I know "the system" far better than you do. My parents were a psychiatrist and an attorney - both working for the Bronx Criminal Court system in the 1960-70's - you may remember the Heroin influx at that time.
I grew up in NYC at one of the most incredible periods of recent history.
My sisters and I have avoided addicts and addiction - and all of us have doctoral degrees and all of us have made it to (and, past ) 50 years of life.
The government, starting with Nixon and accelerating with Reagan until we have no state mental facilities and local facilities have been cut or eliminated. Medicaid, for all intents and purposes, doesn't exist and drug treatment programs have been invaded by "faith-based" alternatives to medicine.
Eighty-five percent (85%) of our prison population has a diagnosed mental illness - and today, our prisons are the mental health wards.
We have retreated to the days of snake pits and the mad woman in the attic.
You make assumptions that there are a "majority" of cases where guys don't get out and kill their families. There are no statistics for the null set. I'll agree with you that there may well be a certain number of people who might have the impulse, but did not act - however, I cannot agree that the comprise the majority (or, even a significant minority) of cases.
Turning to your faith in "officers and the facility who [sic] he escaped from" - the facts speak clearly that your faith is misplaced.
Most prison staff have HS degrees. Management may have a baccalaureate- few have higher education. With the shift to "for profit" prisons we have seen the educational standards, and professionalism, decrease sharply. Federal Courts in several states have ruled that the incarceration of state prisoners in out-of-state for profit facilities is unconstitutional.
Missouri was barred from sending state prisoners to Texas-based private prisons. And, remember that these facilities provide fewer services - mere warehousing - no medical care - and that lead to the federal court decisions against them. A prisoner is entitled to a level of medical care - a level that does not sink below "deliberate indifference" and the for profit facilities had no care - well below the standard.
We have more people incarcerated in the US, as measured by total prison population, and per capita, than any other nation. Most are non-violent offenders and they should be handled differently than the murderer that started this thread.
The mentally ill have different needs - and nothing in prison will help them. Drug addiction and the "war on drugs" ought to be handed to the medical community to be treated for what it is: a public health issue.
Read the posts - you brought greed and fundamental selfishness to the table.
I have not heard one word about philosophy in this whole thread, save for the Objectivists - who don't rise to a philosophy - their beliefs are more an excuse for self centered acts that make them free riders, and a burden on others than a "philosophy'".
I give you whole classes of endeavors that are inherently altruistic and you respond with, "Oh, yeah, well I can name hundreds of exceptions" and that takes the conversation to the classic logical fallacy of Reductio ad absurdum. I steered us away from that slippery slope and now you engage in the ad homonym fallacy.
This isn't a discussion, it is a series of statements containing logical fallacies that up until now I've attempted to resolve by showing the error underlying the fallacy - rather than call attention to the fallacy.
Your last post leaves nothing to discuss but the chain of fallacies.
Keep in mind who brought the topic to the table, greed-boy.
The vast majority of people are far more likely to be self-sacrificing than greedy. Studies have shown, time and again, the the poorer a person is the more they donate to charity, support destitute family members and, yes, strangers and are willing to go out of their way to assist the less fortunate.
Humans are basically decent. Rich humans are basically willing to ascribe personal flaws to the poor to justify their own wealth - most often the result of luck.
You believe what you want and your world is a nasty and brutish world.
I know who will stand for the weak, the sick and the powerless and I'm pleased by what I see.
You are all about Profit. Up until the 1960s no hospital in the US could turn a profit. It was illegal. The same with "mutual insurance companies,"
I know many, many physicians, attorneys and scientists who work in low or no-pay positions because that is their reason for having become the physician, lawyer, scientist in the first place.
Doctors Without Borders is but one example of physicians placing themselves in high-risk positions to work for no money to better lives of strangers.
Ivy-league law graduates can command a 6-figure starting salary - yet, every year, there are those who go to work as Legal Aid and Public Defender counsel.
FAIR, the EFF and hundreds of other legal operations exist as non-profit/no profit operations.
The Union of Concerned Scientists has fought nuclear proliferation for decades - all without pay for staff and members.
I can go on, St. Jude's Children's Hospitals, founded by Danny Thomas, remain free to the children needing care.
i'm a former prosecutor, son of a Psychiatrist (mother) and Attorney (father) and hold advanced degrees in science and law.
I think that the Judicial system, medicine, government funded research into public interest matters (including, of course, public defense), radio spectrum allocation, viral disease propagation and a litany of other areas all fall within the scope of the social compact.
China is the breeding ground for Influenza - like it or not, we have humans, ducks and pigs in close proximity and that is the source of each year's new Influenza variant. The H5N1 variant (close to the 1918 strain) jumps to a forth specie - chickens. That strain is potentially a slate-wiper.
Public health authorities have to be aware of the latest variants and act appropriately, so Chen Li, a farmer in Sichuan Province, is of great interest to you and your family. Remember that it is but one 18 hour flight from China to Denver...
In 1918 one of the Influenza points of origin was Ft. Riley, KS - because we were bringing home infected, solders injured in WWI.
The scope of public interest / social compact duties is ever expanding - not contracting.
It takes neither a physician nor a fireman to be aware of the dangers to themselves and their communities and the need to take prompt action. As a non-firemen I'll turn in a fire alarm, but my skill set doesn't include putting out fires in large structures. Still, my duty to a piece of property and the potential inhabitants thereof is, at a minimum, to report the fire.
The same duties apply to those of us who see a man with a gun walking away from a prison - bent on homicide and suicide.
The duties also apply to those who see the aircraft passenger showing signs of the flu....
How about a child playing with a loaded gun? Would you walk away from a 4 year-old with a loaded handgun, or would you remove the weapon?
What about a drunk driver on I-25? Going to call in the fool or wait to see who he kills?
I believe that all doubt has been eliminated. We are each charged with the duty to act in a cooperative manner to preserve the species.
I have no problem with SS/ Medicare (Medicare a 1965 law) - yet contribution to SS was voluntary for much of her revenue stream. She was a free-rider and she knew it.
Her "philosophy" was a mishmash of other's works and she knew it. So, intellectually dishonest, a free rider and a denier of the Objectivist view when her own self interest was on the line.
Frankly, she has puled off a scam that continues after her death- quite an accomplishment - especially when her contemporaries include Scientology and the Cult of L-Ron the Great, Winning Friends and Influencing People and a slew of Christian cults (that Ayn hated with a passion), oh, did I forget Mary Baker Eddy & Christian Science?
You admit a commitment to to the community is your motivation - and, as a volunteer, you don't get paid. Sounds a lot like the cooperation that leads to the survival of the species, possibly at the cost of your own life (or, a serious shortening thereof).
Are you going to tell me that while you don't care about people, that lack of concern extends to people trapped by fire? Are all of your fire-fighting duties limited to preservation of property? Life never enters into the equation?
Disasters are relative: the earthquake in China might be a serious problem for you if your parents were attending the Olympics and died in an earthquake that collapsed their hotel.
Moreover, why fight fires over PTA? The loss-of-life risk factors are grossly shifted towards the firefighting position. Do you have a death wish or just a low tolerance for boring meetings?
I lived two blocks away from her - 800 West End Avenue - in the 1960's - and I had more than a few discussions with her about her "Objectivist" views.
Fascinating thing, her royalty revenues had ceased - those were 26-year copyright terms prior to the 1976 amendments - and she was quite happy with her Social Security check and her rent-controlled apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
Her public pronouncements were not the life that she lived. Objectivists are self defeating and John Galt is a character lifted from French post-modernist literature - pure infringement.
She also benefitted from free medical care - treating her lung cancer. Amazing that she accepted that which she would have denied others....a hypocrite of the first order.
The biological imperative of survival of the species outweighs the individual. Microbial cooperation is the clearest example of this fundamental fact.
It isn't my argument - it is the fundamental core of the latest studies showing that individual is irrelevant to the survival of the species and the norm is cooperation within the species and, in some cases, extra-species cooperation (symbioses) lead to the best survival outcomes.
Your selfish motivation assumes that your genome has relevance in the greater survival of the species. That fact, in and of itself, shows that the value of your survival is grossly overvalued (as is mine, and most other living, thinking beings) by personal bias.
Ultimately, not even the worst puppy shits in its own bed. The fact of the murder-suicide that lead this thread indicates the fact that Humans are capable of behavior worse than that of a small, furry animal. The sick puppy who eliminated himself from the genome, took his offspring and spouse with him, effectively eliminating the branch of the genetic diversity of humanity that he comprised.
Public interest lawsuits don't necessarily benefit lawyers - and the benefits to the public are far, far greater than any benefit to a lawyer. The E-911 tax scam that the Telecos ran - taking $96.00/per phone line/yr gave the telecos windfall profits - hundreds of millions - who else but public interest law firms (frequently on operatiing grants) could, or would bring suits of this nature?
In Missouri last year a massive Riparian Rights public interest case cam down benefitting farmers throughout the region. The Public Interest law-firm did put in for attorney's fees - but when the class rep tried to divert the fees to his own pocket, the firm waived all $8meg of fees rather than let one greedy schmoe with standing take fees as his. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the right to reject fees. So, there is a classic example of the tug of war between the selfish and the cooperative. The Class Rep benefitted by the clarification and preservation of his riparian rights (as did hundreds of other farmers) but he couldn't be unjustly enriched by attempting to take fees that were not his. Ultimately, the PI Law firm spent $8meg to make water rights available to thousands without a penny coming to them.
As for seat-belts - read: Unsafe at Any Speed, Ralph Nader - that book lead to lawsuits and, finally, government regulation.
Vaccines - search Polio - fully government funded research. Diphtheria, Pertussis and Tetanus vaccines were all government grant funded. Research was not performed by "big pharma" - they didn't exist.
The same applies to Smallpox and the world eradication of that disease (last confirmed case 1976) - all done through US and WHO cooperation.
You are being judgmental - a norm in this society.
If the Crack-addicted individual had access to free medical care and drug support as Europe does, the drop off in drug-related crime and addiction would rapidly pay for itself.
This man was seriously ill - two innocent lives could have been spared (not to mention his) had we proper safeguards in place.
Prisons are the most regulated aspects of our society - i view this tragedy as nothing less than a failure of the prison system.
I just posted the links to mutual cooperation as an aspect of species survival. Joe in the Caucasus Mountains may have no idea that you exist, but his care in packing and sending foodstuffs into general commerce is not directly correlated to personal gain (see, China's food exports) - his care is motivated by a cooperative survival instinct. The whole of our market-based commerce can come tumbling down where too many greedy fools destroy the safety margins/fail-safe nets. See, 1929, bank runs, the 1932 and 1934 SEC Acts, the current collapse of the housing market, the prior GWB collapse of the S&L market.....
The October 1987 market crash - all are examples of the failure of cooperation (and, deregulation to foster anti-cooperative practices).
The cooperative- survival system extends from micro organisms through the ecosystems to the top of the chain (US). What is fruit but a cooperative way to spread a plant's genome through food for another organism?
Why do chimps groom each other (yes, they are small society animals and the risk of a contagion becoming established in one individual makes grooming a "self interest") but mobility within social groups (females) makes most grooming an unnecessary duty for one or more Chimps - yet we don't see that expressed in the communities - the cooperative society survives.
Birds routinely have lookouts - who forgo feeding opportunities to safeguard the flock - once again, the behavior is detrimental to one individual, but increases the survival of the entire group.
Cooperation in complex, multi-species organisms is well established in so many organisms that even I can't list them all - from Lichens to the bacteria in our gut - Selfish motivations do not favor survival (consider pathogens that kill the host - eventually they die because they destroyed their food supply - and, with things like Smallpox, more advanced organisms create vaccines and destroy the selfish bacteria.
The Maslow-influenced / Ayn-Randian motivation does not square with the biological imperative of survival. Cooperation for mutual survival is well established in human behavior and is now being identified in other species as well. The leading new field is cooperation among microorganisms - see, http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v4/n8/abs/nrmicro1461.html
The selfish jerk operation of humankind is contra survival. e.g. the subject of this thread.
Basically, we're all self-centered. Do I care about your wellbeing? Not really. Do you care about mine? I doubt it. Does that mean we will leap at each other's throat the moment we spot each other? Dunno about you, but I won't. Usually, people don't care too much about people they don't know.
Swift one there, Ayn! I guess that those firemen walk into your burning house to pull you away from a horrible death for the pay. Likewise the physicians, therapists and the other adherents to the social compact.
Public interest lawsuits, seat belts, vaccines - yep, you have hit the nail on the head: everybody is exactly like you.
My proof? No Labour party member would ally, support (speaking in whole sentences!) Bush's ramp up to war with Iraq, waste blood and treasure on the say-so of the venial administration of the 'states, and eventually sacrifice his office on the alter of failed foreign policy.
The Official Secrets Act needs an overhaul and some mechanism of appropriate access - as do the yanks with their Freedom of Information Act and Sunshine Laws. My guess: most "Official Secrets" are a load of Dingoes kidneys.
Oh, and the "honeypot" hooker - she just rolled the John. Earlier posts are correct - data would have been copied - or, even a new, cloned, Blackberry could have been put in the old case - nothing missing gives no warning. This was theft, plain and simple.
In the US, how do you tell the political affiliation of the politician by sex scandal? The Democrats like Girls and don't wear napkins to have sex! See, Sen. David Vitter, Fl. Rep. Mark Foley, who preferred his pages, bent over; and, Larry Craig - the naughty, nasty boy with the wide stance....
George Soros is not involved. Neither is Judge Crater, Amelia Earhart, Santa Claus, the Great Pumpkin or any other looney BS.
Get real, the Dems don't have Scaife, Pickens, or the Hunts.
Only your group of rich wackos put money into stupid / insane campaigns. See,
In 1979 the sons of patriarch H.L. Hunt, Nelson Bunker and William Herbert, together with some wealthy Arabs, formed a silver pool. In a short period of time they had amassed more than 200 million ounces of silver, equivalent to half the world's deliverable supply.
When the Hunt's had begun accumulating silver back in 1973 the price was in the $1.95 / ounce range. Early in '79, the price was about $5. Late '79 / early '80 the price was in the $50's, peaking at $54.
(and, that put a serious crimp in my photography at the time)
Once the silver market was cornered, outsiders joined the chase but a combination of changed trading rules on the New York Metals Market (COMEX) and the intervention of the Federal Reserve put an end to the game. The price began to slide, culminating in a 50% one-day decline on March 27, 1980 as the price plummeted from $21.62 to $10.80.
The collapse of the silver market meant countless losses for speculators. The Hunt brothers declared bankruptcy. By 1987 their liabilities had grown to nearly $2.5 billion against assets of $1.5 billion. In August of 1988 the Hunts were convicted of conspiring to manipulate the market.
Soros, or any other dem has done what that is comparable?
All pure conjecture. The law is every state but Louisiana (don't know, Napoleonic code, you know) is that no traffic/municipal court can fund itself from fines. Your fees and so on go to agencies other than the court - they just "enhance" the low fine by putting a handling charge in place.
Oh, and in the Old Dominion the state ran up the traffic fines to hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, to feed the state's coffers. I believe that experiment failed.
Take police out of the picture and you have nobody to prevent accidents from the high-speed, ETOH-fueled drivers. Is eliminating DUI law your real plan here?
Oh, right. That guy, Soros, paid the public health researchers at Johns Hopkins to cook the figures? Lancet PUBLISHES - it doesn't conduct, fund or write the research.
But, the Tri-lateral Commission and the World Bank are scheming to make the Euro the international money standard - despite the fact that the dollar is in free-fall?
This has nothing at all to do with the US having borrowed to the hilt to finance Bush's two wars and recession and inflation grossly under reported in the US - where foreign investment has dropped off in the wake of the largest single bank failure in the history of the nation, right?
The Autobahn is a road engineered to serve high-speed vehicles - but not as high a speed as many would believe. 130 km/h (80 mph) is the suggested top speed and last fall the SPD proposed a blanket top speed of 130 km/h.
And, there are a myriad of traffic laws - including a 3 month suspended license for following too closely - tailgating at speeds over 100 km/h (62 mph) - a fact that would shock most Americans.
Beyond the fuel economy issue, there is the pollution issue - 5x more fuel is 5x more pollution.
Be that as it may, you are correct about appropriate speed for the roadway. In the US Libertarians believe that government has no business setting speed limits would take issue with any restriction or fine - 305 km/h (just over 200 mph) would be just fine for a vehicle on empty roads in Montana or the Garden State Parkway - or, your home street. Of course, Libertarians have a problem with state-built roads - infringing on the rights of private interests to make a profit by building their own roads (nobody has done this - but Libertarians take it on faith that the Government has no reason to exist but national defense and police power).
Your road is not the issue. The issue is are speed limits valid exercises of government rule making and is enforcing speed limits with faulty / error prone technology useful?
Speeding is usually a "strict liability" offense with few, if any, ways to challenge the officer's reported speed.
Libertarians (inserting themselves into the topic) don't believe that the government should set speed limits. Roadways are constructed within engineering parameters that permit "safe" travel at certain ranges of speed, dependent upon conditions.
Fines cannot be used to enrich the Court (conflict of interest) and go to the community that pays for the municipal court with separate tax sources. The fines serve to deter Libertarians, 18 year-olds and DUI laws take drivers off the road.
If error is present, it should be transparent to the cited, counsel and the Court and officer - not to mention the prosecutor. Prosecutors have a duty to dismiss bad busts - and in muni courts, most do.
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I know "the system" far better than you do. My parents were a psychiatrist and an attorney - both working for the Bronx Criminal Court system in the 1960-70's - you may remember the Heroin influx at that time.
I grew up in NYC at one of the most incredible periods of recent history.
My sisters and I have avoided addicts and addiction - and all of us have doctoral degrees and all of us have made it to (and, past ) 50 years of life.
The government, starting with Nixon and accelerating with Reagan until we have no state mental facilities and local facilities have been cut or eliminated. Medicaid, for all intents and purposes, doesn't exist and drug treatment programs have been invaded by "faith-based" alternatives to medicine.
Eighty-five percent (85%) of our prison population has a diagnosed mental illness - and today, our prisons are the mental health wards.
We have retreated to the days of snake pits and the mad woman in the attic.
You make assumptions that there are a "majority" of cases where guys don't get out and kill their families. There are no statistics for the null set. I'll agree with you that there may well be a certain number of people who might have the impulse, but did not act - however, I cannot agree that the comprise the majority (or, even a significant minority) of cases.
Turning to your faith in "officers and the facility who [sic] he escaped from" - the facts speak clearly that your faith is misplaced.
Most prison staff have HS degrees. Management may have a baccalaureate- few have higher education. With the shift to "for profit" prisons we have seen the educational standards, and professionalism, decrease sharply. Federal Courts in several states have ruled that the incarceration of state prisoners in out-of-state for profit facilities is unconstitutional.
Missouri was barred from sending state prisoners to Texas-based private prisons. And, remember that these facilities provide fewer services - mere warehousing - no medical care - and that lead to the federal court decisions against them. A prisoner is entitled to a level of medical care - a level that does not sink below "deliberate indifference" and the for profit facilities had no care - well below the standard.
We have more people incarcerated in the US, as measured by total prison population, and per capita, than any other nation. Most are non-violent offenders and they should be handled differently than the murderer that started this thread.
The mentally ill have different needs - and nothing in prison will help them. Drug addiction and the "war on drugs" ought to be handed to the medical community to be treated for what it is: a public health issue.
My point.
Read the posts - you brought greed and fundamental selfishness to the table.
I have not heard one word about philosophy in this whole thread, save for the Objectivists - who don't rise to a philosophy - their beliefs are more an excuse for self centered acts that make them free riders, and a burden on others than a "philosophy'".
I give you whole classes of endeavors that are inherently altruistic and you respond with, "Oh, yeah, well I can name hundreds of exceptions" and that takes the conversation to the classic logical fallacy of Reductio ad absurdum. I steered us away from that slippery slope and now you engage in the ad homonym fallacy.
This isn't a discussion, it is a series of statements containing logical fallacies that up until now I've attempted to resolve by showing the error underlying the fallacy - rather than call attention to the fallacy.
Your last post leaves nothing to discuss but the chain of fallacies.
Document retention policies ought to follow the IRS document retention guidelines. 5 years at a minimum.
Avoiding liability under SOX by failing to report the improper operation of the corporation and destroying the evidence is a bad, bad idea.
I expect spoilation sanctions for any document destroyed before the IRS standards.
He who has the power to define, rules. H. Newton 1968
Keep in mind who brought the topic to the table, greed-boy.
The vast majority of people are far more likely to be self-sacrificing than greedy. Studies have shown, time and again, the the poorer a person is the more they donate to charity, support destitute family members and, yes, strangers and are willing to go out of their way to assist the less fortunate.
Humans are basically decent. Rich humans are basically willing to ascribe personal flaws to the poor to justify their own wealth - most often the result of luck.
You believe what you want and your world is a nasty and brutish world.
I know who will stand for the weak, the sick and the powerless and I'm pleased by what I see.
You are all about Profit. Up until the 1960s no hospital in the US could turn a profit. It was illegal. The same with "mutual insurance companies,"
I know many, many physicians, attorneys and scientists who work in low or no-pay positions because that is their reason for having become the physician, lawyer, scientist in the first place.
Doctors Without Borders is but one example of physicians placing themselves in high-risk positions to work for no money to better lives of strangers.
Ivy-league law graduates can command a 6-figure starting salary - yet, every year, there are those who go to work as Legal Aid and Public Defender counsel.
FAIR, the EFF and hundreds of other legal operations exist as non-profit/no profit operations.
The Union of Concerned Scientists has fought nuclear proliferation for decades - all without pay for staff and members.
I can go on, St. Jude's Children's Hospitals, founded by Danny Thomas, remain free to the children needing care.
i'm a former prosecutor, son of a Psychiatrist (mother) and Attorney (father) and hold advanced degrees in science and law.
I think that the Judicial system, medicine, government funded research into public interest matters (including, of course, public defense), radio spectrum allocation, viral disease propagation and a litany of other areas all fall within the scope of the social compact.
China is the breeding ground for Influenza - like it or not, we have humans, ducks and pigs in close proximity and that is the source of each year's new Influenza variant. The H5N1 variant (close to the 1918 strain) jumps to a forth specie - chickens. That strain is potentially a slate-wiper.
Public health authorities have to be aware of the latest variants and act appropriately, so Chen Li, a farmer in Sichuan Province, is of great interest to you and your family. Remember that it is but one 18 hour flight from China to Denver...
In 1918 one of the Influenza points of origin was Ft. Riley, KS - because we were bringing home infected, solders injured in WWI.
The scope of public interest / social compact duties is ever expanding - not contracting.
It takes neither a physician nor a fireman to be aware of the dangers to themselves and their communities and the need to take prompt action. As a non-firemen I'll turn in a fire alarm, but my skill set doesn't include putting out fires in large structures. Still, my duty to a piece of property and the potential inhabitants thereof is, at a minimum, to report the fire.
The same duties apply to those of us who see a man with a gun walking away from a prison - bent on homicide and suicide.
The duties also apply to those who see the aircraft passenger showing signs of the flu....
How about a child playing with a loaded gun? Would you walk away from a 4 year-old with a loaded handgun, or would you remove the weapon?
What about a drunk driver on I-25? Going to call in the fool or wait to see who he kills?
I believe that all doubt has been eliminated. We are each charged with the duty to act in a cooperative manner to preserve the species.
I have no problem with SS/ Medicare (Medicare a 1965 law) - yet contribution to SS was voluntary for much of her revenue stream. She was a free-rider and she knew it.
Her "philosophy" was a mishmash of other's works and she knew it. So, intellectually dishonest, a free rider and a denier of the Objectivist view when her own self interest was on the line.
Frankly, she has puled off a scam that continues after her death- quite an accomplishment - especially when her contemporaries include Scientology and the Cult of L-Ron the Great, Winning Friends and Influencing People and a slew of Christian cults (that Ayn hated with a passion), oh, did I forget Mary Baker Eddy & Christian Science?
You admit a commitment to to the community is your motivation - and, as a volunteer, you don't get paid. Sounds a lot like the cooperation that leads to the survival of the species, possibly at the cost of your own life (or, a serious shortening thereof).
Are you going to tell me that while you don't care about people, that lack of concern extends to people trapped by fire? Are all of your fire-fighting duties limited to preservation of property? Life never enters into the equation?
Disasters are relative: the earthquake in China might be a serious problem for you if your parents were attending the Olympics and died in an earthquake that collapsed their hotel.
Moreover, why fight fires over PTA? The loss-of-life risk factors are grossly shifted towards the firefighting position. Do you have a death wish or just a low tolerance for boring meetings?
I lived two blocks away from her - 800 West End Avenue - in the 1960's - and I had more than a few discussions with her about her "Objectivist" views.
Fascinating thing, her royalty revenues had ceased - those were 26-year copyright terms prior to the 1976 amendments - and she was quite happy with her Social Security check and her rent-controlled apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
Her public pronouncements were not the life that she lived. Objectivists are self defeating and John Galt is a character lifted from French post-modernist literature - pure infringement.
She also benefitted from free medical care - treating her lung cancer. Amazing that she accepted that which she would have denied others....a hypocrite of the first order.
No.
The biological imperative of survival of the species outweighs the individual. Microbial cooperation is the clearest example of this fundamental fact.
It isn't my argument - it is the fundamental core of the latest studies showing that individual is irrelevant to the survival of the species and the norm is cooperation within the species and, in some cases, extra-species cooperation (symbioses) lead to the best survival outcomes.
Your selfish motivation assumes that your genome has relevance in the greater survival of the species. That fact, in and of itself, shows that the value of your survival is grossly overvalued (as is mine, and most other living, thinking beings) by personal bias.
Ultimately, not even the worst puppy shits in its own bed. The fact of the murder-suicide that lead this thread indicates the fact that Humans are capable of behavior worse than that of a small, furry animal. The sick puppy who eliminated himself from the genome, took his offspring and spouse with him, effectively eliminating the branch of the genetic diversity of humanity that he comprised.
Public interest lawsuits don't necessarily benefit lawyers - and the benefits to the public are far, far greater than any benefit to a lawyer. The E-911 tax scam that the Telecos ran - taking $96.00/per phone line/yr gave the telecos windfall profits - hundreds of millions - who else but public interest law firms (frequently on operatiing grants) could, or would bring suits of this nature?
In Missouri last year a massive Riparian Rights public interest case cam down benefitting farmers throughout the region. The Public Interest law-firm did put in for attorney's fees - but when the class rep tried to divert the fees to his own pocket, the firm waived all $8meg of fees rather than let one greedy schmoe with standing take fees as his. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the right to reject fees. So, there is a classic example of the tug of war between the selfish and the cooperative. The Class Rep benefitted by the clarification and preservation of his riparian rights (as did hundreds of other farmers) but he couldn't be unjustly enriched by attempting to take fees that were not his. Ultimately, the PI Law firm spent $8meg to make water rights available to thousands without a penny coming to them.
As for seat-belts - read: Unsafe at Any Speed, Ralph Nader - that book lead to lawsuits and, finally, government regulation.
Vaccines - search Polio - fully government funded research. Diphtheria, Pertussis and Tetanus vaccines were all government grant funded. Research was not performed by "big pharma" - they didn't exist.
The same applies to Smallpox and the world eradication of that disease (last confirmed case 1976) - all done through US and WHO cooperation.
You are being judgmental - a norm in this society.
If the Crack-addicted individual had access to free medical care and drug support as Europe does, the drop off in drug-related crime and addiction would rapidly pay for itself.
This man was seriously ill - two innocent lives could have been spared (not to mention his) had we proper safeguards in place.
Prisons are the most regulated aspects of our society - i view this tragedy as nothing less than a failure of the prison system.
I just posted the links to mutual cooperation as an aspect of species survival. Joe in the Caucasus Mountains may have no idea that you exist, but his care in packing and sending foodstuffs into general commerce is not directly correlated to personal gain (see, China's food exports) - his care is motivated by a cooperative survival instinct. The whole of our market-based commerce can come tumbling down where too many greedy fools destroy the safety margins/fail-safe nets. See, 1929, bank runs, the 1932 and 1934 SEC Acts, the current collapse of the housing market, the prior GWB collapse of the S&L market.....
The October 1987 market crash - all are examples of the failure of cooperation (and, deregulation to foster anti-cooperative practices).
http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v4/n8/abs/nrmicro1461.html
The cooperative- survival system extends from micro organisms through the ecosystems to the top of the chain (US). What is fruit but a cooperative way to spread a plant's genome through food for another organism?
Why do chimps groom each other (yes, they are small society animals and the risk of a contagion becoming established in one individual makes grooming a "self interest") but mobility within social groups (females) makes most grooming an unnecessary duty for one or more Chimps - yet we don't see that expressed in the communities - the cooperative society survives.
Birds routinely have lookouts - who forgo feeding opportunities to safeguard the flock - once again, the behavior is detrimental to one individual, but increases the survival of the entire group.
Cooperation in complex, multi-species organisms is well established in so many organisms that even I can't list them all - from Lichens to the bacteria in our gut - Selfish motivations do not favor survival (consider pathogens that kill the host - eventually they die because they destroyed their food supply - and, with things like Smallpox, more advanced organisms create vaccines and destroy the selfish bacteria.
Horse pucky!
The Maslow-influenced / Ayn-Randian motivation does not square with the biological imperative of survival. Cooperation for mutual survival is well established in human behavior and is now being identified in other species as well. The leading new field is cooperation among microorganisms - see, http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v4/n8/abs/nrmicro1461.html
The selfish jerk operation of humankind is contra survival. e.g. the subject of this thread.
Basically, we're all self-centered. Do I care about your wellbeing? Not really. Do you care about mine? I doubt it. Does that mean we will leap at each other's throat the moment we spot each other? Dunno about you, but I won't. Usually, people don't care too much about people they don't know.
Swift one there, Ayn! I guess that those firemen walk into your burning house to pull you away from a horrible death for the pay. Likewise the physicians, therapists and the other adherents to the social compact.
Public interest lawsuits, seat belts, vaccines - yep, you have hit the nail on the head: everybody is exactly like you.
How about the fact that a felon had easy access to a gun?
Apparently his wife wasn't packing heat for the showdown and neither was that 3 year-old.
The most common cause of death by gunshot: an irate / crazy family member.
Now, if he had only gone on a shooting rampage of the Spamhaus top 100.....well, the story might have been somewhat less somber.
The Tories had a stealth PM - Bush's lapdog.
My proof? No Labour party member would ally, support (speaking in whole sentences!) Bush's ramp up to war with Iraq, waste blood and treasure on the say-so of the venial administration of the 'states, and eventually sacrifice his office on the alter of failed foreign policy.
The Official Secrets Act needs an overhaul and some mechanism of appropriate access - as do the yanks with their Freedom of Information Act and Sunshine Laws. My guess: most "Official Secrets" are a load of Dingoes kidneys.
Oh, and the "honeypot" hooker - she just rolled the John. Earlier posts are correct - data would have been copied - or, even a new, cloned, Blackberry could have been put in the old case - nothing missing gives no warning. This was theft, plain and simple.
In the US, how do you tell the political affiliation of the politician by sex scandal? The Democrats like Girls and don't wear napkins to have sex! See, Sen. David Vitter, Fl. Rep. Mark Foley, who preferred his pages, bent over; and, Larry Craig - the naughty, nasty boy with the wide stance....
George Soros is not involved. Neither is Judge Crater, Amelia Earhart, Santa Claus, the Great Pumpkin or any other looney BS.
Get real, the Dems don't have Scaife, Pickens, or the Hunts.
Only your group of rich wackos put money into stupid / insane campaigns. See,
In 1979 the sons of patriarch H.L. Hunt, Nelson Bunker and William Herbert, together with some wealthy Arabs, formed a silver pool. In a short period of time they had amassed more than 200 million ounces of silver, equivalent to half the world's deliverable supply.
When the Hunt's had begun accumulating silver back in 1973 the price was in the $1.95 / ounce range. Early in '79, the price was about $5. Late '79 / early '80 the price was in the $50's, peaking at $54.
(and, that put a serious crimp in my photography at the time)
Once the silver market was cornered, outsiders joined the chase but a combination of changed trading rules on the New York Metals Market (COMEX) and the intervention of the Federal Reserve put an end to the game. The price began to slide, culminating in a 50% one-day decline on March 27, 1980 as the price plummeted from $21.62 to $10.80.
The collapse of the silver market meant countless losses for speculators. The Hunt brothers declared bankruptcy. By 1987 their liabilities had grown to nearly $2.5 billion against assets of $1.5 billion. In August of 1988 the Hunts were convicted of conspiring to manipulate the market.
Soros, or any other dem has done what that is comparable?
All pure conjecture. The law is every state but Louisiana (don't know, Napoleonic code, you know) is that no traffic/municipal court can fund itself from fines. Your fees and so on go to agencies other than the court - they just "enhance" the low fine by putting a handling charge in place.
Oh, and in the Old Dominion the state ran up the traffic fines to hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, to feed the state's coffers. I believe that experiment failed.
Take police out of the picture and you have nobody to prevent accidents from the high-speed, ETOH-fueled drivers. Is eliminating DUI law your real plan here?
Oh, right. That guy, Soros, paid the public health researchers at Johns Hopkins to cook the figures? Lancet PUBLISHES - it doesn't conduct, fund or write the research.
But, the Tri-lateral Commission and the World Bank are scheming to make the Euro the international money standard - despite the fact that the dollar is in free-fall?
This has nothing at all to do with the US having borrowed to the hilt to finance Bush's two wars and recession and inflation grossly under reported in the US - where foreign investment has dropped off in the wake of the largest single bank failure in the history of the nation, right?
The Autobahn is a road engineered to serve high-speed vehicles - but not as high a speed as many would believe. 130 km/h (80 mph) is the suggested top speed and last fall the SPD proposed a blanket top speed of 130 km/h.
And, there are a myriad of traffic laws - including a 3 month suspended license for following too closely - tailgating at speeds over 100 km/h (62 mph) - a fact that would shock most Americans.
Beyond the fuel economy issue, there is the pollution issue - 5x more fuel is 5x more pollution.
Be that as it may, you are correct about appropriate speed for the roadway. In the US Libertarians believe that government has no business setting speed limits would take issue with any restriction or fine - 305 km/h (just over 200 mph) would be just fine for a vehicle on empty roads in Montana or the Garden State Parkway - or, your home street. Of course, Libertarians have a problem with state-built roads - infringing on the rights of private interests to make a profit by building their own roads (nobody has done this - but Libertarians take it on faith that the Government has no reason to exist but national defense and police power).
1. That would be 7MPh - 21 MPh, right? You are talking about KPh here.
Your road is not the issue. The issue is are speed limits valid exercises of government rule making and is enforcing speed limits with faulty / error prone technology useful?
Speeding is usually a "strict liability" offense with few, if any, ways to challenge the officer's reported speed.
Libertarians (inserting themselves into the topic) don't believe that the government should set speed limits. Roadways are constructed within engineering parameters that permit "safe" travel at certain ranges of speed, dependent upon conditions.
Fines cannot be used to enrich the Court (conflict of interest) and go to the community that pays for the municipal court with separate tax sources. The fines serve to deter Libertarians, 18 year-olds and DUI laws take drivers off the road.
If error is present, it should be transparent to the cited, counsel and the Court and officer - not to mention the prosecutor. Prosecutors have a duty to dismiss bad busts - and in muni courts, most do.