, or even anarchy or any set of legal codes. The less to be learned from history is that no system will eliminate crime. The best you can hope to do is minimize it.
"If you want to eliminate theft, eliminate gross inequity in society where some people live in slums and others live in mansions.... " Attempts to punish people for stealing or indeed any crime does no good. Crime is simply better hidden, and corruption becomes more pervasive."
That is a nice ideal. I don't think you'd find it as pleasant as you like though. Luxuries are luxuries precisely because there aren't enough to go around.
But lets say for the time in the history of the world you manage to create a society with no inequity. Do you actually believe that just because they have the same lot as everyone else people will follow the law with no enforcement? What about the people you are taking things away from to give to other people who have less? Do you believe they are going to quietly stand aside and obey when there are no consequences to not doing so?
People are greedy, envious, and violent creatures they do not fit well into the peaceful utopia you seem to want to pretend we could should live in.
Since the government in your scenario has no teeth, the first thing people will do will be to gather into armed gangs. They will then begin claiming territory and enforcing their own laws in a violent and very successful manner. The gangs will battle each other and claim more territory and grow in power, size, and sophistication until each represents a government in itself. As time passes their harsh ways will tame while their technology increases. They will be afraid to exact harsh punishment and instead will lock people up and thanks to technology will be able to more perfectly enforce laws universally that were never really intended to be applied without discretion. Eventually they will either revert to a strong government again or they will weaken and fall apart and the process will repeat.
That IS what history teaches us.
"It's sad that history has made so little impression on you."
Nor you, since nothing you are suggesting is consistent with any lesson in history.
I should probably give a little more background info to this:
"As a rebellious youth I had lots of childhood friends who got into trouble. In every case a 16 or 17 year old was tried as an adult."
In none of these cases were they violent crimes and the most severe of them was a kid who stole his neighbors car (which had the keys inside) to go see his girlfriend in the middle of the night.
Prosecutors do not use discretion with punishment. Common sense and logic doesn't enter into what they do. Except where politics and bribes are concerned prosecutors go after everyone on every charge they can and in the most severe way they can (trying as an adult is up to the prosecutor).
To give a hypothetical scenerio. Old lady is about to get hit by a semi. You jump and tackle her out of road to save her but in so doing you bump another man, he hits his head on a fire hydrant and dies. Unless the media picks up the case (which is like getting hit by lightning or winning the lottery) he will be charged with murder II and probably plea down to involuntary manslaughter. He will get a better deal because a jury is less likely to convict (even though they are lied to by the judge and told they aren't allowed to use discretion in application of the law).
After all, prosecutors get re-elected for being hard on crime and the more they unjustly persecute people or over charge people the better their conviction record. Why get you for a misdemeanor when they can nail you with a felony? Nevermind that you aren't a real criminal and they are destroying your life. You did the crime and you deserve the time in their book. The simple fact that they can charge you as an adult means they should by their logic.
"I agree that disproportionate prison sentences are a major problem and that conditions in some prisons may rise to the degree of cruel"
It is imprisonment itself that is cruel. It has a psychological impact that goes far beyond anything that any physical punishment that can be inflicted in a few moments, no matter how severe. But worse than the imprisonment is destroying someones life with a criminal record. The offense should be erased when the punishment is inflicted.
"In some cases I think it's appropriate. Do you have any actual examples of a minor being tried as an adult for the sort of petty larceny you describe? I've certainly never seen it."
And you've seen it all right? Not that anecdotal evidence is good for anything but I was rebellious youth and the example I gave was my own. As a rebellious youth I had lots of childhood friends who got into trouble. In every case a 16 or 17 year old was tried as an adult.
"A teenager shoplifting is very different in nature from, to use an actual case in the news this week, dousing a guy with alcohol and setting him on fire."
No it isn't. Because no matter what the crime, there was a moment that teenager made a choice to act and considered the consequences of those actions (if he did not understand consequences due to mental issues then he is not guilty under the law even if an adult) and that teenager could not have considered them with the understanding and maturity of an adult.
A deranged and disturbed child is still a child no matter how you cut it. A bright or mature child can say the right words but they simply do not understand long term consequences. They don't understand how long life really is and grasp the depth of spending the rest of their lives in prison. Or of robbing someone else of their life.
A minor has had a very small window of fully developed intellect with which to have experienced someone very close to them dying. They do not understand the lose to the loved ones of someone they might harm. And they certainly haven't lived long enough to know what it means to suffer the consequences of something you have done or that has been done to you for seventy years, sixty years, forty years, twenty years, ten years, or even brief glimpse of five years.
Children do many stupid and even terrible things. They beat each other, abuse each other, burn each other, they mutilate animals, they blackmail, they steal, they blow off life changing things like high school and college. Hell they ARE animals in that they are driven largely by primal urges and all males have a raw urge to destroy both people and things.
But the most important thing is not how malicious, cruel, sadistic, or terrible the actions of a child or teenager. The important thing is that their minds are open in the way an adult will almost never be. It is possible for the children that set another on fire to see the tears in that child's mothers eyes and have their entire moral view of life change in a single moment. A child has no attachment to their beliefs and values. They are completely open minded, all it takes is the right message, presented in the right way such that they believe it.
"By this argument, ineffective punishments should be eliminated. Our current prison system is one such; recidivism is higher than almost any other nation."
Ummm... yeah. That's what I said.
"There's nothing unusual about incarcerating people, of course; one percent of our population is in prison. The system is working, obviously."
Only cruel. Well it does say cruel AND unusual I suppose.
"I hope you never have to go hungry. Personally, I believe that you should ask for work, and if they will not give you work, you should take bread. Obviously you've never had it that hard. Again, I hope that you never do. No one should have to steal to eat."
Give me a fucking break. Exactly what percentage of people breaking the law are stealing food? Something on par with none I'd say. Most of the people we have in prison are there for drug offenses and the most of the rest are in prison because they were stealing to afford the drugs. Nevermind that legalization shows no evidence of increased usage or that if the drugs were legal they could get their fix for the next month at Walgreen's in the supplement isle.
"But it doesn't address actual problems in society. It just makes it harder to write your congresscritter."
Other than the problem of an ineffectual system of punishment that manufacturers hard criminals and destroys their lives.
"Yeah, we should chop off his finger instead of giving him a criminal record."
That would be preferable. Fairly sure I suggested hard labor for minors and removal of toes (the big difference being visibility) for adults. But hey, lets ignore the actual facts of the post and beat down strawmen with flippant remarks instead! WOOO! Less productive but much more fun.
"Sure, jail isn't perfect, but it's an effective way to keep criminals isolated until they learn how stupid it is to be a criminal."
That might make sense in theory but in reality all you are doing is cooping them up with lifetime criminals. Humans adapt to their surroundings. Once you have sent someone to our prison system you turn them into a real convict.
You use the word criminal like it refers to some sort of vile beast when the reality is that those convicted of crime are ordinary people who have been caught doing something stupid. The kinds of things we are all capable of and all consider.
I have a fiery irish wife. She knows all my buttons and pushes them, then pushes them some more, and when I'm on the verge of violence she slams them. But at that moment when I'm in a rage so intense only someone I love could have provoked that much emotion in me, I somehow manage restraint and walk away. In my situation you might feel that restraint justifies me judging someone who does not walk away and setting myself apart from them. I do not. Just because I am strong in this one thing, I know how easy it would be to lose control and I know of many other things in which I am not so strong. I have failed. I have made mistakes.
Because I know I have weakness I do not judge others who make mistakes. There is no easy solution but turning criminals (those who have mistakes and been caught, we would all be criminals if you count breaking the law and not being caught) into hardened convicts definitely is not the solution. Ruining peoples lives for making mistakes is not the solution.
You are right in one thing though. Punishment for crime should not be about rehabilitation, justice, revenge, or paying debts. It should be deterrent, it should be quick, harsh, and over with once it is done.
I both agree and disagree. Punishment should not be about the victims family getting justice aka revenge or punishing the person who committed it. The punishment should exist as a deterrent for committing the crime in the first place.
Our laws do not allow cruel and unusual punishments but if long term incarceration ESPECIALLY with publicly available records is not cruel and unusual then nothing is.
The things we deem cruel and unusual seem far less so to me. Far less expensive as well. Cut off toes, fingers, and other non-essential parts as punishment for crime and escalate for repeat offenders up to and including death. That is a pretty hefty punishment that will definitely deter people from crime. It is also is quick, done with the same day and with the exception of repeat offenders would not prevent someone from getting a good job and continuing with their life. For some offenses and for minors public service might be a suitable option.
I also strongly disagree with EVER trying minors as adults. You can not consider them mature enough to face adult justice and punishment but refuse to allow them adult rights. Either they have the adult intellect and true understanding of long term consequences required to understand their actions (be it drinking, smoking, voting, sex/pornography, military service, or crime) or they do not.
As is stands someone who shoplifts a pack of gum at 17 will be tried as an adult. They will be required to do community service, get probation for a year, and more importantly they will have a record for life. They will always be considered suspect as a witness. They will be unable to pursue a career as an attorney no matter what their grades and no matter how much time passes. They won't be able to get into a top rated university regardless of academics. At a minimum they won't be able to get any sort of real job for the next seven years and in some cases ever.
All because some kid (or adult it really doesn't matter bright and good people do stupid and bad things all the time) will have their lives ruined over an offense involving less than a dollar.
P.S. One other point I neglected to mention in my other post. You have to keep in mind in all this that it is highly suspect that hospitals should be forced to pay the bill for the uninsured in our ER's in the first place.
Hospitals are not public services, they are private organizations and ER care costs them millions of dollars. Next time you need an uncommon procedure that costs $250k, remember that at least half of that is you paying for the uninsured going to the ER with runny noses.
I for one don't agree with it. I don't think we should let OUR PEOPLE (aka US Citizens) die when we have the technology to save them. I don't think dying of a urinary tract infection should be a concern for the citizens of the United States. But the burden should be divided among all taxpayers not dumped on our Hospitals. We can easily build a way to determine those covered from those who are not into our healthcare system.
That leaves only non-citizens to need outside insurance. Legal visitors and immigrants should be required to have it to enter our country. Illegals shouldn't be able to buy it. Their solution is to not enter, enter legally, or go home if they are already here.
$0.35/hr sounds less appealing if you know your children would die if they got sick.
A large scale advertising campaign in mexico letting them know they won't be given emergency medical care and dispelling the myths that spread there wouldn't hurt either.
"C'mon you can do better than that. I post saying that enforcement will cause people who have the right to treatment not to get it. You answer me by asking why I insist on perfect enforcement. "
You do realize that selective quoting only works for newspapers, not in discussions between two people right? Or did you even read my entire post?
"I was talking about the risk of citizens not getting treated. Citizens will not always "know their social security number", especially when unconscious."
I specifically addressed that. Yet again, rtfa troll, you need to rtf post.
"As are legal immigrants; business travellers and many others including some citizens and most people in shock after a car crash."
Already addressed had you rtf post. For legal immigrants and business travelers we require they be insured for the duration of their visit like the rest of the western world. And again, I already stated that treatment should be provided when there is no opportunity to ask. Any citizen can rattle off the social security number they give out every other day their entire life under most circumstances.
"I know of a family that lost a son because they didn't understand that in emergency you call the fire-brigade and not the ambulance."
What? Where do you live? In the US you call 911 in an emergency be it fire or ambulance. I hate to be harsh but if someone in the US doesn't know to dial 911 in an emergency it was natural selection. Children who can barely speak whole sentences have already had this drilled into them by their parents.
"You've already stated yourself that the ER is not providing medical care; just the minimum to make sure that people are not dying. What's do you have against just leaving it at that?"
What is this discussion about? The discussion is about someone (was it you? I don't recall now) claiming we should give illegals healthcare because they will just use our ERs anyway.
The alternative is not throwing people in the street to die. Believe it or not some of us don't want illegals here. If they aren't here, they won't die. Their alternative is to simply come here legally.
"Google have precisely one stage of announcing it to the public."
Because BasilBrush hath declared it so. To hell with reality and a presented example that happens to be the most well known google service next to search.
Gmail was leaked pre-alpha, announced alpha, announced beta with invites, leaked in press releases several times and then announced again after invites, and finally announced once more at public release.
Google milks all the press and buzz it can with every service even when it is only thinking about offering it.
I saw mention on a tv special about google over a year ago that they were working on a language with short compile times.
So unless you have something better than nu uh to reply with save the text. I won't be feeding the trolls.
"Google's language is called Go! (with an exclamation mark.) The preexisting language whose existence has been suddenly and rudely revealed is called Go without the exclamation mark. Since ! is the negation operator, the Google's language is Go (Not)."
Amusing comment but you illustrate the problem nicely. Google's language is Go, the preexisting language is Go! not the other way around.
"Google did this out of ignorance about a language"
Actually he contacted them numerous times prior to launch and they ignored him and pushed to launch anyway. They maliciously took the name.
The man published a book, has published an article on the language, and he is cited around the web. When google announced the launch there was a discussion thread about his language and his attempts to contact google.
Not only have people heard of Go! they were already following the issue.
It is about courtesy, this violates the do no evil policy times ten. Besides, Go is a common english word and shouldn't qualify for the trademark google will want anyway without them greasing palms.
You mean a project that YOU haven't heard of. There was a lively discussion about this guy and his repeated attempts to contact google before launch in Slashdot discussion of the launch announcment.
People not only knew about it, they were following the issue. This guy published a book, he published in peer reviewed journals, and his work is cited in plenty of places.
And companies play the blame game. People who make mistakes (or get blamed for mistakes) that cost the company a bunch of money. Those people get fired.
In this it isn't the person who selected the name who should be canned though. It is the person who read the half dozen communications from the Go! guy PRIOR to launch and didn't want to expend the effort to rename prior to launch. In reality this decision maker will pass the buck to some low level grunt who fields emails.
Slashdot Mirror
"I see a high intensity of labor"
Busy work and hard work are two entirely different things. Laying brick is hard work, door to door sales can be busy work. There is no comparison.
Busy work means a slight stress increase but makes the day go by fast. Most people prefer it. To a point anyway, the reason they are usually so busy is that stores are intentionally understaffed.
That is similar to the old myth white collar workers spread that a stressful job was worse than hard work. One of the many ways for someone in an air conditioned office filing a couple reports to justify having a salary dramatically out of proportion to his effort or the credit he really deserves for the work of those 'under' him.
Not all blue collar factory jobs are hard heavy work but the ones that aren't are usually dull, tedious, and repetitive. It isn't easy to repeatedly attach the same three bolts to part after part all day long or to operate a machine doing more or less the same.
"Solving the bird/bat problem for wind for example would be a big economic driver"
Let me do this so we can afford this fusion project. Look at the $20 fan in your house. The one that stands up and swivels from side to side. Now chuck a bird at it and imagine the air coming in instead of going out.
Problem solved. Put a movable fixed cage around your wind turbine. As for the poor birds and bats... wind turbines aren't really the only threat to their existence. The birds with big enough brains to not fly into the damn turbine will live, the not so bright ones won't. Thus environmental pressures guide mutations and evolution prevails.
Good eatin' too.
"Only the physicists and engineers who are payed by grants in this area seem to think its a good use of money."
Right. The rest feel that grant money would be better spent in their own area. Preferably their very own project.
"Take a look around at what cheap oil did. Cheaper energy means more concrete, more steel, more glass."
You do know those are all recyclable resources right?
As for the cost of recycling, the harder copper (or substitute recyclable resource x here) becomes to find or retrieve the more sense it makes (in practical and economic terms) to recycle. Since there is only so much Copper in the ground that is easily accessible we will reach that point eventually. In the meantime the technology for recycling will continue to advance. Increased consumption will only bring about viable recycling faster.
Frankly, I don't see any reason why recycling should be preferred over mining in the first place.
"Cheaper energy (clean or not) is the death knell for most of the other species on the the planet."
And? Its called evolution, if they can't adapt or evolve to natural changes (like those from other animals like us) then they SHOULD be hearing a death knell. Nature is not about preserving what is now, nature is the force of change and destruction. People are one of its instruments.
The only reason for people to be concerned with these things is that we need to try to avoid doing anything to wipe ourselves out. There is no need to adopt masochistic viewpoint that we must restrain our consumption if we can instead find ways to sustain it and achieve a balanced cycle.
"So, while I think it's important for people to have good working conditions, I really dont' understand why the average factory worker would get paid so much more than somebody who works in a retail store, or fast food joint. They really providing anything extra to any company."
The solution there lies somewhere in the middle. It may not take more knowledge to pound rocks with a sledge hammer all day than it does to make burgers at McDonalds but it is much harder and more tedious work. Factory work is worth more money than retail or fast food because it is harder work, plain and simple.
That said, the slave wages paid to fast food and retail employees are disgusting. Most executives have a job that is no harder than these people and they aren't even paid a living wage. Rather than paying a living wage that would keep employees the companies cater to higher turnover by eliminating fixed schedules and screw employees out of full time benefits and guaranteed hours by only hiring part time employees.
I don't think the retail and fast food employment model is something we want to see spread to any other industry in america. Unskilled labor should still be entitled to a full time and consistent schedule, part time should be A choice not the only choice.
"Perhaps you'd like to give up your 40 hours work weeks, week ends, OSHA regulations, retirement and disability insurance."
OSHA regulations aren't needed for unions and in most industries 40 hour work weeks are a thing of the past. Obviously employees want these things and to make $45/hr but that doesn't make it a feasible way to go about competitive car making. The fact is that an assembly line worker building a car isn't doing anything that should entitle them to more money than the guy operating a press in a printing company for $8-$15/hr.
That said, at least the automotive industry is a place where we are still producing something. We need to be using U.S. materials and U.S. cars to strengthen our industry. The problem with outsourcing everything some other country can do cheaper is that we don't make ANYTHING anymore and therefore the answer is to outsource everything. We are handing our economy to third world nations.
No, there would just be new banks.
Seeing as civilian technologies have been demonstrated to get around the artificial limitation in the accuracy of GPS wouldn't it make more sense for the U.S. military to just allow access to the full precision signal to civilians?
"you advocate eliminating punishments which don't work, but then you want to remove people's digits for stealing, which won't work. History shows that; in societies where parts of people's bodies were removed for theft, theft still occurred."
Historically, there has been a society without theft under any system be it Monarchy, dictatorship, communist, democracy, republic, or even anarchy or any set of legal codes. The less to be learned from history is that no system will eliminate crime. The best you can hope to do is minimize it.
"If you want to eliminate theft, eliminate gross inequity in society where some people live in slums and others live in mansions. ... "
Attempts to punish people for stealing or indeed any crime does no good. Crime is simply better hidden, and corruption becomes more pervasive."
That is a nice ideal. I don't think you'd find it as pleasant as you like though. Luxuries are luxuries precisely because there aren't enough to go around.
But lets say for the time in the history of the world you manage to create a society with no inequity. Do you actually believe that just because they have the same lot as everyone else people will follow the law with no enforcement? What about the people you are taking things away from to give to other people who have less? Do you believe they are going to quietly stand aside and obey when there are no consequences to not doing so?
People are greedy, envious, and violent creatures they do not fit well into the peaceful utopia you seem to want to pretend we could should live in.
Since the government in your scenario has no teeth, the first thing people will do will be to gather into armed gangs. They will then begin claiming territory and enforcing their own laws in a violent and very successful manner. The gangs will battle each other and claim more territory and grow in power, size, and sophistication until each represents a government in itself. As time passes their harsh ways will tame while their technology increases. They will be afraid to exact harsh punishment and instead will lock people up and thanks to technology will be able to more perfectly enforce laws universally that were never really intended to be applied without discretion. Eventually they will either revert to a strong government again or they will weaken and fall apart and the process will repeat.
That IS what history teaches us.
"It's sad that history has made so little impression on you."
Nor you, since nothing you are suggesting is consistent with any lesson in history.
I should probably give a little more background info to this:
"As a rebellious youth I had lots of childhood friends who got into trouble. In every case a 16 or 17 year old was tried as an adult."
In none of these cases were they violent crimes and the most severe of them was a kid who stole his neighbors car (which had the keys inside) to go see his girlfriend in the middle of the night.
Prosecutors do not use discretion with punishment. Common sense and logic doesn't enter into what they do. Except where politics and bribes are concerned prosecutors go after everyone on every charge they can and in the most severe way they can (trying as an adult is up to the prosecutor).
To give a hypothetical scenerio. Old lady is about to get hit by a semi. You jump and tackle her out of road to save her but in so doing you bump another man, he hits his head on a fire hydrant and dies. Unless the media picks up the case (which is like getting hit by lightning or winning the lottery) he will be charged with murder II and probably plea down to involuntary manslaughter. He will get a better deal because a jury is less likely to convict (even though they are lied to by the judge and told they aren't allowed to use discretion in application of the law).
After all, prosecutors get re-elected for being hard on crime and the more they unjustly persecute people or over charge people the better their conviction record. Why get you for a misdemeanor when they can nail you with a felony? Nevermind that you aren't a real criminal and they are destroying your life. You did the crime and you deserve the time in their book. The simple fact that they can charge you as an adult means they should by their logic.
"I agree that disproportionate prison sentences are a major problem and that conditions in some prisons may rise to the degree of cruel"
It is imprisonment itself that is cruel. It has a psychological impact that goes far beyond anything that any physical punishment that can be inflicted in a few moments, no matter how severe. But worse than the imprisonment is destroying someones life with a criminal record. The offense should be erased when the punishment is inflicted.
"In some cases I think it's appropriate. Do you have any actual examples of a minor being tried as an adult for the sort of petty larceny you describe? I've certainly never seen it."
And you've seen it all right? Not that anecdotal evidence is good for anything but I was rebellious youth and the example I gave was my own. As a rebellious youth I had lots of childhood friends who got into trouble. In every case a 16 or 17 year old was tried as an adult.
"A teenager shoplifting is very different in nature from, to use an actual case in the news this week, dousing a guy with alcohol and setting him on fire."
No it isn't. Because no matter what the crime, there was a moment that teenager made a choice to act and considered the consequences of those actions (if he did not understand consequences due to mental issues then he is not guilty under the law even if an adult) and that teenager could not have considered them with the understanding and maturity of an adult.
A deranged and disturbed child is still a child no matter how you cut it. A bright or mature child can say the right words but they simply do not understand long term consequences. They don't understand how long life really is and grasp the depth of spending the rest of their lives in prison. Or of robbing someone else of their life.
A minor has had a very small window of fully developed intellect with which to have experienced someone very close to them dying. They do not understand the lose to the loved ones of someone they might harm. And they certainly haven't lived long enough to know what it means to suffer the consequences of something you have done or that has been done to you for seventy years, sixty years, forty years, twenty years, ten years, or even brief glimpse of five years.
Children do many stupid and even terrible things. They beat each other, abuse each other, burn each other, they mutilate animals, they blackmail, they steal, they blow off life changing things like high school and college. Hell they ARE animals in that they are driven largely by primal urges and all males have a raw urge to destroy both people and things.
But the most important thing is not how malicious, cruel, sadistic, or terrible the actions of a child or teenager. The important thing is that their minds are open in the way an adult will almost never be. It is possible for the children that set another on fire to see the tears in that child's mothers eyes and have their entire moral view of life change in a single moment. A child has no attachment to their beliefs and values. They are completely open minded, all it takes is the right message, presented in the right way such that they believe it.
"By this argument, ineffective punishments should be eliminated. Our current prison system is one such; recidivism is higher than almost any other nation."
Ummm... yeah. That's what I said.
"There's nothing unusual about incarcerating people, of course; one percent of our population is in prison. The system is working, obviously."
Only cruel. Well it does say cruel AND unusual I suppose.
"I hope you never have to go hungry. Personally, I believe that you should ask for work, and if they will not give you work, you should take bread. Obviously you've never had it that hard. Again, I hope that you never do. No one should have to steal to eat."
Give me a fucking break. Exactly what percentage of people breaking the law are stealing food? Something on par with none I'd say. Most of the people we have in prison are there for drug offenses and the most of the rest are in prison because they were stealing to afford the drugs. Nevermind that legalization shows no evidence of increased usage or that if the drugs were legal they could get their fix for the next month at Walgreen's in the supplement isle.
"But it doesn't address actual problems in society. It just makes it harder to write your congresscritter."
Other than the problem of an ineffectual system of punishment that manufacturers hard criminals and destroys their lives.
"Yeah, we should chop off his finger instead of giving him a criminal record."
That would be preferable. Fairly sure I suggested hard labor for minors and removal of toes (the big difference being visibility) for adults. But hey, lets ignore the actual facts of the post and beat down strawmen with flippant remarks instead! WOOO! Less productive but much more fun.
"Sure, jail isn't perfect, but it's an effective way to keep criminals isolated until they learn how stupid it is to be a criminal."
That might make sense in theory but in reality all you are doing is cooping them up with lifetime criminals. Humans adapt to their surroundings. Once you have sent someone to our prison system you turn them into a real convict.
You use the word criminal like it refers to some sort of vile beast when the reality is that those convicted of crime are ordinary people who have been caught doing something stupid. The kinds of things we are all capable of and all consider.
I have a fiery irish wife. She knows all my buttons and pushes them, then pushes them some more, and when I'm on the verge of violence she slams them. But at that moment when I'm in a rage so intense only someone I love could have provoked that much emotion in me, I somehow manage restraint and walk away. In my situation you might feel that restraint justifies me judging someone who does not walk away and setting myself apart from them. I do not. Just because I am strong in this one thing, I know how easy it would be to lose control and I know of many other things in which I am not so strong. I have failed. I have made mistakes.
Because I know I have weakness I do not judge others who make mistakes. There is no easy solution but turning criminals (those who have mistakes and been caught, we would all be criminals if you count breaking the law and not being caught) into hardened convicts definitely is not the solution. Ruining peoples lives for making mistakes is not the solution.
You are right in one thing though. Punishment for crime should not be about rehabilitation, justice, revenge, or paying debts. It should be deterrent, it should be quick, harsh, and over with once it is done.
I both agree and disagree. Punishment should not be about the victims family getting justice aka revenge or punishing the person who committed it. The punishment should exist as a deterrent for committing the crime in the first place.
Our laws do not allow cruel and unusual punishments but if long term incarceration ESPECIALLY with publicly available records is not cruel and unusual then nothing is.
The things we deem cruel and unusual seem far less so to me. Far less expensive as well. Cut off toes, fingers, and other non-essential parts as punishment for crime and escalate for repeat offenders up to and including death. That is a pretty hefty punishment that will definitely deter people from crime. It is also is quick, done with the same day and with the exception of repeat offenders would not prevent someone from getting a good job and continuing with their life. For some offenses and for minors public service might be a suitable option.
I also strongly disagree with EVER trying minors as adults. You can not consider them mature enough to face adult justice and punishment but refuse to allow them adult rights. Either they have the adult intellect and true understanding of long term consequences required to understand their actions (be it drinking, smoking, voting, sex/pornography, military service, or crime) or they do not.
As is stands someone who shoplifts a pack of gum at 17 will be tried as an adult. They will be required to do community service, get probation for a year, and more importantly they will have a record for life. They will always be considered suspect as a witness. They will be unable to pursue a career as an attorney no matter what their grades and no matter how much time passes. They won't be able to get into a top rated university regardless of academics. At a minimum they won't be able to get any sort of real job for the next seven years and in some cases ever.
All because some kid (or adult it really doesn't matter bright and good people do stupid and bad things all the time) will have their lives ruined over an offense involving less than a dollar.
P.S. One other point I neglected to mention in my other post. You have to keep in mind in all this that it is highly suspect that hospitals should be forced to pay the bill for the uninsured in our ER's in the first place.
Hospitals are not public services, they are private organizations and ER care costs them millions of dollars. Next time you need an uncommon procedure that costs $250k, remember that at least half of that is you paying for the uninsured going to the ER with runny noses.
I for one don't agree with it. I don't think we should let OUR PEOPLE (aka US Citizens) die when we have the technology to save them. I don't think dying of a urinary tract infection should be a concern for the citizens of the United States. But the burden should be divided among all taxpayers not dumped on our Hospitals. We can easily build a way to determine those covered from those who are not into our healthcare system.
That leaves only non-citizens to need outside insurance. Legal visitors and immigrants should be required to have it to enter our country. Illegals shouldn't be able to buy it. Their solution is to not enter, enter legally, or go home if they are already here.
$0.35/hr sounds less appealing if you know your children would die if they got sick.
A large scale advertising campaign in mexico letting them know they won't be given emergency medical care and dispelling the myths that spread there wouldn't hurt either.
"C'mon you can do better than that. I post saying that enforcement will cause people who have the right to treatment not to get it. You answer me by asking why I insist on perfect enforcement. "
You do realize that selective quoting only works for newspapers, not in discussions between two people right? Or did you even read my entire post?
"I was talking about the risk of citizens not getting treated. Citizens will not always "know their social security number", especially when unconscious."
I specifically addressed that. Yet again, rtfa troll, you need to rtf post.
"As are legal immigrants; business travellers and many others including some citizens and most people in shock after a car crash."
Already addressed had you rtf post. For legal immigrants and business travelers we require they be insured for the duration of their visit like the rest of the western world. And again, I already stated that treatment should be provided when there is no opportunity to ask. Any citizen can rattle off the social security number they give out every other day their entire life under most circumstances.
"I know of a family that lost a son because they didn't understand that in emergency you call the fire-brigade and not the ambulance."
What? Where do you live? In the US you call 911 in an emergency be it fire or ambulance. I hate to be harsh but if someone in the US doesn't know to dial 911 in an emergency it was natural selection. Children who can barely speak whole sentences have already had this drilled into them by their parents.
"You've already stated yourself that the ER is not providing medical care; just the minimum to make sure that people are not dying. What's do you have against just leaving it at that?"
What is this discussion about? The discussion is about someone (was it you? I don't recall now) claiming we should give illegals healthcare because they will just use our ERs anyway.
The alternative is not throwing people in the street to die. Believe it or not some of us don't want illegals here. If they aren't here, they won't die. Their alternative is to simply come here legally.
"Google have precisely one stage of announcing it to the public."
Because BasilBrush hath declared it so. To hell with reality and a presented example that happens to be the most well known google service next to search.
Gmail was leaked pre-alpha, announced alpha, announced beta with invites, leaked in press releases several times and then announced again after invites, and finally announced once more at public release.
Google milks all the press and buzz it can with every service even when it is only thinking about offering it.
I saw mention on a tv special about google over a year ago that they were working on a language with short compile times.
So unless you have something better than nu uh to reply with save the text. I won't be feeding the trolls.
Believe it or not google projects go through several stages before the final release. I don't even know if gmail is considered final release yet.
"Google's language is called Go! (with an exclamation mark.) The preexisting language whose existence has been suddenly and rudely revealed is called Go without the exclamation mark. Since ! is the negation operator, the Google's language is Go (Not)."
Amusing comment but you illustrate the problem nicely. Google's language is Go, the preexisting language is Go! not the other way around.
"Google did this out of ignorance about a language"
Actually he contacted them numerous times prior to launch and they ignored him and pushed to launch anyway. They maliciously took the name.
The man published a book, has published an article on the language, and he is cited around the web. When google announced the launch there was a discussion thread about his language and his attempts to contact google.
Not only have people heard of Go! they were already following the issue.
It is about courtesy, this violates the do no evil policy times ten. Besides, Go is a common english word and shouldn't qualify for the trademark google will want anyway without them greasing palms.
Since the media picked up on his LEGITIMATE complaint and big corp is now being tried in the media.
Of course Google knew about this, the guy contacted them repeatedly. They might even have done it for the free press.
You mean a project that YOU haven't heard of. There was a lively discussion about this guy and his repeated attempts to contact google before launch in Slashdot discussion of the launch announcment.
People not only knew about it, they were following the issue. This guy published a book, he published in peer reviewed journals, and his work is cited in plenty of places.
"People make mistakes."
And companies play the blame game. People who make mistakes (or get blamed for mistakes) that cost the company a bunch of money. Those people get fired.
In this it isn't the person who selected the name who should be canned though. It is the person who read the half dozen communications from the Go! guy PRIOR to launch and didn't want to expend the effort to rename prior to launch. In reality this decision maker will pass the buck to some low level grunt who fields emails.
Linux is not used in a commercial capacity (at least not by the trademark holder) and yet the name is trademarked.
"Legal questions aside, if Google keeps using the name, then McCabe will have to change his name not for legal reasons, but practical ones."
I think you mean strike that and reverse it.