BTW, not to reply twice, but would you have pushed for nullification if you were on this jury? I would have -- that case cries out for jury nullification.
I love the sheep that served on that jury. "Even the jurors who convicted him seem to have been looking for a reason to acquit him. But the judge gave them little choice" Uhh, yeah, you HAD a choice. Nobody can FORCE you to vote for conviction. Mindless fucking sheep that did whatever the DA and Judge wanted them to. What the hell is the point? 12 people on that Jury and not a single one of them knew about nullification or had even bothered to read a civics textbook in school? Depressing.
but is it really any worse than the way its done already?
Yes. It cuts out the ability to look witnesses and the defendant in the eye. Non-verbal communication is important, particularly when someone's liberty is on the line.
No they aren't, at least in my state. They have the option to pay you but it is not a requirement. One of the ways you can escape jury duty in NYS is if you can demonstrate that it would be a 'financial hardship' to serve.
My employer pays my full wage, minus the amount I receive from the court for serving. Seems fair enough to me. I'd do the same if I was an employer and had the financial resources. People should be encouraged to serve on juries -- it's your civic duty and provides an invaluable check against Governmental power.
Yes, "mass" transit to farm fields in the middle of nowhere. What will you think of next?
Or, we could always bus unemployed U.S. citizens out from the city except for one problem - they don't want to go.
Why do you care what people want? You don't seem particularly concerned about the fact that nobody outside of major cities wants or needs mass transit. You don't seem particularly concerned by the fact that most Americans like their automobiles.
Me too. They'd be lower if we had more mass transit and fewer automobiles.
You can have my automobile when you pry it from my cold dead hands.
Mostly via freight rail, at 500+ ton-miles per gallon of less-refined diesel fuel.
You missed a few. The tractor that plowed the field ran on petrochemicals. The fertilizer that was used was derived from petrochemicals. The truck that brought the food to your local grocery store ran on petrochemicals. The workers who harvested the food got to the field using petrochemicals. That's just food. I haven't even touched on all the other goods that made it to your market through the usage of petrochemicals.
Keep living in your urban fantasy land where you don't benefit from cheap oil prices though:)
Doesn't matter, the Government still exists to secure our rights against those that would take them away and that includes the majority.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed
Actually no, the purpose of Government is to secure liberty, not to impose your ideal of how people should live on the rest of the country. You are right about one thing though, this is a Democracy and it has soundly rejected your ideals every single time some politician has been stupid enough to suggest them.
You don't pay the cost of all of the roads and infrastructure
Roads and infrastructure are built with taxes, which I do pay, so try again.
the cost of the wars our country goes to so that you can have cheap gasoline
We don't go to war to secure "cheap gasoline" and even if we did you do realize that YOU benefit from cheap gasoline too, right? I assume you eat. How do you think that food made it's way to your table?
No Kyoto treaty!
You know the Kyoto treaty was rejected 98-0 in the US Senate, right? Cute how you blame the right-wingers for it though.
but it just won't scale to replace the utility given to us by cars. Buses and trains will.
Buses and trains can not replace the utility of a system that allows you to go almost anywhere you want at a moments notice at any hour of the day or night.
Oh, but the right believes that Public Transportation is "big government that can't support itself"
It is. Is there a single publicly owned mass transit authority anywhere in the United States that is self sufficient? The buses in my county only charge $1 per passenger. That barely covers the salary and benefits of the driver, never mind the costs of running, maintaining and insuring the bus. New York State just imposed a "MTA tax" on people that live near (not in) NYC to bail out that agency.
(if you're really sadistic, make it drop the call if the car isn't going between the speed limit and 3mph below for the stretch of road you're currently on - this would also definitively prove to most of the "but *I* can handle it" crowd that they really can't)
If only there was a way to maintain your speed without needing to keep your foot on the gas.....
When was the last time you brought a hand gun into a school? Why ban them?
They aren't banned everywhere. If you live in Utah and have a concealed carry license you can carry your firearm into any public school or college in the state. Amazingly enough it hasn't been a problem out there.
We should only punish the nut jobs that cause the rampages and not everyone else who has a god given right to bear arms anywhere they like.
That's exactly right. Do you honestly believe that someone who has decided to go on a shooting rampage is going to be deterred by the fact that you've passed a law outlawing guns on school grounds? They'll cross the line to commit murder but not the line to illegally possess a firearm? Are you really that naive?
Are you really that stupid? Hint: TSA is part of Homeland Security. Homeland Security is part of the Executive Branch of the (you guessed it) United States Federal Government.
So maybe you should quit your whining if you've decided that wireless service is what you must have? It's not like you don't have other options. You've just decided not to exercise them. Neither SMS nor roaming are MUST HAVE features of telecommunications. You've just decided they are worth paying for but still don't like what they cost. Get the hell over it already.
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Wait for the Government to save him?
BTW, not to reply twice, but would you have pushed for nullification if you were on this jury? I would have -- that case cries out for jury nullification.
I love the sheep that served on that jury. "Even the jurors who convicted him seem to have been looking for a reason to acquit him. But the judge gave them little choice" Uhh, yeah, you HAD a choice. Nobody can FORCE you to vote for conviction. Mindless fucking sheep that did whatever the DA and Judge wanted them to. What the hell is the point? 12 people on that Jury and not a single one of them knew about nullification or had even bothered to read a civics textbook in school? Depressing.
I'm a Libertarian who believes in Jury Nullification.
So am I, hence the reason why neither of us will ever serve on a jury, unless we lie or the lawyers are too stupid to ask the "right" questions.
I also believe that as a jury member I can ask questions of witnesses beyond the questions directed by either side
Grand Jurors can. I had to field several questions from the Grand Jurors when I testified. Hasn't really filtered down to Petit Jurors yet though.
but is it really any worse than the way its done already?
Yes. It cuts out the ability to look witnesses and the defendant in the eye. Non-verbal communication is important, particularly when someone's liberty is on the line.
No they aren't, at least in my state. They have the option to pay you but it is not a requirement. One of the ways you can escape jury duty in NYS is if you can demonstrate that it would be a 'financial hardship' to serve.
My employer pays my full wage, minus the amount I receive from the court for serving. Seems fair enough to me. I'd do the same if I was an employer and had the financial resources. People should be encouraged to serve on juries -- it's your civic duty and provides an invaluable check against Governmental power.
they'd rather take mass transit
Yes, "mass" transit to farm fields in the middle of nowhere. What will you think of next?
Or, we could always bus unemployed U.S. citizens out from the city except for one problem - they don't want to go.
Why do you care what people want? You don't seem particularly concerned about the fact that nobody outside of major cities wants or needs mass transit. You don't seem particularly concerned by the fact that most Americans like their automobiles.
Actually, the folks who harvested your food don't own automobiles. Or much of anything, including citizenship.
Irrelevant to the point regarding HOW they got to the fields in the first place.
Me too. They'd be lower if we had more mass transit and fewer automobiles.
You can have my automobile when you pry it from my cold dead hands.
Mostly via freight rail, at 500+ ton-miles per gallon of less-refined diesel fuel.
You missed a few. The tractor that plowed the field ran on petrochemicals. The fertilizer that was used was derived from petrochemicals. The truck that brought the food to your local grocery store ran on petrochemicals. The workers who harvested the food got to the field using petrochemicals. That's just food. I haven't even touched on all the other goods that made it to your market through the usage of petrochemicals.
Keep living in your urban fantasy land where you don't benefit from cheap oil prices though :)
The public does not care about "liberty".
Doesn't matter, the Government still exists to secure our rights against those that would take them away and that includes the majority.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed
To die, first a thing must live.
Life has a 100% chance of being a terminal disease ;)
What you're suggesting would not be worth it unless we actually ran out of surface space.
I'm not even sure it would be worth it then. Wouldn't living on or under the oceans be cheaper than living underground?
Actually no, the purpose of Government is to secure liberty, not to impose your ideal of how people should live on the rest of the country. You are right about one thing though, this is a Democracy and it has soundly rejected your ideals every single time some politician has been stupid enough to suggest them.
You don't pay the cost of all of the roads and infrastructure
Roads and infrastructure are built with taxes, which I do pay, so try again.
the cost of the wars our country goes to so that you can have cheap gasoline
We don't go to war to secure "cheap gasoline" and even if we did you do realize that YOU benefit from cheap gasoline too, right? I assume you eat. How do you think that food made it's way to your table?
No Kyoto treaty!
You know the Kyoto treaty was rejected 98-0 in the US Senate, right? Cute how you blame the right-wingers for it though.
Why would mass transit have to be self sufficient???
Why should I have to pay for something that I don't use?
Nobody insists that your car support itself
Excuse me, but I pay all the costs of keeping my car on the road. I'm the end user of my car. I don't ask others to pay for it.
Why would you need any of that?
Who are you to decide what others "need"?
but it just won't scale to replace the utility given to us by cars. Buses and trains will.
Buses and trains can not replace the utility of a system that allows you to go almost anywhere you want at a moments notice at any hour of the day or night.
Oh, but the right believes that Public Transportation is "big government that can't support itself"
It is. Is there a single publicly owned mass transit authority anywhere in the United States that is self sufficient? The buses in my county only charge $1 per passenger. That barely covers the salary and benefits of the driver, never mind the costs of running, maintaining and insuring the bus. New York State just imposed a "MTA tax" on people that live near (not in) NYC to bail out that agency.
If they need to communicate, they can do it over their encrypted spread-spectrum indistinguishable-from-noise military radios.
You do realize that a CDMA cell phone is essentially the same thing (albeit with weaker encryption) right?
(if you're really sadistic, make it drop the call if the car isn't going between the speed limit and 3mph below for the stretch of road you're currently on - this would also definitively prove to most of the "but *I* can handle it" crowd that they really can't)
If only there was a way to maintain your speed without needing to keep your foot on the gas.....
shaving his head with a STRAIGHT RAZOR.
Do you have potholes in Atlanta? That sounds like it would eventually be a self-correcting problem....
When was the last time you brought a hand gun into a school? Why ban them?
They aren't banned everywhere. If you live in Utah and have a concealed carry license you can carry your firearm into any public school or college in the state. Amazingly enough it hasn't been a problem out there.
We should only punish the nut jobs that cause the rampages and not everyone else who has a god given right to bear arms anywhere they like.
That's exactly right. Do you honestly believe that someone who has decided to go on a shooting rampage is going to be deterred by the fact that you've passed a law outlawing guns on school grounds? They'll cross the line to commit murder but not the line to illegally possess a firearm? Are you really that naive?
Retro fitting all cars with a jammer AND OnStar with government mandated subscriptions.
That's silly, the Federal Government doesn't have the power to compel us to buy a product from private enterprise..... oh, wait, never mind....
in New South Wales, police will even confiscate and destroy the phone in front of the user.
Good to know you guys down under gave up your right to due process along with your right to keep and bear arms. Suckers.
Are you really that stupid? Hint: TSA is part of Homeland Security. Homeland Security is part of the Executive Branch of the (you guessed it) United States Federal Government.
So maybe you should quit your whining if you've decided that wireless service is what you must have? It's not like you don't have other options. You've just decided not to exercise them. Neither SMS nor roaming are MUST HAVE features of telecommunications. You've just decided they are worth paying for but still don't like what they cost. Get the hell over it already.