Sacrificial lamb or not, it's pretty obvious that prosecuting Libby isn't going to have any sort of deterrent effect on anyone else. The message of the Libby trial is that you shouldn't piss off a federal prosecutor by trying to jerk him around while he's investigating a crime he has no intention of actually prosecuting in the first place. The fact that everyone who arguably acted unethically and/or illegally before the investigation started got away with no charges whatsoever is a pretty good message that you can get away with just about anything.
As for DeLay, the only charges against him are related to illegally funding state elections with federal campaign money, which might help clean up Texas politics but says nothing about the huge amounts of corruption involved in how business in Congress itself is done. What message does it send? Don't participate in the world's dumbest money laundering scheme. He'd have done better to have gotten advice from a dictionary or a crackhead selling magazines.
Well, I've never heard of a court ordering someone to provide evidence that they're not guilty, but it's unbelievable to me that there are state secrets that can be trusted to AT&T that can't be trusted to a federal judge. Surely they could have a closed trial before one of the FISA Court judges? Oh wait, I forgot... the whole reason they're under investigation is that the FISA court judges' security clearances weren't good enough to let them oversee this perfectly legal but so supersecret we can't tell the judges about it program. Clearly the FISA judges aren't vetted well enough for us to be absolutely sure they're not working for al Qaeda.
No, Jefferson was just as good as misquoting Franklin as any idiot on Slashdot today, thank you very much. I believe it was George Washington who said "a penny saved is a penny you can spend later."
Of course, I'll use the phrase "8 o'clock at night" to refer to 8PM even in the summer when it's before dusk, but that could be just me or a regional usage.
...except that the page you links to actually mentions that a state legislature did try to redefine pi for religious reasons, unsuccessfully, in 1897. The specific email claiming Alabama was doing it in 1998 was a hoax.
I'm sure Google will consider moving there real soon. What with the huge local pool of tech savvy Amish they could hire, Lancaster would make a great location for any tech company.
I'm seeing ads right after the first paragraph in the blog story. You must be blocking them.
I'm not sure if 2 of the 3 ads are for brain injury and brain tumor treatment because the name of his blog is "Brain handles" or because you'd need to have a brain injury to do the "research" he's doing.
mrbluze points us to an AP writeup on the upcoming Pi Day -- 3-14
Ok, which retarded state legislature is trying to redefine Pi as -11 now? Is there new Biblical evidence that those people who claim that Pi is exactly 3 were off by 14?
If the device wasn't timezone/DST aware at all, you've have a point. However, the thing does account for DST, it's just completely wrong in how it does it now. I think you'd be pissed if you had to set your watch an hour ahead yesterday and then in 3 weeks you had to remember to set it back an hour because it set itself ahead another hour for you.
That's because you don't need a license to listen to the music at home; there's nothing like a EULA to include with the CD itself. You do need a license to distribute copies of music, and the record companies have licensing deals with legitimate distributors. AllOfMP3 doesn't have such a license, and it would take someone with a lot more knowledge of Russian law than I have to tell you if what they're doing is legal or simply illegal and not enforced. Russia's not exactly known for effectively and consistently enforcing its laws these days
Leveling the playing field was proven invalid by the collapse of a system in Russia that made no attempt to do any such thing, just because the system was put in place by people calling themselves "Communist"? Right.
If I form a government under what I call "The Mathematics Party" and it fails horribly, does that prove that math is fundamentally flawed?
I imagine the number of people in the world who don't hold some sort of irrational belief based on no evidence whatsoever is so incredibly small that we may as well call it 0. I like to think that my own superstitions or irrational behaviors are slightly less crazy than believing that there are extraterrestrials flying around in Earth's atmosphere all the time who only ever make contact with random nutjobs out in the boonies and the whole thing is covered up by a really good conspiracy, or that there's some invisible man in the sky with infinite power controlling everything, but I'd say that when Aristotle claimed that man is a rational animal he was pretty much completely wrong.
You should get a tin foil hat if you're seriously worried about the police going through the records of everything you've ever done without any probable cause because someone you used to be friends with committed a crime that you obviously weren't involved in. Being able to identify pictures you took with this camera is entirely irrelevant to that kind of paranoia; who's to say the police won't just come to your house and take all of your photo albums and negatives along with getting all of your credit card records, etc., because they heard from someone that you used to be friends with some random criminal years ago?
Of course they left out that clause. Why would a government want to put the burden of proof on itself to show that the person doing the filming knew the people doing the assaulting, when it would be much easier to write the law as it is and just prosecute the people you "know" are related but can't prove it? Of course, one would hope that the filmer who just happened to be in the right place at the right time would be able to make a reasonable argument that he wasn't involved in the assault and thus not get prosecuted. I imagine turning over the recording as evidence to the police, who you called to report the assault you were taping instead of posting it on youtube would probably make for a pretty good reasonable argument.
No, you shouldn't take them as false. You may or may not choose to give his opinions on one subject weight based on his opinions on another subject. The world isn't black and white, and I see no one here attempting to construct a logical proof. You might not be on drugs, but you've probably taken an overdose of math.
Is there any reason to think that if something is unethical when one human does it to another, it's not unethical for the first person to build a robot to do that unethical thing? If not, is there any point whatsoever to having ethical rules that apply only to robots?
Of course it's true. If I tell you that 3*3= 8, I have no credibility in regards to mathematics. It would be a logical fallacy to then assert that if I say "9*9=81" I'm incorrect because I believed that 3*3=8, but not to assert that I'm not credible.
I do not assert that anything else GP stated is false, merely that no one should take him seriously even if he says true things.
It's obvious. Before this act, terrorists could kill all of the US Attorneys and Senators, and when they were caught we'd just have to set them free because there'd be no one authorized to prosecute them. Now when they manage to wipe out most of our legislative and prosecutorial infrastructure, we'll still be able to hold them accountable, since we obviously won't have much more important problems to deal with in such a situation than finally starting to have trials for enemy combatants instead of turning them over to the military.
Slashdot Mirror
Sacrificial lamb or not, it's pretty obvious that prosecuting Libby isn't going to have any sort of deterrent effect on anyone else. The message of the Libby trial is that you shouldn't piss off a federal prosecutor by trying to jerk him around while he's investigating a crime he has no intention of actually prosecuting in the first place. The fact that everyone who arguably acted unethically and/or illegally before the investigation started got away with no charges whatsoever is a pretty good message that you can get away with just about anything.
As for DeLay, the only charges against him are related to illegally funding state elections with federal campaign money, which might help clean up Texas politics but says nothing about the huge amounts of corruption involved in how business in Congress itself is done. What message does it send? Don't participate in the world's dumbest money laundering scheme. He'd have done better to have gotten advice from a dictionary or a crackhead selling magazines.
Well, I've never heard of a court ordering someone to provide evidence that they're not guilty, but it's unbelievable to me that there are state secrets that can be trusted to AT&T that can't be trusted to a federal judge. Surely they could have a closed trial before one of the FISA Court judges? Oh wait, I forgot... the whole reason they're under investigation is that the FISA court judges' security clearances weren't good enough to let them oversee this perfectly legal but so supersecret we can't tell the judges about it program. Clearly the FISA judges aren't vetted well enough for us to be absolutely sure they're not working for al Qaeda.
No, Jefferson was just as good as misquoting Franklin as any idiot on Slashdot today, thank you very much. I believe it was George Washington who said "a penny saved is a penny you can spend later."
"Later into the evening" then?
Of course, I'll use the phrase "8 o'clock at night" to refer to 8PM even in the summer when it's before dusk, but that could be just me or a regional usage.
...except that the page you links to actually mentions that a state legislature did try to redefine pi for religious reasons, unsuccessfully, in 1897. The specific email claiming Alabama was doing it in 1998 was a hoax.
I'm sure Google will consider moving there real soon. What with the huge local pool of tech savvy Amish they could hire, Lancaster would make a great location for any tech company.
I'm seeing ads right after the first paragraph in the blog story. You must be blocking them.
I'm not sure if 2 of the 3 ads are for brain injury and brain tumor treatment because the name of his blog is "Brain handles" or because you'd need to have a brain injury to do the "research" he's doing.
mrbluze points us to an AP writeup on the upcoming Pi Day -- 3-14
Ok, which retarded state legislature is trying to redefine Pi as -11 now? Is there new Biblical evidence that those people who claim that Pi is exactly 3 were off by 14?
If the device wasn't timezone/DST aware at all, you've have a point. However, the thing does account for DST, it's just completely wrong in how it does it now. I think you'd be pissed if you had to set your watch an hour ahead yesterday and then in 3 weeks you had to remember to set it back an hour because it set itself ahead another hour for you.
Umm, wouldn't a "morning person" prefer to have light in the morning instead of later into the night? Clearly you're an idiot.
Is unemployment so rampant in Saskatchewan that if I move there I won't have to get up at a set time anymore to go to work?
That's because you don't need a license to listen to the music at home; there's nothing like a EULA to include with the CD itself. You do need a license to distribute copies of music, and the record companies have licensing deals with legitimate distributors. AllOfMP3 doesn't have such a license, and it would take someone with a lot more knowledge of Russian law than I have to tell you if what they're doing is legal or simply illegal and not enforced. Russia's not exactly known for effectively and consistently enforcing its laws these days
Leveling the playing field was proven invalid by the collapse of a system in Russia that made no attempt to do any such thing, just because the system was put in place by people calling themselves "Communist"? Right.
If I form a government under what I call "The Mathematics Party" and it fails horribly, does that prove that math is fundamentally flawed?
I imagine the number of people in the world who don't hold some sort of irrational belief based on no evidence whatsoever is so incredibly small that we may as well call it 0. I like to think that my own superstitions or irrational behaviors are slightly less crazy than believing that there are extraterrestrials flying around in Earth's atmosphere all the time who only ever make contact with random nutjobs out in the boonies and the whole thing is covered up by a really good conspiracy, or that there's some invisible man in the sky with infinite power controlling everything, but I'd say that when Aristotle claimed that man is a rational animal he was pretty much completely wrong.
You should get a tin foil hat if you're seriously worried about the police going through the records of everything you've ever done without any probable cause because someone you used to be friends with committed a crime that you obviously weren't involved in. Being able to identify pictures you took with this camera is entirely irrelevant to that kind of paranoia; who's to say the police won't just come to your house and take all of your photo albums and negatives along with getting all of your credit card records, etc., because they heard from someone that you used to be friends with some random criminal years ago?
Of course they left out that clause. Why would a government want to put the burden of proof on itself to show that the person doing the filming knew the people doing the assaulting, when it would be much easier to write the law as it is and just prosecute the people you "know" are related but can't prove it? Of course, one would hope that the filmer who just happened to be in the right place at the right time would be able to make a reasonable argument that he wasn't involved in the assault and thus not get prosecuted. I imagine turning over the recording as evidence to the police, who you called to report the assault you were taping instead of posting it on youtube would probably make for a pretty good reasonable argument.
If "we" want better elected officials, wouldn't it be great if every 2 or 6 years we had a chance to change them?
The problem is that "we" apparently want more of the same.
No, you shouldn't take them as false. You may or may not choose to give his opinions on one subject weight based on his opinions on another subject. The world isn't black and white, and I see no one here attempting to construct a logical proof. You might not be on drugs, but you've probably taken an overdose of math.
Is there any reason to think that if something is unethical when one human does it to another, it's not unethical for the first person to build a robot to do that unethical thing? If not, is there any point whatsoever to having ethical rules that apply only to robots?
The reply link moved to the floating thing in the sidebar or top of the screen.
Since at least the copyright act of 1909, but possibly earlier.
Of course it's true. If I tell you that 3*3= 8, I have no credibility in regards to mathematics. It would be a logical fallacy to then assert that if I say "9*9=81" I'm incorrect because I believed that 3*3=8, but not to assert that I'm not credible.
I do not assert that anything else GP stated is false, merely that no one should take him seriously even if he says true things.
You couldn't possibly be more wrong. Enlighten yourself
If Greece and Turkey declare war on each other, would they then have to declare war on themselves too, since they're "allies"?
It's obvious. Before this act, terrorists could kill all of the US Attorneys and Senators, and when they were caught we'd just have to set them free because there'd be no one authorized to prosecute them. Now when they manage to wipe out most of our legislative and prosecutorial infrastructure, we'll still be able to hold them accountable, since we obviously won't have much more important problems to deal with in such a situation than finally starting to have trials for enemy combatants instead of turning them over to the military.