The power companies make a huge profit off of those solar users’ surplus power compared with what they would be paying for peaker plants. They can readily afford to absorb the infrastructure cost even if the customer is consistently producing more power than they consume.
In many (most?) States the power company isn't making any profit off this energy. Deregulation (a misnomer, actually they just changed the regulations) separated the supply/generation side of the business from the transmission side of the business. In New York State the utilities were forced to sell their generation facilities back in the 90s by the Public Service Commission. Customers are in turn forced to pick an "energy supplier" from a list of dozens of companies, the theory being that competition brings down prices. Of course this hasn't panned out in reality because electricity and natural gas are commodities; the price difference between the various suppliers is statistically meaningless even for customers that purchase large amounts of energy. I laid them all out in a spreadsheet once upon a time and the difference between the highest and lowest was less than 1%.
Of course, I digress. Bottom line, in New York State and many other States the utility isn't actually seeing any profit from your sale of solar energy. It goes back into the statewide electricity market and is bid on wholesale by spectators that then sell the energy back to consumers. The utility is only allowed to charge the usual transmission fees for this energy, which is a flat per kWh fee (with demand charges for larger commercial/industrial concerns) that doesn't vary based on the source of the energy.
If you want to make net metering competitive you'll have to attack this regulatory scheme that tried to improve a natural monopoly for a commodity by introducing false competition. Even at that it won't really be net metering because there's a non-zero cost associated with synchronizing your power supply with the grid. The fairest way would be to combine net metering with an additional flat monthly fee to cover the interconnection costs.
Of course, all of this is a moot point so long as the utility isn't actually allowed to touch your power but has to sell it into a virtual market that seemingly exists just to provide some middlemen with a profit opportunity.
It's awesome that you got +5 for this when I never mentioned coal while I've already earned a flamebait mod simply for sharing my own experience and pointing out that the return on ecological investment for wind isn't nearly as favorable as more conventional sources of power. Even hydro has a better environmental ROI than wind and hydro relies on submerging entire valleys.....
Other than the short term inconvenience of a major infrastructure project going in (oh no!) your long term view of the even longer term benefits of the site seem awfully jaded given the extremely low impact (i.e. none) to your daily life.
It lasted six years dude. The effects were even more obnoxious than I listed; I remember dusting the house every bloody day because they were stirring up that much dust and dirt. They destroyed our local roads and paid nothing towards the repair of them. I moved out of that area a full year after they completed construction and the streams still weren't clear. That's what happens when you clear cut thousands of acres of forest. The out-of-towners they trucked in for the job showed no respect to the local community. The complaints ranged from the trivial (speeding, ignoring stop signs) to the obnoxious (unnecessary jake braking at 3am, sexual innuendo on their CB radios) to the criminal (assault and rapes tripled in Wyoming County during this project).
Relations with the locals deteriorated to the point that people were literally pulling guns over road closures and other matters that seem trivial when viewed in a vacuum but which were somewhat understandable if you lived through it. I moved to the area in the middle of the project and tried to play devil's advocate in favor of it; I'm usually pro-development and at the time believed in wind power. After six months of living through this hell I had grown frustrated enough to join the locals in waging an undeclared war against BP and their subcontractors. My preferred method of acting out was to fuck with the 18 wheelers that tailgated me. "Hmm, 60 in the 45 isn't fast enough for you?" [sets cruise control for 30] "Oh, you're going to pass me?" [floors it] "Yeah, how'd that work out for you? Get back there bitch. That's right." [back to 30, rinse and repeat for 15 miles]
The sad thing is I'm really not the NIMBY type; I would have been willing to tolerate the obnoxiousness if there was a net gain to society, but on balance there wasn't. 141 megawatts and for that we destroyed 9,000 acres of formerly pristine wilderness. They could have built a nuclear power plant that would have consumed a fraction of that land while producing many times the power. In reality you wouldn't have to destroy wilderness to build new nuclear plants; there are plenty of abandoned industrial sites across CONUS that would accommodate them.
Incidentally, it fails from an economics standpoint just as badly (if not more so) as it fails from an environmental one. That wind farm produced the staggering total of ten permanent jobs. A conventional power plant employs hundreds of people and doesn't require thousands of acres of wilderness. Heck, even the small businesses around here that install solar panels usually employ more than ten people.
How many tax subsidies finance into your average power plant? How much are the indirect costs (ignoring CO2 emissions, let's just focus on locally increased health care costs from coal pollution, long term storage costs for nuclear waste, military adventurism for oil, etc.)
Oil doesn't have a whole lot to do with electricity; oil is primarily consumed in the transportation sector and there's a limit to how much of it you're going to be able to replace even if electric cars become competitive (in terms of range and cost) with fossil fuel ones. I haven't yet seen a realistic plan to replace fossil fuels in the shipping sector, i.e., planes, trains, trucks, and ships. Only one of those (trains) could conceivably be electrified and powered by carbon neutral (solar, nuclear, or hydro) means. Ships could conceivably be powered by nuclear marine propulsion, though when tried in the past it was a failure from an economics standpoint, and I'm not certain how you'd go about replacing the global fleet of merchant ships.
They're most definitely both of those things. I had the misfortune of living through the construction of the Mehoopany Wind Farm. Think 24/7 heavy truck traffic, seemingly random road closures to move turbines/blades that were never communicated to the locals (it's awesome being half an hour late for work because they changed their schedule with no notice), huge amounts of deforestation (nine thousand acres worth), formerly crystal clear streams filled with silt from runoff, and dozens of blinking red lights where we formerly had clear nighttime skies. Take a look at this to get a feel for the impact of but one small segment of this wind farm. Look at the footprint for a single turbine and multiply it more than one hundred times, all for this one wind farm.
9,000 acres of real estate for a lousy 141 megawatts of electrical production that's wholly at the mercy of mother nature. Let's contrast that to nuclear power, the cutting edge of 1950s technology: Nine Mile Point occupies 10% of that footprint (900 acres), hosts a second power station on the property and between the two can generate 2,599 megawatts 24/7/365 regardless of the weather. That's more than eighteen times the electrical production for 10% of the land. Zero carbon emissions for production; a non-zero amount overall (plant construction and fuel mining each have a carbon footprint) but that's true of wind as well.
Wind power is a joke regardless of how you look at it. It's more environmentally disruptive than yesterday's technology and doesn't scale nearly as well. I'm not anti-solar; solar can be placed on otherwise wasted space (i.e., my roof) and is an awesome solution for peak power demand (nuclear doesn't work well here, it's better suited for base load)
If you're engaged in activities that would place you on the radar of a major nation-state's intelligence apparatus you shouldn't trust anyone. The only truly secure way to use encryption is to exchange keys (or better yet, one time pads) in person with those that you wish to communicate with. The web of trust/certificate authority model was never intended to provide protection in life or death scenarios, rather it was intended to protect day to day web browsing and e-commerce. By definition it requires that you trust people you've never met and will never meet. This is sufficient when the threat vector is nosy network administrators and script kiddies sniffing hotspot packets at Starbucks.
The whole discussion here is laughable; there's probably a 10 to 1 ratio of people questioning this development vs. those welcoming it. I'm guessing that not a single one of the people in the former category is interesting enough to be on NSA's radar. Many of these same people were commenting in the stories about supercookies and condemning AT&T and Verizon for that behavior. Here's your solution to such shenanigans people....
From a theoretical standpoint, encryption without trust is no more secure than plaintext transmission. However, from a practical standpoint, encryption blocks out a lot of script kiddies who sit on a wireless network with wireshark (incidentally, there is no way to verify that a WiFi SSID corresponds to a given base station, so if you're on WiFi you are almost always vulnerable to MITM attacks). The EFF, Mozilla, Cisco, and Akami are trying to raise the bar on the difficulty of the practical attacks.
It also blocks out obnoxious ISPs that want to mess with your web sessions for whatever reason (usually advertising); from my point of view this matters more to me than the script kiddie with wireshark.
I can set up a website to sell handguns to convicted felons and murderers with no paperwork.
Actually, no, you can't. Such a website would doubtless be construed as engaging in the business of selling firearms, which requires a Federal Firearms License. FFLs are mandated to you run background checks before the transfer of any firearm. Private sellers do not face this requirement but they're still forbidden to transfer a firearm to someone that they know to be a prohibited person.
Set up that website if you doubt me; I hear Club Fed is beautiful this time of the year....
A group of people does not have the same attributes as it's individuals.
You do realize that most political advocacy groups in the United States are incorporated, right? Citizens United was about one such organization that the FEC attempted to stop from releasing a video about Hillary Clinton in the run up to the 2008 Presidential Primaries. Do you seriously not see a problem when a Federal regulatory agency attempts to stop a political advocacy group from releasing materials about a candidate for the highest office in the land? Read the oral arguments for Citizens United, they're pretty interesting, particularly the part where the Solicitor General says that the legislation then in effect would empower the FEC to ban books containing political speech in the run up to an election.
Also, you don't necessarily need to interpret the 1st amendment 100% literally in order to come to the obvious conclusion that it lists no exceptions
The 2nd Amendment lists no exceptions either. Under your logic the Federal Law that precludes convicted felons, domestic abusers, dishonorably discharged service members, the involuntarily committed, and those who renounce their citizenship from possessing firearms is a violation of the right to keep and bear arms. Hell, let's go further, there's no exemption in the 2nd Amendment that covers people currently serving time, so I guess we have to equip Cell Block D with 1911s if they ask for them?
I will refer you to what I referred the other person to. "Compelling state interest" and "strict scrutiny." Google them. There's 230 years of jurisprudence (more if you count the common law we inherited from Great Britain) behind these principles. I'll take that collective wisdom over random internet ramblings any day of the week.
but they weren't clearly criminal things either (letter of the law, maybe, but it's not like he was knowingly training terrorists or killing people etc)
Umm, did you read the indictment? One of his would be clients told him that he was worried about his polygraph because he had engaged in smuggling while employed for Homeland Security. He proceeded to assist that would be client (actually an Undercover LEO) with the falsification of his testimony to the Federal Government. Mens rea was clearly evident on the part of Mr. Williams.
The differences between state and federal are irrelevant. The 1st Amendment applies to them all... To hell with your nuance Read the damn words
The words say "Congress shall make no law." You're the one choosing to interpret them literally. If you want to get into the 1st Amendment applying to the State Legislatures you're going to have to talk about case law and guess what? The case law doesn't agree with your interpretation of the 1st Amendment. You've lost this discussion on two fronts now, the literal reading of the words and the jurisprudence that has evolved around them. Why do you keep trying?
And your sig kinda gives you away.
My signature is a James Earl Jones quote from a fairly well known geek movie. There is no hidden political agenda in my signature. You're projecting; I can't decide if it's sad or amusing. Not that it really matters but I'm not affiliated with any political party. The Libertarians actually scare me to a certain extent and I would not vote for one even as a protest vote.
They make it more expensive to fight than give in.
I guess that's in the eye of the beholder. I wouldn't cop a plea to a crime I didn't commit. Would. Not. Happen. Furthermore, the Feds actually have competent public defenders, who are mandated by law to have the same salary and resources as the US Attorneys they go up against. It's a different story on the State level of course, though the States can only dream of the conviction rate that they Feds get.
Also, 3 felonies a day guarantees they'll be able to find something to get you with. Even if it's unrelated to what you did. Like Martha Stewart in prison for obstruction.
Martha Stewart did time because she was arrogant enough to think she could get away with lying to the FBI. The smarter move would have been to shut up and leave it at "I do not wish to make any statements without first consulting with my attorney." Her incident has nothing to do with three felonies a day, which is an overstatement if ever there was one (I've read through most of the Federal Code and all of the NYS Penal Law, I don't commit one felony a day, never mind three)
I disagree; the Government didn't force him to commit mail fraud and witness tampering. It may have set the stage but he's the one who walked onto it. This is no different than the local cops sending in underage person in to try and buy booze.
Cross examination won't be that interesting. The Feds have a conviction/plea-bargain rate over 90%. They don't bring cases they can't win. He's going to jail. None of his arguments about free speech will be relevant, they ceased to apply as soon as he advised someone to lie to a sworn Federal officer. That's criminal conspiracy. I would convict him based on what I've read and so would anyone else empaneled on a Federal jury.
Are you saying some statutes can take precedence over explicit written law in the constitution? That it can be interpreted in any political fashion of the times? Either it applies or it doesn't.
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech
What does that mean, exactly? Please explain to me how a law against reckless endangerment represents an abridgment on the freedom of speech. Such laws cover acts that a reasonable person should know place others in danger. If I see a police officer interacting with another person does the First Amendment allow me to shout "HE'S GOT A GUN!" or would such an action constitute reckless endangerment? Heck, if we want to talk about firearms, is it a violation of the Second Amendment to charge me with reckless endangerment if I discharge my firearm into my neighbor's apartment while trying to clean it?
See, this this is where I don't think you so-called 'libertarians' really believe in freedom
What the heck have I said that leads you to conclude I'm a libertarian?
The 1st Amendment states, "...no law..." You just can't get more absolute.
If you want to read it that literally it says "Congress shall make no law...." Guess what? Reckless endangerment laws exist at the State level, not the Federal level. Of course, constitutional case law has evolved to incorporate the 1st Amendment against State Legislatures; too bad you're not interested in learning the nuisances of constitutional case law in the United States. Do you know the difference between the Federal and State governments in my country? Did you know that the States are sovereign entities that do not derive their authority from the Federal Constitution?
and have nothing but contempt for your legal system
Frankly I don't care if you have contempt for our legal system. I'm not certain where you're from my friend but if it happens to be Canada or the EU I'm willing to bet I know more about your legal system than you've bothered to learn about ours. You don't see me acting smug and superior about it, even though there are aspects of those jurisdictions (particularly civil law countries, e.g., all of Europe outside of the British Isles, do you know the difference between civil and common law?) that I would find troubling as an American.
It's not censorship of speech; read the statutes I quoted, speech is not mentioned. If you wish to conduct further research you can start by looking up "strict scrutiny" and "compelling state interest." Based on your choice of words I'm guessing you're not an American, so your confusion regarding our system is understandable, but you should probably learn more about it before you condemn it.
Really? You "highly doubt" that the same telco's who are practically bending over backwards to track their own users and sell that shit to the NSA would be "stupid" enough for an MITM attack?
Spare me the NSA paranoia; this is all about dollars and cents. That's what it all comes down to with any for-profit corporation. Do you seriously think that a Fortune 100 company is stupid enough to mess with encrypted sessions that will contain credentials for financial accounts? HIPAA protected medical information? Communications between attorneys and their clients? Secured sessions for defense contractors and Government employees working with Top Secret data?
Take the tin-foil hat off long enough to contemplate the fact that Google is being spanked for the incidental capture of plaintext wi-fi packets. What do you suppose happens to the telco company that captures any of the data I've mentioned and subsequently loses it to black hats or a disgruntled employee? They'd be on the hook for millions of dollars worth of civil damages and whatever fines the alphabet soup of regulatory agencies decided to impose upon them. Do you seriously think they'd run that risk for the sake of some incidental ad revenue?
Moreover, the only way they could even do it would be to install trusted certificates on the phones that they sell. How long do you suppose that would fly under the radar before being discovered? Do you really think Google or Apple would go along with it? Use some common sense man....
The better Breaking Bad scene is when Mike is listening to the DEA discuss him, via the bugs he placed in their office:
He's been throwing every tail we put on him.
The guy's a pro. (Mike smiles) Yeah, well, even pros make mistakes.
One of these days, our pal Ehrmantraut's gonna slip up.
Just gotta be there when he does. (The smile leaves Mike's face and is replaced by a look of consternation)
This is one of my favorite scenes with Mike and he doesn't have a single word of dialogue. It's all facial expressions and body language. He knows that they're right; now that they're watching him it's only a matter of time before he screws up and goes to jail. That's the problem with being involved in crime. The authorities can make an unlimited number of mistakes; the criminal can't afford to make a single one.
In this instance it appears that greed got the better of Mr. Williams. If you look at his website he's not doing anything wrong; he may be peddling snake oil but he's hardly the first one and that's not a crime. Read through the indictment and a different picture emerges. He counsels his clients to lie to Government investigators (witness tampering), arranges to receive the proceeds for this venture via the mail (mail fraud) and even ignores his own good judgment. When one of the undercover agents admits to lying on his employment application Williams cuts him off and says he can't work with him, he only works with people that are being truthful but whom are nervous about the test. This is in fact what his website says.
Had he stopped there he would have been fine. Did he? Of course not! He decides to "sleep on it" and comes up with a hair brained scheme to transfer money in a supposedly untraceable manner. He then tells his would-be client to break contact and reestablish it under a different name so that he doesn't have to knowingly counsel someone to lie.
The net proceeds of this particular venture? $5,000. The man is going to lose his freedom for a lousy five grand, all because greed overrode the little voice inside his head that said something was wrong. This is a life lesson that applies to everyone, criminal and honest citizen alike.
You're asking the wrong questions. Here's a better one: Why can't we have a discussion about making https mandatory? At least for websites deployed on IPV6 where there's no address limitations resulting in a need to use virtual hosting. What compelling reason is there to transmit data in clear text?
Yes, I know that there's nothing technical that stops the telco's from doing MITM attacks, but I highly doubt they would be stupid enough to do this. Many jurisdictions have laws against such behavior and even in those that don't they be assuming an enormous civil liability if certain data (banking credentials) was captured and later compromised.
Read your Constitution, read the Federalist papers, etc... etc.. there is not even a hint at "some" speech being disallowed.
Some of the same authors of the Constitution and Federalist papers passed the Alien and Sedition Acts. Those were far more oppressive than laws against reckless endangerment (the charge you'll face for shouting fire in a crowded theater) or laws against obstructing justice.
Reckless endangerment simply says that you can't engage in conduct that carries a significant risk of causing physical injury to another person. Do you seriously take exception to such a law? What about laws against falsely reporting crimes? Can I use the First Amendment as a justification for calling 911 and telling them my neighbor assaulted me when he did no such thing?
Free speech doesn't extend so far as to protect you against reckless endangerment charges. Different hypothetical for you: I know you're deathly allergic to peanuts. We're out to eat at my favorite restaurant. You ask me if a certain entree has peanuts in it. I tell you that it does not even though I know full well that it does. You end up dying from anaphylactic shock. Does the First Amendment offer a "get out of jail free" for the criminal charges I'm likely to face?
Here's the definition of reckless endangerment in New York State:
"A person is guilty of reckless endangerment in the second degree when he recklessly engages in conduct which creates a substantial risk of serious physical injury to another person. Reckless endangerment in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor."
"A person is guilty of reckless endangerment in the first degree when, under circumstances evincing a depraved indifference to human life, he recklessly engages in conduct which creates a grave risk of death to another person. Reckless endangerment in the first degree is a class D felony."
In the worn out "Fire!" in a crowded theater analogy you're going to face at least a second degree reckless endangerment charge. In my example you'll be facing the first degree charge and possibly some other ones depending on your motive. You did it because you thought it would be funny? Reckless endangerment in the first degree. You did it because you were married to the person and wanted a cheaper out than divorce? Murder in the second degree.
No, he was arrested for telling other people to lie to the Government (witness tampering) and for charging them money for this "advice" that was delivered to him via USPS (mail fraud)
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The power companies make a huge profit off of those solar users’ surplus power compared with what they would be paying for peaker plants. They can readily afford to absorb the infrastructure cost even if the customer is consistently producing more power than they consume.
In many (most?) States the power company isn't making any profit off this energy. Deregulation (a misnomer, actually they just changed the regulations) separated the supply/generation side of the business from the transmission side of the business. In New York State the utilities were forced to sell their generation facilities back in the 90s by the Public Service Commission. Customers are in turn forced to pick an "energy supplier" from a list of dozens of companies, the theory being that competition brings down prices. Of course this hasn't panned out in reality because electricity and natural gas are commodities; the price difference between the various suppliers is statistically meaningless even for customers that purchase large amounts of energy. I laid them all out in a spreadsheet once upon a time and the difference between the highest and lowest was less than 1%.
Of course, I digress. Bottom line, in New York State and many other States the utility isn't actually seeing any profit from your sale of solar energy. It goes back into the statewide electricity market and is bid on wholesale by spectators that then sell the energy back to consumers. The utility is only allowed to charge the usual transmission fees for this energy, which is a flat per kWh fee (with demand charges for larger commercial/industrial concerns) that doesn't vary based on the source of the energy.
If you want to make net metering competitive you'll have to attack this regulatory scheme that tried to improve a natural monopoly for a commodity by introducing false competition. Even at that it won't really be net metering because there's a non-zero cost associated with synchronizing your power supply with the grid. The fairest way would be to combine net metering with an additional flat monthly fee to cover the interconnection costs.
Of course, all of this is a moot point so long as the utility isn't actually allowed to touch your power but has to sell it into a virtual market that seemingly exists just to provide some middlemen with a profit opportunity.
It's awesome that you got +5 for this when I never mentioned coal while I've already earned a flamebait mod simply for sharing my own experience and pointing out that the return on ecological investment for wind isn't nearly as favorable as more conventional sources of power. Even hydro has a better environmental ROI than wind and hydro relies on submerging entire valleys.....
Other than the short term inconvenience of a major infrastructure project going in (oh no!) your long term view of the even longer term benefits of the site seem awfully jaded given the extremely low impact (i.e. none) to your daily life.
It lasted six years dude. The effects were even more obnoxious than I listed; I remember dusting the house every bloody day because they were stirring up that much dust and dirt. They destroyed our local roads and paid nothing towards the repair of them. I moved out of that area a full year after they completed construction and the streams still weren't clear. That's what happens when you clear cut thousands of acres of forest. The out-of-towners they trucked in for the job showed no respect to the local community. The complaints ranged from the trivial (speeding, ignoring stop signs) to the obnoxious (unnecessary jake braking at 3am, sexual innuendo on their CB radios) to the criminal (assault and rapes tripled in Wyoming County during this project).
Relations with the locals deteriorated to the point that people were literally pulling guns over road closures and other matters that seem trivial when viewed in a vacuum but which were somewhat understandable if you lived through it. I moved to the area in the middle of the project and tried to play devil's advocate in favor of it; I'm usually pro-development and at the time believed in wind power. After six months of living through this hell I had grown frustrated enough to join the locals in waging an undeclared war against BP and their subcontractors. My preferred method of acting out was to fuck with the 18 wheelers that tailgated me. "Hmm, 60 in the 45 isn't fast enough for you?" [sets cruise control for 30] "Oh, you're going to pass me?" [floors it] "Yeah, how'd that work out for you? Get back there bitch. That's right." [back to 30, rinse and repeat for 15 miles]
The sad thing is I'm really not the NIMBY type; I would have been willing to tolerate the obnoxiousness if there was a net gain to society, but on balance there wasn't. 141 megawatts and for that we destroyed 9,000 acres of formerly pristine wilderness. They could have built a nuclear power plant that would have consumed a fraction of that land while producing many times the power. In reality you wouldn't have to destroy wilderness to build new nuclear plants; there are plenty of abandoned industrial sites across CONUS that would accommodate them.
Incidentally, it fails from an economics standpoint just as badly (if not more so) as it fails from an environmental one. That wind farm produced the staggering total of ten permanent jobs. A conventional power plant employs hundreds of people and doesn't require thousands of acres of wilderness. Heck, even the small businesses around here that install solar panels usually employ more than ten people.
I'll repeat: Wind power is a joke.
How many tax subsidies finance into your average power plant? How much are the indirect costs (ignoring CO2 emissions, let's just focus on locally increased health care costs from coal pollution, long term storage costs for nuclear waste, military adventurism for oil, etc.)
Oil doesn't have a whole lot to do with electricity; oil is primarily consumed in the transportation sector and there's a limit to how much of it you're going to be able to replace even if electric cars become competitive (in terms of range and cost) with fossil fuel ones. I haven't yet seen a realistic plan to replace fossil fuels in the shipping sector, i.e., planes, trains, trucks, and ships. Only one of those (trains) could conceivably be electrified and powered by carbon neutral (solar, nuclear, or hydro) means. Ships could conceivably be powered by nuclear marine propulsion, though when tried in the past it was a failure from an economics standpoint, and I'm not certain how you'd go about replacing the global fleet of merchant ships.
They call it an "eye sore" and "disruptive."
They're most definitely both of those things. I had the misfortune of living through the construction of the Mehoopany Wind Farm. Think 24/7 heavy truck traffic, seemingly random road closures to move turbines/blades that were never communicated to the locals (it's awesome being half an hour late for work because they changed their schedule with no notice), huge amounts of deforestation (nine thousand acres worth), formerly crystal clear streams filled with silt from runoff, and dozens of blinking red lights where we formerly had clear nighttime skies. Take a look at this to get a feel for the impact of but one small segment of this wind farm. Look at the footprint for a single turbine and multiply it more than one hundred times, all for this one wind farm.
9,000 acres of real estate for a lousy 141 megawatts of electrical production that's wholly at the mercy of mother nature. Let's contrast that to nuclear power, the cutting edge of 1950s technology: Nine Mile Point occupies 10% of that footprint (900 acres), hosts a second power station on the property and between the two can generate 2,599 megawatts 24/7/365 regardless of the weather. That's more than eighteen times the electrical production for 10% of the land. Zero carbon emissions for production; a non-zero amount overall (plant construction and fuel mining each have a carbon footprint) but that's true of wind as well.
Wind power is a joke regardless of how you look at it. It's more environmentally disruptive than yesterday's technology and doesn't scale nearly as well. I'm not anti-solar; solar can be placed on otherwise wasted space (i.e., my roof) and is an awesome solution for peak power demand (nuclear doesn't work well here, it's better suited for base load)
If you're engaged in activities that would place you on the radar of a major nation-state's intelligence apparatus you shouldn't trust anyone. The only truly secure way to use encryption is to exchange keys (or better yet, one time pads) in person with those that you wish to communicate with. The web of trust/certificate authority model was never intended to provide protection in life or death scenarios, rather it was intended to protect day to day web browsing and e-commerce. By definition it requires that you trust people you've never met and will never meet. This is sufficient when the threat vector is nosy network administrators and script kiddies sniffing hotspot packets at Starbucks.
The whole discussion here is laughable; there's probably a 10 to 1 ratio of people questioning this development vs. those welcoming it. I'm guessing that not a single one of the people in the former category is interesting enough to be on NSA's radar. Many of these same people were commenting in the stories about supercookies and condemning AT&T and Verizon for that behavior. Here's your solution to such shenanigans people....
From a theoretical standpoint, encryption without trust is no more secure than plaintext transmission. However, from a practical standpoint, encryption blocks out a lot of script kiddies who sit on a wireless network with wireshark (incidentally, there is no way to verify that a WiFi SSID corresponds to a given base station, so if you're on WiFi you are almost always vulnerable to MITM attacks). The EFF, Mozilla, Cisco, and Akami are trying to raise the bar on the difficulty of the practical attacks.
It also blocks out obnoxious ISPs that want to mess with your web sessions for whatever reason (usually advertising); from my point of view this matters more to me than the script kiddie with wireshark.
I can set up a website to sell handguns to convicted felons and murderers with no paperwork.
Actually, no, you can't. Such a website would doubtless be construed as engaging in the business of selling firearms, which requires a Federal Firearms License. FFLs are mandated to you run background checks before the transfer of any firearm. Private sellers do not face this requirement but they're still forbidden to transfer a firearm to someone that they know to be a prohibited person.
Set up that website if you doubt me; I hear Club Fed is beautiful this time of the year....
A group of people does not have the same attributes as it's individuals.
You do realize that most political advocacy groups in the United States are incorporated, right? Citizens United was about one such organization that the FEC attempted to stop from releasing a video about Hillary Clinton in the run up to the 2008 Presidential Primaries. Do you seriously not see a problem when a Federal regulatory agency attempts to stop a political advocacy group from releasing materials about a candidate for the highest office in the land? Read the oral arguments for Citizens United, they're pretty interesting, particularly the part where the Solicitor General says that the legislation then in effect would empower the FEC to ban books containing political speech in the run up to an election.
Also, you don't necessarily need to interpret the 1st amendment 100% literally in order to come to the obvious conclusion that it lists no exceptions
The 2nd Amendment lists no exceptions either. Under your logic the Federal Law that precludes convicted felons, domestic abusers, dishonorably discharged service members, the involuntarily committed, and those who renounce their citizenship from possessing firearms is a violation of the right to keep and bear arms. Hell, let's go further, there's no exemption in the 2nd Amendment that covers people currently serving time, so I guess we have to equip Cell Block D with 1911s if they ask for them?
I will refer you to what I referred the other person to. "Compelling state interest" and "strict scrutiny." Google them. There's 230 years of jurisprudence (more if you count the common law we inherited from Great Britain) behind these principles. I'll take that collective wisdom over random internet ramblings any day of the week.
the stuff they're busing him for aren't all that awful
Witness tampering isn't "all that awful?" Would you think the same thing if I advised a witness to lie in a proceeding to which you were a party?
but they weren't clearly criminal things either (letter of the law, maybe, but it's not like he was knowingly training terrorists or killing people etc)
Umm, did you read the indictment? One of his would be clients told him that he was worried about his polygraph because he had engaged in smuggling while employed for Homeland Security. He proceeded to assist that would be client (actually an Undercover LEO) with the falsification of his testimony to the Federal Government. Mens rea was clearly evident on the part of Mr. Williams.
The differences between state and federal are irrelevant. The 1st Amendment applies to them all... To hell with your nuance Read the damn words
The words say "Congress shall make no law." You're the one choosing to interpret them literally. If you want to get into the 1st Amendment applying to the State Legislatures you're going to have to talk about case law and guess what? The case law doesn't agree with your interpretation of the 1st Amendment. You've lost this discussion on two fronts now, the literal reading of the words and the jurisprudence that has evolved around them. Why do you keep trying?
And your sig kinda gives you away.
My signature is a James Earl Jones quote from a fairly well known geek movie. There is no hidden political agenda in my signature. You're projecting; I can't decide if it's sad or amusing. Not that it really matters but I'm not affiliated with any political party. The Libertarians actually scare me to a certain extent and I would not vote for one even as a protest vote.
They make it more expensive to fight than give in.
I guess that's in the eye of the beholder. I wouldn't cop a plea to a crime I didn't commit. Would. Not. Happen. Furthermore, the Feds actually have competent public defenders, who are mandated by law to have the same salary and resources as the US Attorneys they go up against. It's a different story on the State level of course, though the States can only dream of the conviction rate that they Feds get.
Also, 3 felonies a day guarantees they'll be able to find something to get you with. Even if it's unrelated to what you did. Like Martha Stewart in prison for obstruction.
Martha Stewart did time because she was arrogant enough to think she could get away with lying to the FBI. The smarter move would have been to shut up and leave it at "I do not wish to make any statements without first consulting with my attorney." Her incident has nothing to do with three felonies a day, which is an overstatement if ever there was one (I've read through most of the Federal Code and all of the NYS Penal Law, I don't commit one felony a day, never mind three)
I disagree; the Government didn't force him to commit mail fraud and witness tampering. It may have set the stage but he's the one who walked onto it. This is no different than the local cops sending in underage person in to try and buy booze.
Cross examination won't be that interesting. The Feds have a conviction/plea-bargain rate over 90%. They don't bring cases they can't win. He's going to jail. None of his arguments about free speech will be relevant, they ceased to apply as soon as he advised someone to lie to a sworn Federal officer. That's criminal conspiracy. I would convict him based on what I've read and so would anyone else empaneled on a Federal jury.
How could he make a stupid mistake like that?
Greed.
Are you saying some statutes can take precedence over explicit written law in the constitution? That it can be interpreted in any political fashion of the times? Either it applies or it doesn't.
Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech
What does that mean, exactly? Please explain to me how a law against reckless endangerment represents an abridgment on the freedom of speech. Such laws cover acts that a reasonable person should know place others in danger. If I see a police officer interacting with another person does the First Amendment allow me to shout "HE'S GOT A GUN!" or would such an action constitute reckless endangerment? Heck, if we want to talk about firearms, is it a violation of the Second Amendment to charge me with reckless endangerment if I discharge my firearm into my neighbor's apartment while trying to clean it?
See, this this is where I don't think you so-called 'libertarians' really believe in freedom
What the heck have I said that leads you to conclude I'm a libertarian?
The 1st Amendment states, "...no law..." You just can't get more absolute.
If you want to read it that literally it says "Congress shall make no law...." Guess what? Reckless endangerment laws exist at the State level, not the Federal level. Of course, constitutional case law has evolved to incorporate the 1st Amendment against State Legislatures; too bad you're not interested in learning the nuisances of constitutional case law in the United States. Do you know the difference between the Federal and State governments in my country? Did you know that the States are sovereign entities that do not derive their authority from the Federal Constitution?
and have nothing but contempt for your legal system
Frankly I don't care if you have contempt for our legal system. I'm not certain where you're from my friend but if it happens to be Canada or the EU I'm willing to bet I know more about your legal system than you've bothered to learn about ours. You don't see me acting smug and superior about it, even though there are aspects of those jurisdictions (particularly civil law countries, e.g., all of Europe outside of the British Isles, do you know the difference between civil and common law?) that I would find troubling as an American.
It's not censorship of speech; read the statutes I quoted, speech is not mentioned. If you wish to conduct further research you can start by looking up "strict scrutiny" and "compelling state interest." Based on your choice of words I'm guessing you're not an American, so your confusion regarding our system is understandable, but you should probably learn more about it before you condemn it.
Really? You "highly doubt" that the same telco's who are practically bending over backwards to track their own users and sell that shit to the NSA would be "stupid" enough for an MITM attack?
Spare me the NSA paranoia; this is all about dollars and cents. That's what it all comes down to with any for-profit corporation. Do you seriously think that a Fortune 100 company is stupid enough to mess with encrypted sessions that will contain credentials for financial accounts? HIPAA protected medical information? Communications between attorneys and their clients? Secured sessions for defense contractors and Government employees working with Top Secret data?
Take the tin-foil hat off long enough to contemplate the fact that Google is being spanked for the incidental capture of plaintext wi-fi packets. What do you suppose happens to the telco company that captures any of the data I've mentioned and subsequently loses it to black hats or a disgruntled employee? They'd be on the hook for millions of dollars worth of civil damages and whatever fines the alphabet soup of regulatory agencies decided to impose upon them. Do you seriously think they'd run that risk for the sake of some incidental ad revenue?
Moreover, the only way they could even do it would be to install trusted certificates on the phones that they sell. How long do you suppose that would fly under the radar before being discovered? Do you really think Google or Apple would go along with it? Use some common sense man....
The better Breaking Bad scene is when Mike is listening to the DEA discuss him, via the bugs he placed in their office:
He's been throwing every tail we put on him.
The guy's a pro. (Mike smiles)
Yeah, well, even pros make mistakes.
One of these days, our pal Ehrmantraut's gonna slip up.
Just gotta be there when he does. (The smile leaves Mike's face and is replaced by a look of consternation)
This is one of my favorite scenes with Mike and he doesn't have a single word of dialogue. It's all facial expressions and body language. He knows that they're right; now that they're watching him it's only a matter of time before he screws up and goes to jail. That's the problem with being involved in crime. The authorities can make an unlimited number of mistakes; the criminal can't afford to make a single one.
In this instance it appears that greed got the better of Mr. Williams. If you look at his website he's not doing anything wrong; he may be peddling snake oil but he's hardly the first one and that's not a crime. Read through the indictment and a different picture emerges. He counsels his clients to lie to Government investigators (witness tampering), arranges to receive the proceeds for this venture via the mail (mail fraud) and even ignores his own good judgment. When one of the undercover agents admits to lying on his employment application Williams cuts him off and says he can't work with him, he only works with people that are being truthful but whom are nervous about the test. This is in fact what his website says.
Had he stopped there he would have been fine. Did he? Of course not! He decides to "sleep on it" and comes up with a hair brained scheme to transfer money in a supposedly untraceable manner. He then tells his would-be client to break contact and reestablish it under a different name so that he doesn't have to knowingly counsel someone to lie.
The net proceeds of this particular venture? $5,000. The man is going to lose his freedom for a lousy five grand, all because greed overrode the little voice inside his head that said something was wrong. This is a life lesson that applies to everyone, criminal and honest citizen alike.
You're asking the wrong questions. Here's a better one: Why can't we have a discussion about making https mandatory? At least for websites deployed on IPV6 where there's no address limitations resulting in a need to use virtual hosting. What compelling reason is there to transmit data in clear text?
Yes, I know that there's nothing technical that stops the telco's from doing MITM attacks, but I highly doubt they would be stupid enough to do this. Many jurisdictions have laws against such behavior and even in those that don't they be assuming an enormous civil liability if certain data (banking credentials) was captured and later compromised.
Read your Constitution, read the Federalist papers, etc... etc.. there is not even a hint at "some" speech being disallowed.
Some of the same authors of the Constitution and Federalist papers passed the Alien and Sedition Acts. Those were far more oppressive than laws against reckless endangerment (the charge you'll face for shouting fire in a crowded theater) or laws against obstructing justice.
Reckless endangerment simply says that you can't engage in conduct that carries a significant risk of causing physical injury to another person. Do you seriously take exception to such a law? What about laws against falsely reporting crimes? Can I use the First Amendment as a justification for calling 911 and telling them my neighbor assaulted me when he did no such thing?
Free speech doesn't extend so far as to protect you against reckless endangerment charges. Different hypothetical for you: I know you're deathly allergic to peanuts. We're out to eat at my favorite restaurant. You ask me if a certain entree has peanuts in it. I tell you that it does not even though I know full well that it does. You end up dying from anaphylactic shock. Does the First Amendment offer a "get out of jail free" for the criminal charges I'm likely to face?
Here's the definition of reckless endangerment in New York State:
"A person is guilty of reckless endangerment in the second degree when he recklessly engages in conduct which creates a substantial risk of serious physical injury to another person. Reckless endangerment in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor."
"A person is guilty of reckless endangerment in the first degree when, under circumstances evincing a depraved indifference to human life, he recklessly engages in conduct which creates a grave risk of death to another person. Reckless endangerment in the first degree is a class D felony."
In the worn out "Fire!" in a crowded theater analogy you're going to face at least a second degree reckless endangerment charge. In my example you'll be facing the first degree charge and possibly some other ones depending on your motive. You did it because you thought it would be funny? Reckless endangerment in the first degree. You did it because you were married to the person and wanted a cheaper out than divorce? Murder in the second degree.
No, he was arrested for telling other people to lie to the Government (witness tampering) and for charging them money for this "advice" that was delivered to him via USPS (mail fraud)
There is no miscarriage of justice here.
How did it go when you answered "Does this dress make me look fat?"
"I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that it may incriminate me."