The concept of currencies outside of government control tends to make governments nervous.
Yes, because the advocates of those currencies are loudly crowing that the entire point is to enable criminal acts. That it's a perfect money laundering service and that this is a great thing.
But if a government responded rationally to this widely advertised lawbreaking by shutting down the people who launder money and the mechanism they're using to do it, that would somehow be immoral, and anyway they wouldn't do it. Because, um. Government bad, government inefficient, Bitcoin rules, FBI drools?
I'm shocked, shocked that Bitcoin exchanges might conceivably be running into money problems related to fund and transfer freezes from ongoing international drug investigations. That's simply not possible, because Bitcoin!
Saying that Bitcoin is only good for criminal purposes is like saying bittorrent is only good for stealing copies of movies. Any technology can be used for illegal purposes. Bitcoin put money outside of government control. Bittorrent allowed the individual more control over what files they choose or choose not to share, rather than the Napster model which openned up your eintire hard drive for browsing and downloading. Steam uses the bittorrent protocol. So do other MMOGs when they want to put updates to their gams out. The tools themselves are not inherently criminal, and Bitcoin is merely a tool.
I'm sorry, I love a good conspiracy theory as much as the next guy, but blaming the gov for this is just tin foil men on too much Jolt soda.
What are we looking at, a whopping half a million stolen in Flexcoin and what, 700k stolen in MtGox?
If a loss of less then 2 mil, or actually, whatever the total amount of bitcoins available is a threat to any government, that government is even flimsier than bitcoin is showing to be. Sorry . . ..
I'm not categorically saying 'the government' wiped out these exchanges. I've been saying all along that the governments have the most to gain by the failures of private currencies. Remember a couple months ago when governments were demading that the exchanges bow down to banking regulations and the exchanges told them to go fuck themselves?
Other than making it harder to spy on transactions, how does bitcoin threaten government?
It doesn't threaten governments, it threatens the government monopoly on money.
Fiat money means precisely that: all debts are legally satisfiable in dollars. Bitcoin becoming popular cannot change that basic fact. If you sell me a widget on the promise that I pay in bitcoins, I fail to do so, and you sue me: guess which currency the court is likely going to force me to pay you in. (Disregarding any penalty for me being a dick).
Bitcoin offered an alternative to state-backed currencies. Whether the premise was right, wrong, or indifferent, it offered an alternative. A reasonably untraceable alternative.
Contrary to the liberatard delusion, government doesn't have a monopoly on currency.
Bearer bonds have been around for years and are in effect private currency.
Corporate script as also been around and is also explicitly private money.
Private industry has been hiring convicted felon Mitnick for years.
Your tirade shows nothing but ignorance.
Um, no. Bearer bonds aren't fiat currencies, they're financial instruments guaranteeing a stake in something, a company, a government economy, whatever. Point is, they are legitimised and regulated as part of the system. Bitcoin went outside the system.
Keep in mind that private currencies undermine government monopolies.
As I said, small potatoes. The magnitude of bitcoin isn't enough to really concern most governments, and certainly not the ones with the resources to do what you suggest.
Bitcoin itself is immaterial. The concept of currencies outside of government control tends to make governments nervous. Remember when they took down Silk Road? Government spokespeople went on and on and on about how Bitcoin was being used to launder drug money and was a Bad Thing because there was no government oversight on it. Silk Road was what, maybe 1% of all Bitcoin traffic? But I digress...
Could it be a case of criminals in a government being behind this?
Sure. Could it be alien space monkeys trying to destabilize our currencies and use us for slaves to harvest tasty bananas? Sure, I guess
There's about as much evidence for either of those, which means there's zero evidence at all.
I generally tend to fall a little on the tinfoil-hat end of the spectrum -- but in the absence of evidence, I fall back to "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
You're well into just claiming it could be a conspiracy, but I just don't see the need. It could be if you want to be paranoid enough. But there's nothing real to suggest it's true, which makes it just pure imagination for the moment.
Again, look at the forest here. Who benefits the most if private nongovernmental currencies come undone? Governments and corporations. Occam's Razor says, even if there was no governmental or corporate involvement in the heist, they won't bend over backwards to help the victims recover their losses, and just may be quietly cheering on the 'thieves' from the sidelines. It looks win/win for them to me.
Fiat money works only as long as there remains confidence in the issuing agency. If you don't trust the government to back up its currency, its currency is so much paper, and it doesn't even make good asswipe. Want to get rid of a competing currency? Undermine confidence in it, it'll go away. We're seeing that with Bitcoin. Whether it's by 'criminal activity' or government design is immaterial; confidence in Bitcoin is gone.
BitCoin is a fiat currency by definition.
I never said it wasn't. I DID say there isn't a hard currency on the planet that I can find. So is the US dollar, the Euro, the yen, the...
I could go on and on and on, but you get my point.
Dependable banks pretty much require somebody large enough backing them. That is generally governments who can print money.
That seems to be the problem all around. Read a Federal Reserve note sometime. There is nothing backing it but the government's promises. There isn't a hard currency on the entire planet at the moment. The difference between Bitcoin and a government currency is, Bitcoin didn't have a government 'guaranteeing' the cash.
Fiat money works only as long as there remains confidence in the issuing agency. If you don't trust the government to back up its currency, its currency is so much paper, and it doesn't even make good asswipe. Want to get rid of a competing currency? Undermine confidence in it, it'll go away. We're seeing that with Bitcoin. Whether it's by 'criminal activity' or government design is immaterial; confidence in Bitcoin is gone.
Why is anyone assuming this is being done by 'criminals'?
Because currently Bitcoin is small potatoes, and the exchanges are so far doing some of the work for them, and because if there's money to be had criminals will go after it.
Keep in mind that private currencies undermine government monopolies. Governments back 99.999% of the currencies out there. Bitcoin had no such backstop, was getting popular, and was considered a 'threat' because it had no government behind it. I've read quite a few anti-Bitcoin raves by government spokespeople, mostly decrying it because it's outside of their system and thus not subject to taxes.
Is it possible this is some grand conspiracy? Sure it is. Is it more likely that the people running these things have failed at security and actually been ripped off? Sure. Is it also possible that the exchanges are really just scams and these were inside jobs? Sure.
I just don't see the need to assume governments undermining the credibility of these -- it seems to be happening just fine without the need for government help on that front.
I'm reminded of the old bumper sticker that said "Don't steal. The government hates competition". Governments hiring hackers after they've been convicted of cybercrimes is common. Could it be a case of criminals in a government being behind this? Likely, governments have the most to gain if private currencies fall.
Reform of the individual is an important part of why we put people in prison.
Nobody believes that any more.
Not even the corrections departments make any effort to reform, because 100 years of trying has taught them
that it doesn't work.
Actually, reform has been tried on and off for decades. It's never been consistently applied, though. Somebody gets a reform program pushed through, it runs for a year or so, then the funding is cut and so is the program, and things go back to the way they were.
I don't presume to know how close you've ever been to full-on drug addiction,
but in my own admittedly small sampling,
many an addict's confinement is the only time in their adult lives they're not using. A great friend passed last year at the ripe old age of 48, but his life was probably extended a decade by frequent periods of abstinence as a guest of the County and State.
Problem with simple confinement is, it doesn't fix the problems, just delays the next dose. And don't think for a minute that jails and prisons are drug-free. They're not. Drugs are available, just at insanely high prices due to scarcity.
Speaking as a recovering addict, you need to fix the cause, not the symptoms. Incarceration does neither, and tags the 'offender' with a felony rap, making it that much harder for them to reintegrate to society by blocking employment opportunities when they get back to the streets. End results? The 'offender' ends up back in jail.
Well, theoretically, but the EPA is in the process of instituting new regulations under the Clean Air Act. Congress has held hearings on those regulations and the EPA promised to send them the studies upon which the regulations are based over two years ago, but have so far failed to do so.
Once this law is passed, if it is passed, it will be much harder to justify opposing similar laws for other regulatory agencies. One thing to point out is that passing such a law for an agency that has been open and forthright about the science behind its regulations is probably a bad idea. However, the EPA has demonstrated an unwillingness to release the data behind at least some of their regulations, making this law necessary.
The committee wants all the data, including medical data that the EPA is required by federal law to withhold. And the committee knows that data cannot be released. It's grandstanding to position itself to neuter the EPA.
What surprises me about this story is that I thought all that data had to be disclosed already. How stupid is it that we have regulations based on data that's isn't made available for independent verification?
They have been asking that the private medical data of everyone whose medical records were used during the evaluation of soot and particulate rules for the Clean Air Act be made public. The authors of those studies don't have the authority to release that data, neither does the EPA. Though I'm certain the GOP would love to berate the EPA publicly for betraying patient confidentiality if they did disclose that information
The proposed law does not say WHO reproduces it, merely that someone MUST be able to reproduce the results. If the EPA can point to another, independent, study which reproduces the results of the first study, it meets those qualifications.
Indeed, most studies that can be reproduced can be reproduced from the published papers. It's just hard work and expensive, which is why it's rarely done. Demanding reproducibility is fine, but demanding actual reproduction (as proof of reproducibility) would kill most science-based initiatives cold. Note, in particular, another law proposed by Lamar Smith that would allow NSF funding only for research that is "not duplicative of other research projects being funded by the Foundation or other Federal science agencies". Take the two together, and you have a requirement for reproduction, but deny funding to do the reproduction. Ooops - how convenient.
Since the NSF would be precluded from redoing the research, it would fall to private companies to do it. How very convenient indeed. You, sir, have just found the gator in the swamp. My hat is off to you.
...except afterwards it was published widely while it was being approved by the states.
Similar to the way that negotiated treaties are when presented to the Senate for confirmation then.
Then there's the Patriot Act that people voted on without even reading...
I'm not a fan of the "pass it before reading" method that has become so popular. On the other hand the Patriot Act has now been available for years and it keeps being reauthorized. People have obviously had a chance to read it before reauthorization.
Except if you're a Republican, it's a knee-jerk reaction to reauthorise it, and if you're a Democrat, your Republican opponents in the next election will use your vote to get you out of office because you are 'soft on terrorism'.
No, they are not the same people. No more than the Democrats are composed of nothing but crystal-rubbing New Agers.
The Tealiban minority in the GOP keeps getting further and further out there, and regularly blackmails more mainstream GOP candidates, telling them that they'll 'get primaried' unless they toe the Tealiban party line. Considering the Tealiban is backed financially by the richest portion of the 1%, it's a valid threat. Senator Robert Bennett, of Utah, was considered to be the most conservative sitting senator. In 2010, he got 'primaried' by Mike Lee when he actually cooperated with Democrats on some legislation before the Senate in 2010 and refused to denounce Obama as a 'socialist'. Bennett got endorsements from Hatch, Garn, hell, even ROMNEY, while Lee got endorsements from the Tealiban darlings. Lee won.
So, you are saying that he is lying and the EPA GAVE that information to Congress? Can you provide me with a link supporting that?
No, we're saying Smith's handlers wrote this legislation and gave it to him to introduce, as is common these days: The industry to be 'regulated' writes the legislation in their favor and gets it voted in. Knowing who Smith's handlers are, and knowing said handlers' track record, I can be reasonably confident that this legislation is not in our favor and will benefit his handlers. What's the point of buying Congressmen if you can't get your special perks embedded in federal law?
Finally, was it when a then-Governor of MA put resumes of highly-accomplished women for his consideration for high-level positions in his administration in (gasp!) binders?
Funny you should mention that. Said former governor got ALEC-provided model legislation recommended by the Heritage Foundation put into law in his state and the Republicans cheered it as a major event.
Fast forward a few years when a Democratic president signs into law a modified clone of that same very legislation as a compromise, modified to cut down on some of the abuses of the 'insurance industry' like arbitrarily terminating somebody's health insurance the instant they're diagnosed with cancer, unless they have the special added cancer rider on their plan, because paying benefits will cost them money, profits, and bonuses. Now, all of a sudden, this legislation is the most evil thing since Hitler, and this president is a tyrant.
And yes, Obamacare was the Republican-demanded compromise, as the Democrats really wanted to go single-payer like the rest of the civilised world uses.
"because we all know that all Republicans are anti-science, bloodletting phrenologists" In fact, yes, we do know that.:D
"Obama and the Democrates[sp] are all open and transparent and honest!" Of course that's not true. We know that too.
It should be blindingly obvious to anyone with half a brain that this is just a blatant attempt to get out of EPA regs. Worse, it's a blatant attempt to get out of EPA regs barely a month after the West Virginia debacle that should show everyone just how important EPA regs are. Also, yes, Republicans are quite anti science. If they don't want the label, maybe they should be shoving creationism.
No, the Tealiban is not antiscience. They totally adore weapons technologies and anything that will help them create more and more wealth for their backers. They just hate science that says what they wanna do isn't safe because it costs their backers money that could be spent elsewhere, like on elevators for their cars in their mansions, or flying in fresh food from somewhere else cause the local food is inedible.
The already exists a legal definition of "publicly available". In addition, this law would apply to the EPA, not to the labs which produced the results. That is, it is the EPA which this law requires to make this information publicly available. This bill was created in reaction to the EPA's failure to provide the scientific information upon which it based its revision to Clean Air Act regulations to Congress.
Feel free to suggest an alternative wording that is more to your liking.
More like an attempt to flush the clean air regs down the shitter. 'You totally ignored the study sponsored bought and paid for by the Very Big Corporation, therefore your regulations do not meet federal law and shall not be enacted or enforced. Thank you for playing, get your gas mask at the door.'
Did you read the linked bill? Can you point out the language that institutes something other than good science?
You might want to read this link to understand where this bill comes from:http://junkscience.com/2013/08/01/statement-of-chairman-lamar-smith-r-texas-business-meeting-to-consider-epa-subpoena-over-secret-science/
Smith was bitching that the EPA didn't show their math therefore all the Clean Air regs need to go. After all, if there's no proof that factories cause pollution, why spend all that money cleaning up that smokestack's exhaust? So, til you can prove it hurts people, why regulate it?
Oh, this bill was sponsored by Republican candidates, so it must be bad, because we all know that all Republicans are anti-science, bloodletting phrenologists. And, of course, Obama and the Democrates are all open and transparent and honest! Obama's EPA would never do anything that wasn't scientifically reproducible and valid, even if they won't show us how they did it!
It's sponsored by Tea Party whackjobs, financed and written by climate change deniers. That makes it automatically suspect, since a big thing with the Tea Party's backers is, 'Get rid of the EPA, it unduly restricts trade and our profits'. Follow the money, it goes right back to ALEC and Co, the Kochs, and everybody who wants to make sure their profits aren't cut by 'needless government interference'. Then take a good look at West Virginia's ongoing crisis about their water supply. The Kochs don't live in West Virginia, so they could care less what happens to the water there.
While I have a well earned disdain for lawyers, I see nothing wrong with having 4 lawyers and a judge entangled in a meaningless duel until they all die.
From the specifics of this story, I do want the defense attorneys to win the vast majority of similar cases, but anything that keeps more of the feral lawyer population away from defenseless civilians is a good thing in my mind. My apologies to those who will be caught up as defendants in this nonsense, but remember that your suffering in the company of these creatures is time that they won't be threatening others with their cancerous philosophy.
Oh, sure, it's quite comfy under this bus. Come join us.
Slashdot Mirror
The concept of currencies outside of government control tends to make governments nervous.
Yes, because the advocates of those currencies are loudly crowing that the entire point is to enable criminal acts. That it's a perfect money laundering service and that this is a great thing.
But if a government responded rationally to this widely advertised lawbreaking by shutting down the people who launder money and the mechanism they're using to do it, that would somehow be immoral, and anyway they wouldn't do it. Because, um. Government bad, government inefficient, Bitcoin rules, FBI drools?
I'm shocked, shocked that Bitcoin exchanges might conceivably be running into money problems related to fund and transfer freezes from ongoing international drug investigations. That's simply not possible, because Bitcoin!
Saying that Bitcoin is only good for criminal purposes is like saying bittorrent is only good for stealing copies of movies. Any technology can be used for illegal purposes. Bitcoin put money outside of government control. Bittorrent allowed the individual more control over what files they choose or choose not to share, rather than the Napster model which openned up your eintire hard drive for browsing and downloading. Steam uses the bittorrent protocol. So do other MMOGs when they want to put updates to their gams out. The tools themselves are not inherently criminal, and Bitcoin is merely a tool.
I'm sorry, I love a good conspiracy theory as much as the next guy, but blaming the gov for this is just tin foil men on too much Jolt soda. What are we looking at, a whopping half a million stolen in Flexcoin and what, 700k stolen in MtGox? If a loss of less then 2 mil, or actually, whatever the total amount of bitcoins available is a threat to any government, that government is even flimsier than bitcoin is showing to be. Sorry . . . .
I'm not categorically saying 'the government' wiped out these exchanges. I've been saying all along that the governments have the most to gain by the failures of private currencies. Remember a couple months ago when governments were demading that the exchanges bow down to banking regulations and the exchanges told them to go fuck themselves?
Other than making it harder to spy on transactions, how does bitcoin threaten government?
It doesn't threaten governments, it threatens the government monopoly on money.
Fiat money means precisely that: all debts are legally satisfiable in dollars. Bitcoin becoming popular cannot change that basic fact. If you sell me a widget on the promise that I pay in bitcoins, I fail to do so, and you sue me: guess which currency the court is likely going to force me to pay you in. (Disregarding any penalty for me being a dick).
Bitcoin offered an alternative to state-backed currencies. Whether the premise was right, wrong, or indifferent, it offered an alternative. A reasonably untraceable alternative.
Contrary to the liberatard delusion, government doesn't have a monopoly on currency.
Bearer bonds have been around for years and are in effect private currency.
Corporate script as also been around and is also explicitly private money.
Private industry has been hiring convicted felon Mitnick for years.
Your tirade shows nothing but ignorance.
Um, no. Bearer bonds aren't fiat currencies, they're financial instruments guaranteeing a stake in something, a company, a government economy, whatever. Point is, they are legitimised and regulated as part of the system. Bitcoin went outside the system.
As I said, small potatoes. The magnitude of bitcoin isn't enough to really concern most governments, and certainly not the ones with the resources to do what you suggest.
Bitcoin itself is immaterial. The concept of currencies outside of government control tends to make governments nervous. Remember when they took down Silk Road? Government spokespeople went on and on and on about how Bitcoin was being used to launder drug money and was a Bad Thing because there was no government oversight on it. Silk Road was what, maybe 1% of all Bitcoin traffic? But I digress...
Could it be a case of criminals in a government being behind this?
Sure. Could it be alien space monkeys trying to destabilize our currencies and use us for slaves to harvest tasty bananas? Sure, I guess
There's about as much evidence for either of those, which means there's zero evidence at all.
I generally tend to fall a little on the tinfoil-hat end of the spectrum -- but in the absence of evidence, I fall back to "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
You're well into just claiming it could be a conspiracy, but I just don't see the need. It could be if you want to be paranoid enough. But there's nothing real to suggest it's true, which makes it just pure imagination for the moment.
Again, look at the forest here. Who benefits the most if private nongovernmental currencies come undone? Governments and corporations. Occam's Razor says, even if there was no governmental or corporate involvement in the heist, they won't bend over backwards to help the victims recover their losses, and just may be quietly cheering on the 'thieves' from the sidelines. It looks win/win for them to me.
Fiat money works only as long as there remains confidence in the issuing agency. If you don't trust the government to back up its currency, its currency is so much paper, and it doesn't even make good asswipe. Want to get rid of a competing currency? Undermine confidence in it, it'll go away. We're seeing that with Bitcoin. Whether it's by 'criminal activity' or government design is immaterial; confidence in Bitcoin is gone.
BitCoin is a fiat currency by definition.
I never said it wasn't. I DID say there isn't a hard currency on the planet that I can find. So is the US dollar, the Euro, the yen, the...
I could go on and on and on, but you get my point.
Dependable banks pretty much require somebody large enough backing them. That is generally governments who can print money.
That seems to be the problem all around. Read a Federal Reserve note sometime. There is nothing backing it but the government's promises. There isn't a hard currency on the entire planet at the moment. The difference between Bitcoin and a government currency is, Bitcoin didn't have a government 'guaranteeing' the cash.
Fiat money works only as long as there remains confidence in the issuing agency. If you don't trust the government to back up its currency, its currency is so much paper, and it doesn't even make good asswipe. Want to get rid of a competing currency? Undermine confidence in it, it'll go away. We're seeing that with Bitcoin. Whether it's by 'criminal activity' or government design is immaterial; confidence in Bitcoin is gone.
Because currently Bitcoin is small potatoes, and the exchanges are so far doing some of the work for them, and because if there's money to be had criminals will go after it.
Keep in mind that private currencies undermine government monopolies. Governments back 99.999% of the currencies out there. Bitcoin had no such backstop, was getting popular, and was considered a 'threat' because it had no government behind it. I've read quite a few anti-Bitcoin raves by government spokespeople, mostly decrying it because it's outside of their system and thus not subject to taxes.
Is it possible this is some grand conspiracy? Sure it is. Is it more likely that the people running these things have failed at security and actually been ripped off? Sure. Is it also possible that the exchanges are really just scams and these were inside jobs? Sure.
I just don't see the need to assume governments undermining the credibility of these -- it seems to be happening just fine without the need for government help on that front.
I'm reminded of the old bumper sticker that said "Don't steal. The government hates competition". Governments hiring hackers after they've been convicted of cybercrimes is common. Could it be a case of criminals in a government being behind this? Likely, governments have the most to gain if private currencies fall.
Reform of the individual is an important part of why we put people in prison.
Nobody believes that any more. Not even the corrections departments make any effort to reform, because 100 years of trying has taught them that it doesn't work.
Actually, reform has been tried on and off for decades. It's never been consistently applied, though. Somebody gets a reform program pushed through, it runs for a year or so, then the funding is cut and so is the program, and things go back to the way they were.
I don't presume to know how close you've ever been to full-on drug addiction,
but in my own admittedly small sampling,
many an addict's confinement is the only time in their adult lives they're not using. A great friend passed last year at the ripe old age of 48, but his life was probably extended a decade by frequent periods of abstinence as a guest of the County and State.
Problem with simple confinement is, it doesn't fix the problems, just delays the next dose. And don't think for a minute that jails and prisons are drug-free. They're not. Drugs are available, just at insanely high prices due to scarcity.
Speaking as a recovering addict, you need to fix the cause, not the symptoms. Incarceration does neither, and tags the 'offender' with a felony rap, making it that much harder for them to reintegrate to society by blocking employment opportunities when they get back to the streets. End results? The 'offender' ends up back in jail.
Well, theoretically, but the EPA is in the process of instituting new regulations under the Clean Air Act. Congress has held hearings on those regulations and the EPA promised to send them the studies upon which the regulations are based over two years ago, but have so far failed to do so. Once this law is passed, if it is passed, it will be much harder to justify opposing similar laws for other regulatory agencies. One thing to point out is that passing such a law for an agency that has been open and forthright about the science behind its regulations is probably a bad idea. However, the EPA has demonstrated an unwillingness to release the data behind at least some of their regulations, making this law necessary.
The committee wants all the data, including medical data that the EPA is required by federal law to withhold. And the committee knows that data cannot be released. It's grandstanding to position itself to neuter the EPA.
What surprises me about this story is that I thought all that data had to be disclosed already. How stupid is it that we have regulations based on data that's isn't made available for independent verification?
They have been asking that the private medical data of everyone whose medical records were used during the evaluation of soot and particulate rules for the Clean Air Act be made public. The authors of those studies don't have the authority to release that data, neither does the EPA. Though I'm certain the GOP would love to berate the EPA publicly for betraying patient confidentiality if they did disclose that information
http://www.epw.senate.gov/publ...
Catch-22. Reveal the data and you break the law. Don't reveal the data and the needed regulation won't happen.
The proposed law does not say WHO reproduces it, merely that someone MUST be able to reproduce the results. If the EPA can point to another, independent, study which reproduces the results of the first study, it meets those qualifications.
Indeed, most studies that can be reproduced can be reproduced from the published papers. It's just hard work and expensive, which is why it's rarely done. Demanding reproducibility is fine, but demanding actual reproduction (as proof of reproducibility) would kill most science-based initiatives cold. Note, in particular, another law proposed by Lamar Smith that would allow NSF funding only for research that is "not duplicative of other research projects being funded by the Foundation or other Federal science agencies". Take the two together, and you have a requirement for reproduction, but deny funding to do the reproduction. Ooops - how convenient.
Since the NSF would be precluded from redoing the research, it would fall to private companies to do it. How very convenient indeed. You, sir, have just found the gator in the swamp. My hat is off to you.
...except afterwards it was published widely while it was being approved by the states.
Similar to the way that negotiated treaties are when presented to the Senate for confirmation then.
Then there's the Patriot Act that people voted on without even reading...
I'm not a fan of the "pass it before reading" method that has become so popular. On the other hand the Patriot Act has now been available for years and it keeps being reauthorized. People have obviously had a chance to read it before reauthorization.
Except if you're a Republican, it's a knee-jerk reaction to reauthorise it, and if you're a Democrat, your Republican opponents in the next election will use your vote to get you out of office because you are 'soft on terrorism'.
No, they are not the same people. No more than the Democrats are composed of nothing but crystal-rubbing New Agers.
The Tealiban minority in the GOP keeps getting further and further out there, and regularly blackmails more mainstream GOP candidates, telling them that they'll 'get primaried' unless they toe the Tealiban party line. Considering the Tealiban is backed financially by the richest portion of the 1%, it's a valid threat. Senator Robert Bennett, of Utah, was considered to be the most conservative sitting senator. In 2010, he got 'primaried' by Mike Lee when he actually cooperated with Democrats on some legislation before the Senate in 2010 and refused to denounce Obama as a 'socialist'. Bennett got endorsements from Hatch, Garn, hell, even ROMNEY, while Lee got endorsements from the Tealiban darlings. Lee won.
So, you are saying that he is lying and the EPA GAVE that information to Congress? Can you provide me with a link supporting that?
No, we're saying Smith's handlers wrote this legislation and gave it to him to introduce, as is common these days: The industry to be 'regulated' writes the legislation in their favor and gets it voted in. Knowing who Smith's handlers are, and knowing said handlers' track record, I can be reasonably confident that this legislation is not in our favor and will benefit his handlers. What's the point of buying Congressmen if you can't get your special perks embedded in federal law?
Finally, was it when a then-Governor of MA put resumes of highly-accomplished women for his consideration for high-level positions in his administration in (gasp!) binders?
Funny you should mention that. Said former governor got ALEC-provided model legislation recommended by the Heritage Foundation put into law in his state and the Republicans cheered it as a major event.
Fast forward a few years when a Democratic president signs into law a modified clone of that same very legislation as a compromise, modified to cut down on some of the abuses of the 'insurance industry' like arbitrarily terminating somebody's health insurance the instant they're diagnosed with cancer, unless they have the special added cancer rider on their plan, because paying benefits will cost them money, profits, and bonuses. Now, all of a sudden, this legislation is the most evil thing since Hitler, and this president is a tyrant.
And yes, Obamacare was the Republican-demanded compromise, as the Democrats really wanted to go single-payer like the rest of the civilised world uses.
Nobody's claiming the opposition are saints. They're not, not by a long shot. But they are a proven lesser evil.
Back in the day it was dinner and a movie.
DAMN you, cable tv!!
"because we all know that all Republicans are anti-science, bloodletting phrenologists" In fact, yes, we do know that. :D
"Obama and the Democrates[sp] are all open and transparent and honest!" Of course that's not true. We know that too.
It should be blindingly obvious to anyone with half a brain that this is just a blatant attempt to get out of EPA regs. Worse, it's a blatant attempt to get out of EPA regs barely a month after the West Virginia debacle that should show everyone just how important EPA regs are. Also, yes, Republicans are quite anti science. If they don't want the label, maybe they should be shoving creationism.
No, the Tealiban is not antiscience. They totally adore weapons technologies and anything that will help them create more and more wealth for their backers. They just hate science that says what they wanna do isn't safe because it costs their backers money that could be spent elsewhere, like on elevators for their cars in their mansions, or flying in fresh food from somewhere else cause the local food is inedible.
The already exists a legal definition of "publicly available". In addition, this law would apply to the EPA, not to the labs which produced the results. That is, it is the EPA which this law requires to make this information publicly available. This bill was created in reaction to the EPA's failure to provide the scientific information upon which it based its revision to Clean Air Act regulations to Congress.
Feel free to suggest an alternative wording that is more to your liking.
More like an attempt to flush the clean air regs down the shitter. 'You totally ignored the study sponsored bought and paid for by the Very Big Corporation, therefore your regulations do not meet federal law and shall not be enacted or enforced. Thank you for playing, get your gas mask at the door.'
Did you read the linked bill? Can you point out the language that institutes something other than good science? You might want to read this link to understand where this bill comes from:http://junkscience.com/2013/08/01/statement-of-chairman-lamar-smith-r-texas-business-meeting-to-consider-epa-subpoena-over-secret-science/
Smith was bitching that the EPA didn't show their math therefore all the Clean Air regs need to go. After all, if there's no proof that factories cause pollution, why spend all that money cleaning up that smokestack's exhaust? So, til you can prove it hurts people, why regulate it?
Oh, this bill was sponsored by Republican candidates, so it must be bad, because we all know that all Republicans are anti-science, bloodletting phrenologists. And, of course, Obama and the Democrates are all open and transparent and honest! Obama's EPA would never do anything that wasn't scientifically reproducible and valid, even if they won't show us how they did it!
It's sponsored by Tea Party whackjobs, financed and written by climate change deniers. That makes it automatically suspect, since a big thing with the Tea Party's backers is, 'Get rid of the EPA, it unduly restricts trade and our profits'. Follow the money, it goes right back to ALEC and Co, the Kochs, and everybody who wants to make sure their profits aren't cut by 'needless government interference'. Then take a good look at West Virginia's ongoing crisis about their water supply. The Kochs don't live in West Virginia, so they could care less what happens to the water there.
We've already been sold -- now they're just negotiating the price.
Guess we better lay back & enjoy it then, eh?
While I have a well earned disdain for lawyers, I see nothing wrong with having 4 lawyers and a judge entangled in a meaningless duel until they all die.
From the specifics of this story, I do want the defense attorneys to win the vast majority of similar cases, but anything that keeps more of the feral lawyer population away from defenseless civilians is a good thing in my mind. My apologies to those who will be caught up as defendants in this nonsense, but remember that your suffering in the company of these creatures is time that they won't be threatening others with their cancerous philosophy.
Oh, sure, it's quite comfy under this bus. Come join us.