what new policies are in place to insure such an egregious violation of constitutional rights never happens again? What people were fired? And what assurance do the people have that this type of data-mining isn't just passed off to another agency?
Let's be clear here: not that much would have changed without certain revelations. It isn't enough to be caught with your hand in the cookie jar to simply say you won't do it again. I want a clear informed law that states some ass will be ground into dust if anyone tries this bullshit.
Anything short of that is just playing possum until it happens again.
That's all very well and good. Now look at the cost of medicine today, compare it to just 30 years ago, and then tell me it hasn't been driven in very large part by technological advances, which hasn't significantly improved outcomes, but has driven medical care out of reach for many, keeping in mind telemedicine is seen as a cost-saving measure due in part to more spending on the technological aspect of medicine at the expense of the infrastructure.
For all your claims it isn't getting better, reality has a counter argument.
Having seen telemedicine in practice over the past 10 years, I can tell you the clear and defining raison d'etre is a CYA mentality that at least some specialist was involved, and of course money. Lots and lots of money.
Of course any proof that patient outcomes were better is sorely lacking, but hey, who needs scientific rigour when there is money to be had selling a bunch of high-tech equipment to people who can barely afford it, let alone an actual doctor.
I don't see you listing any barriers that can't be overtaken
One of the largest obstacles to automated medicine is simple pattern recognition, where even having a wealth of information on tap is meaningless without boots on the ground that can identify subtle pattern changes that even patients might not notice, which often drives having further tests done. That requires having trained medical staff onsite, and that requires money, which in short supply. That is a huge barrier.
You are clearly against technological progress.
Nope, just seen 'technological progress' used as a sales pitch too often, that had very little to offer in terms of actual improvement, but by-golly succeeded splendidly in making some people rich.
And in this particular framing, government is some intractable beast held in check, but never a defender of those rights. Why it is perfectly apt to fire someone for being Jewish... oh, wait, no you can't; almost as if the government were also imbued with protecting the rights of the minority against the will of the majority.
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech
You might want to revisit the meaning of this, since nowhere can it be found that this applies only to government, and the corollary to it is that congress is well within its powers to make laws promoting freedom of speech, of the press, and religion, as can be documented in hundreds of circumstances conveniently ignored.
And just as McCarthyism is viewed distastefully now, only the dim would suppose that disfavor was exclusive to government action. which is why you can safely work for a Republican even though you are a Democrat, and even have the audacity to have Sanders bumper sticker on your car without fear of legally losing your job.
I do believe that is freedom from consequences, damn that meddling government.
The government also makes laws that states you could be fired from your job for expressing an opinion, which just a proxy, much like the US government not being legal in snooping into your affairs without a warrant, but is perfectly cromulent to authorize a foreign government to do the snooping. Doubt you would be as sympathetic if you were fired for expressing your love of kittens. After all, it was just consequences of your speech. The government wasn't involved at all, except making it a legal argument for dismissal.
And all this ignores the spirit of the 1st Amendment, which is to foster debate, free from intrusion. Your line logic lead to free speech zones, which yes; you are free to say what ever you want (just like you could in prison), but far away from it being meaningful.
Then let them tell themselves that the traffic, diminished purchasing potential, and degraded quality of life is worth it.
Place I live has a pop. of about 50,000, has a performing arts center that can attract acts like the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, is 1.5 hours out from a major city in any direction, has several good universities nearby, and what I use to pay in rent can get a house.
I would expect especially nerds to do a cost-benefit analysis and figure it out.
I am consistently surprised that more of the entrepreneurial types don't drag a bunch of their friends to the South or Mid-West to set up shop. There is little benefit I can see to joining established markets except for the "Me too!"-ism and paying inflated costs.
Especially as far as tech is concerned, that can be done almost anywhere. I remember when Austin was little more than flyover country, and it still would have been except a few decided to make the first strike.
To a large extent "quis custodiet ipsos custodes" has been solved. Extra guards to increase the cost of bribery, open procedures and oversight. Essentially everyone becomes a guard.
Beyond that, agreed this is just silly. The psychological affect may deter some, but if you are already looking at death, what do you have to lose?
Just more security theatre that accomplishes nothing.
One of the last vestiges of the Old Boys Network is company boards, where even after making a wreck of the world economy and a few decades of screaming for reform has yield squat: the SEC prosecutes with a velvet glove and shareholders are either scheming themselves or left wondering what the next golden parachute will do to the stock price. It's easy to make 4000% more than the underlings when all your CEO friends sit on other corporate boards as well.
No one sane believes that most CEOs are worth what they are paid, and their performance has proven that mostly correct. Shareholders can't even make inroads at disciplining executive pay, so I sincerely doubt most executives are at risk of losing their jobs.
What I can see is maybe automation playing the role of the 8 year old adviser, correcting the most egregious fuckups that come down the pike (which will be a vast improvement) but short of armed revolt the moneyed class will not go quietly into the night.
If I remember correctly, Reaction Engines got severely dicked by the UK government (pulling funding declaring the engines covered by the Official Secrets Act), effectively ending private development.
The design was promising but had teething issues, and has been carried on as a garage project all these years.
That they've managed to get this far given the hurdles they've had to overcome is nothing short of astounding.
When your means of assessing risk (housing bubble anyone?) is more or less reading tea leaves and cat entrails, looking for word associations on social media is hardly surprising.
That most financial institutions would have crashed and burned with the last recession isn't surprising either.
Look at this as proof that another round of bailouts are coming, with bankers stating with a straight face "never saw wasted on his facebook page, so I thought he was a good risk" when student debit becomes the next reaming of the taxpayer.
To be fair, this isn't so much the "left" as much as "progressives". Even the left has taken to calling them the regressive left, and are just as much disgusted by the nannyism.
And if we take a look back, these elements were always a part of the left (mostly from feminist that marched in lockstep with the religious right often enough), it's just they are at the forefront now, in many respects using the left as cover for their authoritarian agenda. Authoritarianism takes many forms.
And regardless, demonizing the left wholesale isn't helping, as many are just as much against the new censorship.
And more subtly, there will need to be some type of consensus between both left and right in maintaining freedom of speech. You'd be wise to make friends with those on the left opposing this latest round of censorship.
The standard-bearer was to invest in infrastructure during downturns (you are getting labor at a discount and are getting a return on top of). The macro approach now is to go into debit to pay welfare, with a 3. ????? 4. PROFIT, that can't exactly explain why giving the same money to billionaires wouldn't lead to the same results.
Austerity has never been an argument about cutting government spending per se than where to direct government spending.
And somehow the other part of macro (saving during booms) never gets the same airing.
Oh, it has definitely been studied, but like most things in economics is open to interpretation, is counter-intuitive to the MBA mantra, and most importantly subverts the employer as lord and master mindset (you know, the type that imagines being boss as telling everyone else what to do instead of seeing every customer as their boss).
Gent I know who was GM at a Taco Bell broke it down to me like this:
"You see every person here? They are a $10,000 investment I've made. They are going to cost me $10,000 in training, lost productivity until they are up to speed, and lost initiative if I can't give them a reason other than a paycheck to come in. Every single one is an assistant manager trainee since I can't predict who is going to rise through the ranks. Now tell me, how much do you think they are worth?"
He ran THE most profitable franchise in the region. He paid substantially more than minimum wage. He worked every position to set the standard of how things should be done.
And I could point to several others who were quite successful that operated very much in the same vein. Is it so surprising that "you get what you pay for" doesn't apply to labor as well?
And most recently, as Amazon is pushing it's subscription service, there are products Amazon refuses to sell unless you join Prime (Prime Pantry items being the most egregious). Only the hubris Jeff Bezos can justify the logic in not selling things.
Amazon's only grace at this point is near one-stop shopping, but increasingly on terms of price, total ease (especially if there is the possibility of a return involved), and speed of delivery (Walmart usually takes 3-5 days, Amazon is averaging 2 weeks), other retailers have got them beat.
Assistant Attorney General (Office of Legal Counsel) in the Reagan administration.
In September 2007 Olson was considered by the Bush administration for the post of Attorney General to succeed Alberto Gonzales. The Democrats, however, were so vehemently opposed that Bush nominated Michael Mukasey instead.
And most importantly-
Olson, over time, came to believe that there is a constitutional right for same-sex marriage.[8] In 2009 he joined with David Boies, his opposing counsel in Bush v. Gore, to bring a federal lawsuit, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, challenging Proposition 8, a California state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.[9] His work on the lawsuit earned him a place among the Time 100's greatest thinkers.[10] In 2011 Olson and David Boies were awarded the ABA Medal, the highest award of the American Bar Association.
I challenge you to name an equivalent serving member on the left that has done more to advance gay civil rights.
When the left were patting themselves on the back at how wonderful they were at ushering a new era of peace and hope, even when poo-pooing anyone bringing up Obama's vote on the Telecom Immunity bill and his then stance on gay marriage (and let's not forget some of the most meaningful advances on this have come from... gasp! the right), they were demonizing everyone else (Ron Paul especially) with a better record on civil rights, casting doom and gloom upon the nation if anyone else got elected.
So isn't this essentially arguing for Disneyfying the world to keep kids safe?
Ban all porn (or at least require training in the proper handling and storage before downloading that file).
Alternatively ban or require sex education (even though there is scant proof comprehensive sex education reduces teen pregnancy. Ditto banning it).
And of course all manner of food, drugs, video games, D&D, etc.
It just strikes me as peculiar that some will argue for personal responsibility and freedom of choice when their favored thingy is under fire, and in the same breath argue for regulation and restriction when it is someone else's favorite thingy.
And in the past few decades we have moved increasingly towards Disneyfying the world. I would just like some honesty to which degree the world should cater exclusively to children.
You've had a few candidates that made it a point to limit the amount of campaign contributions they got. Granted, none of them won those elections (but Jerry Brown did manage to snag the govenerorship), but the point still stands. Even the influence of lobbying groups can be political suicide if the constituents really dislike the proposal.
Nope, the biggest problem we have is still the vast majority of people don't vote, which means a minority interest is controlling nearly every time. That situation is perfectly ripe for being bought since the wealthy can target their spending. If it was more spread out, it becomes a case of diminishing returns.
And unfortunately the media is complicit in this since they are the major benefactors of increased campaign spending; which is really the part that is being bought wholesale. You really want to reform elections? Change the rules media must abide by so every election season isn't a cash cow for them.
As it is, it has taken several decades to reach this sorry state with government. Years of neglect by the voters has resulted in a death by a thousand cuts. But that can change in any year. People just need a reason to make the effort.
Just over the past few generations, we've seen a shift in the doctrine of child raising move from beating the hell out of your kids to institutionalizing them for fairly typical teenage rebelliousness to "expert" recommendations that unwanted behaviors stem from a lack of self-esteem (and of course the best way to build self-esteem is to patronize kids instead of letting them have a chance at real accomplishment/failure) to it being a mental condition to not to want to sit for 8 hours a day without respite, requiring medication.
You can also expect a chance at a sex offender registry for typical sexual exploration, and "zero tolerance" policies towards the inherent violence in taking the wrong tone with your speech that at the same time seems oblivious to the hazing other kids go through.
I don't think it is really a case of parents letting the kids do whatever they want when letting them walk down the street unescorted results in threat from child protective services to place the kids in state custody.
Add to that the dissolution of the nuclear and extended family, stagnant wages requiring both parents to work even longer hours than a few generations before, and parents who aren't religious fanatics somberly considering the logistics of home-schooling.
Are parents really the most culpable parties to this?
Far from running wild in the streets, we have bubble children who are perhaps the most psychically isolated in history, mostly from gullible parents trusting the guidance of "experts".
Let's not forget that much of public education (or culture for that matter) has become a cesspool of incompetence, questionable agendas, and dehumanization. Even if kids lack the emotional maturity to name exactly what is being done to them, they are certainly aware the authority over them is lacking in mutual respect.
Add in a surge of hormones, and you've got a wicked circumstance.
"When inward life dries up, when feeling decreases and apathy increases, when one cannot affect or even genuinely touch another person, violence flares up as a daimonic necessity for contact, a mad drive forcing touch in the most direct way possible." -Rollo May
One of the sticking points though is the individual doesn't have an army of lawyers to argue their case.
Nope, this is systematic of getting the best justice money can buy, and governments having to grapple with the fact that some pockets are deeper than theirs, and weighing the pros and cons of funding they can extract now through fines relative to tax revenue that could be had later on (certainly don't want to kill the golden goose in this case).
But let's not forget that it was the purse of government that caused this problem, even as they meander through without anything approaching judicial reform.
Yeah, but don't doubt for an instant some harebrained MBA type won't champion this as some new paradigm for worker relations (*cough*), which will be lauded by upper management as it effectively washes their hands from, you know, doing their damn job and supervising their employees' work, not to mention any process like this will be gamed by any employee with modicum of disdain.
And this is particularly damning in instances where strict compliance and careful execution is of utmost importance. Do you really want your surgeon being judged on how many people he can rifle through the operating theatre? Well, too bad, because metrics like these are being employed by hospitals to disastrous effect.
And as most of these processes are far from integrated, there is a cost to monitoring. I've pointed out to my managers that all the nickle and dime initiatives they've instituted over the years adds about 1.5 hours to the workday, which adds up to a yearly cost of just north of 1 million in labor alone, and by-the-way has anyone checked to see if the benefits are even close to that?
Slashdot Mirror
what new policies are in place to insure such an egregious violation of constitutional rights never happens again? What people were fired? And what assurance do the people have that this type of data-mining isn't just passed off to another agency?
Let's be clear here: not that much would have changed without certain revelations. It isn't enough to be caught with your hand in the cookie jar to simply say you won't do it again. I want a clear informed law that states some ass will be ground into dust if anyone tries this bullshit.
Anything short of that is just playing possum until it happens again.
That's all very well and good. Now look at the cost of medicine today, compare it to just 30 years ago, and then tell me it hasn't been driven in very large part by technological advances, which hasn't significantly improved outcomes, but has driven medical care out of reach for many, keeping in mind telemedicine is seen as a cost-saving measure due in part to more spending on the technological aspect of medicine at the expense of the infrastructure.
For all your claims it isn't getting better, reality has a counter argument.
http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/...
Take a look at the reality for yourself then. It is less than clear-cut, except for the fact costs have risen dramatically.
Having seen telemedicine in practice over the past 10 years, I can tell you the clear and defining raison d'etre is a CYA mentality that at least some specialist was involved, and of course money. Lots and lots of money.
Of course any proof that patient outcomes were better is sorely lacking, but hey, who needs scientific rigour when there is money to be had selling a bunch of high-tech equipment to people who can barely afford it, let alone an actual doctor.
I don't see you listing any barriers that can't be overtaken
One of the largest obstacles to automated medicine is simple pattern recognition, where even having a wealth of information on tap is meaningless without boots on the ground that can identify subtle pattern changes that even patients might not notice, which often drives having further tests done. That requires having trained medical staff onsite, and that requires money, which in short supply. That is a huge barrier.
You are clearly against technological progress.
Nope, just seen 'technological progress' used as a sales pitch too often, that had very little to offer in terms of actual improvement, but by-golly succeeded splendidly in making some people rich.
freedom of speech is not freedom of consequences
It's platitudes all the way down!
And in this particular framing, government is some intractable beast held in check, but never a defender of those rights. Why it is perfectly apt to fire someone for being Jewish... oh, wait, no you can't; almost as if the government were also imbued with protecting the rights of the minority against the will of the majority.
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech
You might want to revisit the meaning of this, since nowhere can it be found that this applies only to government, and the corollary to it is that congress is well within its powers to make laws promoting freedom of speech, of the press, and religion, as can be documented in hundreds of circumstances conveniently ignored.
And just as McCarthyism is viewed distastefully now, only the dim would suppose that disfavor was exclusive to government action. which is why you can safely work for a Republican even though you are a Democrat, and even have the audacity to have Sanders bumper sticker on your car without fear of legally losing your job.
I do believe that is freedom from consequences, damn that meddling government.
Not exactly that clear cut.
The government also makes laws that states you could be fired from your job for expressing an opinion, which just a proxy, much like the US government not being legal in snooping into your affairs without a warrant, but is perfectly cromulent to authorize a foreign government to do the snooping. Doubt you would be as sympathetic if you were fired for expressing your love of kittens. After all, it was just consequences of your speech. The government wasn't involved at all, except making it a legal argument for dismissal.
And all this ignores the spirit of the 1st Amendment, which is to foster debate, free from intrusion. Your line logic lead to free speech zones, which yes; you are free to say what ever you want (just like you could in prison), but far away from it being meaningful.
Then let them tell themselves that the traffic, diminished purchasing potential, and degraded quality of life is worth it.
Place I live has a pop. of about 50,000, has a performing arts center that can attract acts like the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, is 1.5 hours out from a major city in any direction, has several good universities nearby, and what I use to pay in rent can get a house.
I would expect especially nerds to do a cost-benefit analysis and figure it out.
I am consistently surprised that more of the entrepreneurial types don't drag a bunch of their friends to the South or Mid-West to set up shop. There is little benefit I can see to joining established markets except for the "Me too!"-ism and paying inflated costs.
Especially as far as tech is concerned, that can be done almost anywhere. I remember when Austin was little more than flyover country, and it still would have been except a few decided to make the first strike.
To a large extent "quis custodiet ipsos custodes" has been solved. Extra guards to increase the cost of bribery, open procedures and oversight. Essentially everyone becomes a guard.
Beyond that, agreed this is just silly. The psychological affect may deter some, but if you are already looking at death, what do you have to lose?
Just more security theatre that accomplishes nothing.
One of the last vestiges of the Old Boys Network is company boards, where even after making a wreck of the world economy and a few decades of screaming for reform has yield squat: the SEC prosecutes with a velvet glove and shareholders are either scheming themselves or left wondering what the next golden parachute will do to the stock price. It's easy to make 4000% more than the underlings when all your CEO friends sit on other corporate boards as well.
No one sane believes that most CEOs are worth what they are paid, and their performance has proven that mostly correct. Shareholders can't even make inroads at disciplining executive pay, so I sincerely doubt most executives are at risk of losing their jobs.
What I can see is maybe automation playing the role of the 8 year old adviser, correcting the most egregious fuckups that come down the pike (which will be a vast improvement) but short of armed revolt the moneyed class will not go quietly into the night.
A favorite band of mine was in a similar situation.
They ended up releasing the song just as they were about to break up, and the publishing company also went out of business about the same time.
The end result was like yours but in reverse: impossible to track down anyone to sue.
And even supposing you did get permission from the legal rights holder, that does not indemnify you from lawsuits.
https://news.google.com/newspa...
Basically, make the cluster-fuck of copyright law work for you.
If I remember correctly, Reaction Engines got severely dicked by the UK government (pulling funding declaring the engines covered by the Official Secrets Act), effectively ending private development.
The design was promising but had teething issues, and has been carried on as a garage project all these years.
That they've managed to get this far given the hurdles they've had to overcome is nothing short of astounding.
Then logically, no one paying taxes would only mean the government borrows more, and since expenses are dissociated from income; no problems, right?
It will affect how much the government borrows...
Which has no effect on the interest rates that anyone else pays.
When your means of assessing risk (housing bubble anyone?) is more or less reading tea leaves and cat entrails, looking for word associations on social media is hardly surprising.
That most financial institutions would have crashed and burned with the last recession isn't surprising either.
Look at this as proof that another round of bailouts are coming, with bankers stating with a straight face "never saw wasted on his facebook page, so I thought he was a good risk" when student debit becomes the next reaming of the taxpayer.
Joy.
To be fair, this isn't so much the "left" as much as "progressives". Even the left has taken to calling them the regressive left, and are just as much disgusted by the nannyism.
And if we take a look back, these elements were always a part of the left (mostly from feminist that marched in lockstep with the religious right often enough), it's just they are at the forefront now, in many respects using the left as cover for their authoritarian agenda. Authoritarianism takes many forms.
And regardless, demonizing the left wholesale isn't helping, as many are just as much against the new censorship.
And more subtly, there will need to be some type of consensus between both left and right in maintaining freedom of speech. You'd be wise to make friends with those on the left opposing this latest round of censorship.
The standard-bearer was to invest in infrastructure during downturns (you are getting labor at a discount and are getting a return on top of). The macro approach now is to go into debit to pay welfare, with a 3. ????? 4. PROFIT, that can't exactly explain why giving the same money to billionaires wouldn't lead to the same results.
Austerity has never been an argument about cutting government spending per se than where to direct government spending.
And somehow the other part of macro (saving during booms) never gets the same airing.
Funny that.
Oh, it has definitely been studied, but like most things in economics is open to interpretation, is counter-intuitive to the MBA mantra, and most importantly subverts the employer as lord and master mindset (you know, the type that imagines being boss as telling everyone else what to do instead of seeing every customer as their boss).
Gent I know who was GM at a Taco Bell broke it down to me like this:
"You see every person here? They are a $10,000 investment I've made. They are going to cost me $10,000 in training, lost productivity until they are up to speed, and lost initiative if I can't give them a reason other than a paycheck to come in. Every single one is an assistant manager trainee since I can't predict who is going to rise through the ranks. Now tell me, how much do you think they are worth?"
He ran THE most profitable franchise in the region. He paid substantially more than minimum wage. He worked every position to set the standard of how things should be done.
And I could point to several others who were quite successful that operated very much in the same vein. Is it so surprising that "you get what you pay for" doesn't apply to labor as well?
Can't vouch for 5 times the cost, but often the same product is significantly cheaper through Walmart, and is delivered quicker.
http://www.amazon.com/Everlast...
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Ever...
And most recently, as Amazon is pushing it's subscription service, there are products Amazon refuses to sell unless you join Prime (Prime Pantry items being the most egregious). Only the hubris Jeff Bezos can justify the logic in not selling things.
Amazon's only grace at this point is near one-stop shopping, but increasingly on terms of price, total ease (especially if there is the possibility of a return involved), and speed of delivery (Walmart usually takes 3-5 days, Amazon is averaging 2 weeks), other retailers have got them beat.
Well, to begin with, Christian extremist isn't exactly synonymous with the right.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Highlights-
Founding member of the Federalist Society.
Assistant Attorney General (Office of Legal Counsel) in the Reagan administration.
In September 2007 Olson was considered by the Bush administration for the post of Attorney General to succeed Alberto Gonzales. The Democrats, however, were so vehemently opposed that Bush nominated Michael Mukasey instead.
And most importantly-
Olson, over time, came to believe that there is a constitutional right for same-sex marriage.[8] In 2009 he joined with David Boies, his opposing counsel in Bush v. Gore, to bring a federal lawsuit, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, challenging Proposition 8, a California state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.[9] His work on the lawsuit earned him a place among the Time 100's greatest thinkers.[10] In 2011 Olson and David Boies were awarded the ABA Medal, the highest award of the American Bar Association.
I challenge you to name an equivalent serving member on the left that has done more to advance gay civil rights.
Oh, I'd go even further.
When the left were patting themselves on the back at how wonderful they were at ushering a new era of peace and hope, even when poo-pooing anyone bringing up Obama's vote on the Telecom Immunity bill and his then stance on gay marriage (and let's not forget some of the most meaningful advances on this have come from... gasp! the right), they were demonizing everyone else (Ron Paul especially) with a better record on civil rights, casting doom and gloom upon the nation if anyone else got elected.
Yeah, well, that worked out smashingly well.
So isn't this essentially arguing for Disneyfying the world to keep kids safe?
Ban all porn (or at least require training in the proper handling and storage before downloading that file).
Alternatively ban or require sex education (even though there is scant proof comprehensive sex education reduces teen pregnancy. Ditto banning it).
And of course all manner of food, drugs, video games, D&D, etc.
It just strikes me as peculiar that some will argue for personal responsibility and freedom of choice when their favored thingy is under fire, and in the same breath argue for regulation and restriction when it is someone else's favorite thingy.
And in the past few decades we have moved increasingly towards Disneyfying the world. I would just like some honesty to which degree the world should cater exclusively to children.
Even this is murky.
You've had a few candidates that made it a point to limit the amount of campaign contributions they got. Granted, none of them won those elections (but Jerry Brown did manage to snag the govenerorship), but the point still stands. Even the influence of lobbying groups can be political suicide if the constituents really dislike the proposal.
Nope, the biggest problem we have is still the vast majority of people don't vote, which means a minority interest is controlling nearly every time. That situation is perfectly ripe for being bought since the wealthy can target their spending. If it was more spread out, it becomes a case of diminishing returns.
And unfortunately the media is complicit in this since they are the major benefactors of increased campaign spending; which is really the part that is being bought wholesale. You really want to reform elections? Change the rules media must abide by so every election season isn't a cash cow for them.
As it is, it has taken several decades to reach this sorry state with government. Years of neglect by the voters has resulted in a death by a thousand cuts. But that can change in any year. People just need a reason to make the effort.
Just over the past few generations, we've seen a shift in the doctrine of child raising move from beating the hell out of your kids to institutionalizing them for fairly typical teenage rebelliousness to "expert" recommendations that unwanted behaviors stem from a lack of self-esteem (and of course the best way to build self-esteem is to patronize kids instead of letting them have a chance at real accomplishment/failure) to it being a mental condition to not to want to sit for 8 hours a day without respite, requiring medication.
You can also expect a chance at a sex offender registry for typical sexual exploration, and "zero tolerance" policies towards the inherent violence in taking the wrong tone with your speech that at the same time seems oblivious to the hazing other kids go through.
I don't think it is really a case of parents letting the kids do whatever they want when letting them walk down the street unescorted results in threat from child protective services to place the kids in state custody.
Add to that the dissolution of the nuclear and extended family, stagnant wages requiring both parents to work even longer hours than a few generations before, and parents who aren't religious fanatics somberly considering the logistics of home-schooling.
Are parents really the most culpable parties to this?
Far from running wild in the streets, we have bubble children who are perhaps the most psychically isolated in history, mostly from gullible parents trusting the guidance of "experts".
Let's not forget that much of public education (or culture for that matter) has become a cesspool of incompetence, questionable agendas, and dehumanization. Even if kids lack the emotional maturity to name exactly what is being done to them, they are certainly aware the authority over them is lacking in mutual respect.
Add in a surge of hormones, and you've got a wicked circumstance.
"When inward life dries up, when feeling decreases and apathy increases, when one cannot affect or even genuinely touch another person, violence flares up as a daimonic necessity for contact, a mad drive forcing touch in the most direct way possible." -Rollo May
One of the sticking points though is the individual doesn't have an army of lawyers to argue their case.
Nope, this is systematic of getting the best justice money can buy, and governments having to grapple with the fact that some pockets are deeper than theirs, and weighing the pros and cons of funding they can extract now through fines relative to tax revenue that could be had later on (certainly don't want to kill the golden goose in this case).
But let's not forget that it was the purse of government that caused this problem, even as they meander through without anything approaching judicial reform.
Yeah, but don't doubt for an instant some harebrained MBA type won't champion this as some new paradigm for worker relations (*cough*), which will be lauded by upper management as it effectively washes their hands from, you know, doing their damn job and supervising their employees' work, not to mention any process like this will be gamed by any employee with modicum of disdain.
And this is particularly damning in instances where strict compliance and careful execution is of utmost importance. Do you really want your surgeon being judged on how many people he can rifle through the operating theatre? Well, too bad, because metrics like these are being employed by hospitals to disastrous effect.
And as most of these processes are far from integrated, there is a cost to monitoring. I've pointed out to my managers that all the nickle and dime initiatives they've instituted over the years adds about 1.5 hours to the workday, which adds up to a yearly cost of just north of 1 million in labor alone, and by-the-way has anyone checked to see if the benefits are even close to that?
Ooops!