Interesting to note that in the US, 'gun crime' overall has dropped steadily over the last 2 decades, even as gun sales have increased...except in those areas with extremely restrictive gun laws that prevent most law abiding citizens from owning & carrying guns.
U.S. Republican congressional staff said in a report released Wednesday that previous efforts to regulate privacy technology were flawed and that lawmakers need to learn more about technology before trying to regulate it.
*Republicans* are creating and authorizing the publication of reports critical of government-mandated encryption 'backdoors'?
We keep being lectured by those on the Left that the Democrats are the ones that protect the "regular Joe" and the Republicans are the ones that want to crush the rights/privacy of the "regular Joe".
I read your sig and it's stupid. You're one of those very silly people who sees world in black and white terms cheering on your "team" and having a nice 2 minutes hate for the other team. Try actually engaging your brain and thinking independently for a change.
Classic liberal/progressive reply: Pure projection. Accuse those with whom they disagree of the very things they are guilty of. I believe in many cases it's at least partially due to an inability to imagine their opponents *not* engaging in the same kind of Alinsky-style tactics that they embrace.
Protip: When your central playbooks' author ("Rules For Radicals" - Saul Alinsky) dedicates his book to Satan among others, that should be setting off serious alarm bells in one's mind, even if one is an atheist.
Nice thought, but we both know such interpretational standards will only be selectively applied where it favors TPTB's agendas and goals, and deliberately not where it favors those opposing the agendas and goals of TPTB.
Law for thee but not for me. The Rule of Law is dead in the US. Sadly, the US has become no better in that respect than some totalitarian banana republic.
If I understand you correctly, you are saying: "People who want to rent out their house/apartment as a business have to register like any other business. This proves that the Rule of Law is dead in the US."
I'm not sure of your gender, so I don't feel right calling you a Drama Queen. Maybe Drama Royalty?
Government has always had the right to regulate commerce. To me, this seems quite reasonable. Sure, sometimes it regulates poorly, in which case I can spend my days wailing about how I'm being oppressed like a peasant in a Monty Python skit, or I can vote for people who will improve it, or (since I have enough money) I can move somewhere where the government works the way I want it to. I prefer the second method myself, and am glad that the third method is available to me.
In the US we get the government we want, by voting in the people we want. Different regions have wildly different laws because of this fact. Seems like a good thing to me.
Are you sure you've replied to the correct post?
I said that those in government and those powerful interests aligned with government (cronies) don't have to follow the same set of laws, rules, and regulations that Joe Sixpack is forced to comply with, and that those same "above the law" types and those in government use the selectively-enforced and interpreted laws/rules/regulations as weapons against those they consider a threat.
In the US it's quite common for established businesses to influence government to pass laws and regulations dressed up and sold as being for the greater good when they are actually only there to create barriers to competition and protect outdated business models.
I think the SCOTUS BS undue burden ruling on abortion yesterday should be taken and run with. I think any regulation where the state does not have solid evidence is effective at addressing an explicitly stated objective which restricts someones rights in anyway ( In this case AirBnb's right to advertise rent able units ) should be automatically considered unconstitutional.
Lets exploit this shabby reasoning to its max.
Nice thought, but we both know such interpretational standards will only be selectively applied where it favors TPTB's agendas and goals, and deliberately not where it favors those opposing the agendas and goals of TPTB.
Law for thee but not for me. The Rule of Law is dead in the US. Sadly, the US has become no better in that respect than some totalitarian banana republic.
...next time it might be something extremly important like wiki-leaks that shows us how much our government is corrupt and working against our interests
Exactly!
Who wants to hear or read about that kind of stuff!?
As long as I'm not confronted with such facts it makes my desire for government to regulate/restrict/ban/disenfranchise those things/people/freedoms/speech I don't like and give me boatloads of free stuff much more reasonable in my own mind. At a minimum, it lets me ignore the whole thing and let apathy rule while maintaining the illusion of normalcy./s
I'm still LOLing at the Europeans even today, most of whom are mourning the first of many nations to leave the EU. It's a matter of time before the rest of the EU fails, too. I'm so thankful for being a Canadian, because we are smarter and better than the Europeans and Americans. Unlike the United States and most of Europe, Canada is not a failed state. Look for Canada to become the dominant power as China sinks deeper into recession, the United States spirals downward in decay, and the EU breaks apart at the seams.
You'd better hope the US doesn't decay too much or too far. One of the hallmarks of failed republics is to become an aggressor-state to prop up the failing system, and Canada would be a tempting and convenient target for US annexation and subsequent plundering of it's wealth and resources.
The US has the very real potential to become the greatest threat to the world since Nazi Germany if it goes full-fascist/socialist-oligarchy, which is a distinct possibility if/when the US economy and currency collapses, particularly if there's a 'cult of personality' populist-demagogue type of leader like Trump in charge at the time.
I've probably been on just about every 'list' they have for decades, now. Screw the authoritarian bastages.
The fear is what they want. I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer, the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
There are thousands of drivers and riders, right? This is Texas where there are a large number of firearm owners, right?
Shouldn't be any trouble to surround the cops with thousands while video/audio recording and then decide, based on the police reaction, to just loudly protest or to forcibly disarm them and place them under citizen's arrest. There is power in numbers. When the government itself fails to follow the Rule of Law when it comes to the powerful and 'connected', force of numbers is about all you have left.
Or you can do the same things you've always done and get the same results you've always gotten and which has led to this situation to begin with. I seem to remember a saying about dong the same thing repeatedly and yet expecting different results.
That all may be true, and the price you pay for that is in blood. If you think it's worth it then that's on you.
Ah! And you see, that's precisely the point!
In a free and open society that promotes and protects individual freedom, the very nature of such means that there is also the freedom that can allow the occasional bad guy or group to commit bad acts.
When I grew up guys like us in high school usually had a couple rifles and/or shotguns in a rear-window gun rack, and not unusual to also find a handgun in the glove or behind/under the seat in a locked box. Many left after school and drove directly to the range. It just was never an issue. Nobody was being shot, nobody dialing the police just because somebody had guns in their rear pickup window, guns were just another tool and basic means of defense. If you said "school shooting" to one of us back then we would think you meant something related to the school rifle or skeet teams.
The trick is to address the actual root causes of a societal/cultural problem like gun violence is, rather than abridge civil rights in an ill-conceived and doomed-to-fail shortcut to addressing only one of the many symptoms while utterly ignoring the root causes.
The difference I see in US society that stands out most glaringly to me over more than a half-century of observation is that then, people of all ethnic & cultural backgrounds in the US generally held a shared, common sense of right and wrong, a common moral framework, a concept which many people today who push 'diversity' would consider anathema to their beliefs.
A lack of a common moral framework combined with special protected and entitled classes, the breakdown of Rule of Law and equal accountability, class warfare demagoguery and racial/identity politics and hate groups, failed social programs like the 'war on drugs', 'war on poverty', the 'great society', the 'new deal', all served to divide and pit people against each other and empower government by taking power and wealth from the people and then doling it back out as they see fit.
Until actions are taken to address those problems nothing will get better and more people will suffer and die. Guns owned by law abiding people are not the problem and never have been.
You can't solve a cultural problem by technological means.
Now you're just moving the same problem around and still fails for similar reasons that Prohibition and the War On (some) Drugs has, and is, failing.
They can't prevent Palestinians from obtaining all kinds of military guns, bombs, rockets, etc when there is a military blockade in place on all sides. How do you propose, exactly, to stop ammo/guns from flowing across the borders into the US? There is also cartridge and shell reloading that many already do to save on ammo costs.
It is simply impossible in any rational, practical, non-nation-collapsing way to ban firearms in the US. It simply cannot happen without destroying the US and killing a majority of the population and incarcerating most of the rest.
US firearm bans are insane fantasies with zero chance of succeeding short of mass genocide. Such calls for bans are nothing but propaganda and demagoguery.
Do you honestly believe that more gun-free zones and laws would've stopped him?
Do you think having little to no access to guns makes it harder to commit a shooting? If you're answer is anything but yes you're a fucking moron.
Making guns illegal =/= making guns unavailable/inaccessible, particularly in the case of people who pay no attention to laws in the first place, and plan on dying in the execution of their plans in any case.
Certain drugs have been illegal for many decades, and yet they are still widely and easily available for anyone that wants them and can pay the going rates.
You want a small sample of what banning guns in the US would look like? Just read up on the 1920's-era Prohibition effort to ban alcohol. Now ramp up the carnage and loss of life by orders of magnitude.
It won't result in fewer AR-15s. It will result in an all-out proliferation of fully-automatic AK-47s, M4 carbines, and other NFA and prohibited firearms. If all guns are illegal, might as well be a very well-armed criminal with a fully-auto weapon as opposed to currently-legal Glocks or AR-15 semi-automatic weapons.
Guns will never disappear in the US no matter what laws or Amendments are passed. Those horses left the barn over 2 centuries ago. It would require the genocide of the vast majority of people living in the US with the remainder put in prison camps. Not a viable option for anyone who is sane.
How do you make online transactions? It's one of the best ways to shop, and sometimes the best deals are online. I do what I can to minimize my exposure, but there are some very clear benefits to dealing with things online. I just steer clear of the obviously-monitoring-you-for-ad-money type of things. My debit card (from a credit union, NEVER a bank) opens me up to opportunities (like Square Cash) that I just couldn't take advantage of without a card and doing (a little) business online.
IANAL, IANAFA (I am not a financial advisor), this is only my personal thoughts.
I would say set up multiple checking accounts under your shareholder account and use separate accounts so that if, for instance, some internet vendor payment service screws up and sends a freeze, you won't lose the use of the account which receives your direct deposit employer paychecks, SS benefit payments, or whatever your income source is. When you want to make an online transaction, transfer just that amount to that separate checking account.
Talk to an account manager first at your financial institution, as not all laws, regulations, and policies and/or account-structure design are the same everywhere and/or at every CU. You may have to actually open another share account in order to protect yourself.
Another nice benefit is that you can set alerts/alarms on that online transaction checking account so you know if there's an attempt to make an unauthorized charge, etc without having the landlord cashing the rent check setting off the alarms and possible protective measures like a temporary transaction freeze.
Like I said, these are just my thoughts. None of this constitutes financial, accounting, or legal advice, nor does it impose any liabilities and/or responsibilities for any party in any way. (And somewhere right now, a high ranking US federal official and/or high office-holder is snorting coke off a hooker's ass and laughing his or her ass off.)
"Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you and good evening. The sponsor has been identified, but unlike most television programs, the performer hasn't been provided with a script. As a matter of fact, I have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks.
I have spent most of my life as a Democrat. I recently have seen fit to follow another course. I believe that the issues confronting us cross party lines. Now, one side in this campaign has been telling us that the issues of this election are the maintenance of peace and prosperity. The line has been used, "We've never had it so good."
But I have an uncomfortable feeling that this prosperity isn't something on which we can base our hopes for the future. No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income. Today, 37 cents out of every dollar earned in this country is the tax collector's share, and yet our government continues to spend 17 million dollars a day more than the government takes in. We haven't balanced our budget 28 out of the last 34 years. We've raised our debt limit three times in the last twelve months, and now our national debt is one and a half times bigger than all the combined debts of all the nations of the world. We have 15 billion dollars in gold in our treasury; we don't own an ounce. Foreign dollar claims are 27.3 billion dollars. And we've just had announced that the dollar of 1939 will now purchase 45 cents in its total value.
As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.
Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.
And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.
This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or
Lighter than air craft have a lot of problems. The energy use isn't as as low as you might imagine - there is no drag due to drift, but the large frontal area resulst in a lot of parasitic drag except at very low speeds. Winds, ice etc can be a serious problem, and they typically can't climb above weather.
one example at http://www.zeppelinflug.de/en/ carries 16 people, 80mph, 600hp total engines, range 600 miles (they don't give detailed specs).
Compare with a 1960s beechcraft baron: 6 people, 230mph, 600HP total engines, range ~800miles
person miles / gallon seems to be in the same ballpark. The airship may be a lot more pleasant to fly in, but its isn't substantially more efficient.
Wasn't talking about lighter-than-air craft. What I'm talking about nobody has built an analog of yet that I'm aware of.
Basically a giant electric powered airliner/cargo plane/lifting body that is capable of landing/taking off from land or sea which has *some* of the lift requirements met by adjustable/controllable gas cells located inside the craft. I'm talking on the scale of one of the giant container ships or "supertanker" oil ships, maybe even much larger. I'm thinking something that uses a combination of lifting-body design and surface-effect-cushion aerodynamics at just a few meters altitude above the sea, possibly, rather than lifting to a multiple-kilometers altitude? Not sure at this point what might be possible versus pragmatic and practical/efficient in that regard.
Haven't thought out all the details yet. The comparisons you cite also both utilize '50s/'60s/'70s era engineering, technology, & materials and also uses internal combustion engines for power. Even in the example you cite, there is *some* savings, just not an impressive and/or worthwhile amount.
Like I said, I'm basically typing a 'stream-of-consciousness' here as I consider the problem.
Depending on number of factors, that in itself may not be a bad thing.
Where I can see possibilities here is possibly as propulsion for fractional-buoyancy/buoyancy-compensated mass air cargo/passenger transport craft design using gas filled cells to lessen the demands for lift and thrust.
Some thing somewhere between a dirigible, a sea-going ship, and a passenger/cargo plane. Something that could take advantage of large scale economy savings combined with lower environmental impact. Imagine a large cargo or passenger ship that, once it clears a harbor/port area (or simply takes off from an airport), can lift itself into the air and proceed on course for it's destination on electric power with a significant percentage of the need for lift and thrust cancelled by positive-buoyancy gas cells, most or all of the electricity coming from photo-voltaic cells covering the upper hull/fuselage and lifting/control surfaces.
Having the ability to land on land or sea and at the lower speeds involved adds a large safety factor as well in the event of unforeseen weather or technical/mechanical problems in the craft itself on long global navigation legs.
If a ticket from London to Tokyo or Singapore to LA took two days but cost around the $100USD price point or even lower, many more people would travel and shipping costs included in the price of many things shipped long distances would plummet.
The current state of energy storage technology and the energy densities achievable currently do not lend themselves to small craft yet to a level approaching the ranges, loads, speeds, and costs of current small aircraft. That will likely eventually change, but it will also likely be a while yet before the balance scales tip the other way
But as I pointed out above, electric propulsion for aircraft may well scale up quite nicely with some creative engineering.
Its amazing to me how many people seem to forget that life goes on just fine when everything is unplugged.... instead they start freaking out for some reason
From my perspective, I wonder "where do they find all that spare time?
I'm usually far too busy to watch a lot of movies/video/TV. I'm very selective and choose carefully, I have to. There is simply just so much to do, so many guitars to play, circuits to build, programs to write, news/science/technology sources to check, etc etc, on and on it seems at times.
It's a lot of work to accomplish even a fraction of all the project goals and tasks one would wish to in 24 hours while also trying to stay informed and current, and still get some damn sleep, ha!
I dunno, I'd consider Slashdot to be one of the closest things to an "antisocial media" website on the 'net except maybe for 4chan, at least as far as toxicity/hostility-factors go, heh!
Let me guess -- you don't own a television either?
I have one, I just don't find myself using it. Between lack of worthwhile content and cable-service monopoly pricing, and adding that I can watch pretty much anything I like on the interwebs in full HD and on-demand at much lower costs ala carte or free on a big ViewSonic HD monitor with no or very little advertising, I just don't have much use for a traditional TV (or what passes for one these days), except maybe testing out game consoles, etc, for friends & family.
Yes. Firing a high-power rifle round or a shotgun blast in the air, with no backstop, is a fantastic idea. Especially in an urban environment.
I never made any statement in my post which advocates for a particular method/tool/location for any or every situation.
I agree that being unsafe with a gun is being unsafe with a gun or any type of tool, for that matter. Those were just the first few methods/tools that came to mind that had a very high likelihood of disabling even a hardened unit.
As a long time builder in construction, mechanical/automation, and radio and navigation/guidance electronics-related fields and disciplines, among many others, "The proper tool for the job!" is a maxim in one's life (yes, I've been around a while, watched X-15 flights and Shepard's and Glenn's first Mercury launches). Crowbars, hammers, etc can be extremely useful as well depending on the situation, location, etc etc. As a bonus, those tools are the easiest and least expensive to procure, as well as least likely to attract undue LE attention nor engender the more-severe legal penalties for possession.
As a matter of fact, either whole or parted-out, those things might be worth a tidy sum of cash. Mighty tempting for drug addicts, etc that don't concern themselves much with legalities, particularly in lower-rent urban/ghetto areas as found in many large cities in the US. Heck, there are areas in Detroit that police and emergency services will not go, and I don't mean just in the outer-'burbs! I wouldn't give one of those cameras more than 2 weekends at the most there before some crack/meth-heads try to salvage it for anything they can, the metal content if nothing else!
It may even be possible to re-purpose and/or compromise them for counter-surveillance, possibly even such that they are not aware that it has even happened, but yet being capable of total control of the data they see. Like any exposed system, they could never be 100% certain it had not occurred.
That kind of technical challenge should be right up a large number of nerd/geek's wheelhouses. I wonder if the contractor/supplier/builder's sales representative pointed this serious security vulnerability out to the FBI/DHS procurement office during his sales presentation/contract proposal or related paperwork?
Slashdot Mirror
Here's a video clip you'll enjoy if you haven't already seen it.
https://youtu.be/Cw6jDrshgEw
Interesting to note that in the US, 'gun crime' overall has dropped steadily over the last 2 decades, even as gun sales have increased...except in those areas with extremely restrictive gun laws that prevent most law abiding citizens from owning & carrying guns.
Strat
Yeah, after all, the NRA and Ronald Reagan were all for the Black Panthers carrying around [scary-looking-guns] to defend their neighborhoods. /s
"Defending their neighborhoods"?
You mean from those dangerous "cracker babies"?
https://youtu.be/2Y3Cd9gnvlw
https://youtu.be/-S2MIqgI-ic
So much hate.
So much cognitive dissonance on the Left.
Strat
U.S. Republican congressional staff said in a report released Wednesday that previous efforts to regulate privacy technology were flawed and that lawmakers need to learn more about technology before trying to regulate it.
*Republicans* are creating and authorizing the publication of reports critical of government-mandated encryption 'backdoors'?
We keep being lectured by those on the Left that the Democrats are the ones that protect the "regular Joe" and the Republicans are the ones that want to crush the rights/privacy of the "regular Joe".
This is unpossible!
Strat
I read your sig and it's stupid. You're one of those very silly people who sees world in black and white terms cheering on your "team" and having a nice 2 minutes hate for the other team. Try actually engaging your brain and thinking independently for a change.
Classic liberal/progressive reply: Pure projection. Accuse those with whom they disagree of the very things they are guilty of. I believe in many cases it's at least partially due to an inability to imagine their opponents *not* engaging in the same kind of Alinsky-style tactics that they embrace.
Protip: When your central playbooks' author ("Rules For Radicals" - Saul Alinsky) dedicates his book to Satan among others, that should be setting off serious alarm bells in one's mind, even if one is an atheist.
Strat
Another liberal run (into the ground) city
Doing whatever it can to suck more money out of its citizens
Moderated -1
Truth to a US "liberal" is as salt to a slug. (See my sig)
Strat
Are you sure you've replied to the correct post?
I said that those in government and those powerful interests aligned with government (cronies) don't have to follow the same set of laws, rules, and regulations that Joe Sixpack is forced to comply with, and that those same "above the law" types and those in government use the selectively-enforced and interpreted laws/rules/regulations as weapons against those they consider a threat.
In the US it's quite common for established businesses to influence government to pass laws and regulations dressed up and sold as being for the greater good when they are actually only there to create barriers to competition and protect outdated business models.
Strat
I think the SCOTUS BS undue burden ruling on abortion yesterday should be taken and run with. I think any regulation where the state does not have solid evidence is effective at addressing an explicitly stated objective which restricts someones rights in anyway ( In this case AirBnb's right to advertise rent able units ) should be automatically considered unconstitutional.
Lets exploit this shabby reasoning to its max.
Nice thought, but we both know such interpretational standards will only be selectively applied where it favors TPTB's agendas and goals, and deliberately not where it favors those opposing the agendas and goals of TPTB.
Law for thee but not for me. The Rule of Law is dead in the US. Sadly, the US has become no better in that respect than some totalitarian banana republic.
Strat
...next time it might be something extremly important like wiki-leaks that shows us how much our government is corrupt and working against our interests
Exactly!
Who wants to hear or read about that kind of stuff!?
As long as I'm not confronted with such facts it makes my desire for government to regulate/restrict/ban/disenfranchise those things/people/freedoms/speech I don't like and give me boatloads of free stuff much more reasonable in my own mind. At a minimum, it lets me ignore the whole thing and let apathy rule while maintaining the illusion of normalcy. /s
Strat
I'm still LOLing at the Europeans even today, most of whom are mourning the first of many nations to leave the EU. It's a matter of time before the rest of the EU fails, too. I'm so thankful for being a Canadian, because we are smarter and better than the Europeans and Americans. Unlike the United States and most of Europe, Canada is not a failed state. Look for Canada to become the dominant power as China sinks deeper into recession, the United States spirals downward in decay, and the EU breaks apart at the seams.
You'd better hope the US doesn't decay too much or too far. One of the hallmarks of failed republics is to become an aggressor-state to prop up the failing system, and Canada would be a tempting and convenient target for US annexation and subsequent plundering of it's wealth and resources.
The US has the very real potential to become the greatest threat to the world since Nazi Germany if it goes full-fascist/socialist-oligarchy, which is a distinct possibility if/when the US economy and currency collapses, particularly if there's a 'cult of personality' populist-demagogue type of leader like Trump in charge at the time.
Strat
you just got added to like 7 lists.
Pfft!
I've probably been on just about every 'list' they have for decades, now. Screw the authoritarian bastages.
The fear is what they want. I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer, the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
Strat
Set up a "sting" on the cops.
There are thousands of drivers and riders, right? This is Texas where there are a large number of firearm owners, right?
Shouldn't be any trouble to surround the cops with thousands while video/audio recording and then decide, based on the police reaction, to just loudly protest or to forcibly disarm them and place them under citizen's arrest. There is power in numbers. When the government itself fails to follow the Rule of Law when it comes to the powerful and 'connected', force of numbers is about all you have left.
Or you can do the same things you've always done and get the same results you've always gotten and which has led to this situation to begin with. I seem to remember a saying about dong the same thing repeatedly and yet expecting different results.
Strat
That all may be true, and the price you pay for that is in blood. If you think it's worth it then that's on you.
Ah! And you see, that's precisely the point!
In a free and open society that promotes and protects individual freedom, the very nature of such means that there is also the freedom that can allow the occasional bad guy or group to commit bad acts.
When I grew up guys like us in high school usually had a couple rifles and/or shotguns in a rear-window gun rack, and not unusual to also find a handgun in the glove or behind/under the seat in a locked box. Many left after school and drove directly to the range. It just was never an issue. Nobody was being shot, nobody dialing the police just because somebody had guns in their rear pickup window, guns were just another tool and basic means of defense. If you said "school shooting" to one of us back then we would think you meant something related to the school rifle or skeet teams.
The trick is to address the actual root causes of a societal/cultural problem like gun violence is, rather than abridge civil rights in an ill-conceived and doomed-to-fail shortcut to addressing only one of the many symptoms while utterly ignoring the root causes.
The difference I see in US society that stands out most glaringly to me over more than a half-century of observation is that then, people of all ethnic & cultural backgrounds in the US generally held a shared, common sense of right and wrong, a common moral framework, a concept which many people today who push 'diversity' would consider anathema to their beliefs.
A lack of a common moral framework combined with special protected and entitled classes, the breakdown of Rule of Law and equal accountability, class warfare demagoguery and racial/identity politics and hate groups, failed social programs like the 'war on drugs', 'war on poverty', the 'great society', the 'new deal', all served to divide and pit people against each other and empower government by taking power and wealth from the people and then doling it back out as they see fit.
Until actions are taken to address those problems nothing will get better and more people will suffer and die. Guns owned by law abiding people are not the problem and never have been.
You can't solve a cultural problem by technological means.
Strat
Cut off the supply of ammunition.
Now you're just moving the same problem around and still fails for similar reasons that Prohibition and the War On (some) Drugs has, and is, failing.
They can't prevent Palestinians from obtaining all kinds of military guns, bombs, rockets, etc when there is a military blockade in place on all sides. How do you propose, exactly, to stop ammo/guns from flowing across the borders into the US? There is also cartridge and shell reloading that many already do to save on ammo costs.
It is simply impossible in any rational, practical, non-nation-collapsing way to ban firearms in the US. It simply cannot happen without destroying the US and killing a majority of the population and incarcerating most of the rest.
US firearm bans are insane fantasies with zero chance of succeeding short of mass genocide. Such calls for bans are nothing but propaganda and demagoguery.
Strat
Making guns illegal =/= making guns unavailable/inaccessible, particularly in the case of people who pay no attention to laws in the first place, and plan on dying in the execution of their plans in any case.
Certain drugs have been illegal for many decades, and yet they are still widely and easily available for anyone that wants them and can pay the going rates.
You want a small sample of what banning guns in the US would look like? Just read up on the 1920's-era Prohibition effort to ban alcohol. Now ramp up the carnage and loss of life by orders of magnitude.
It won't result in fewer AR-15s. It will result in an all-out proliferation of fully-automatic AK-47s, M4 carbines, and other NFA and prohibited firearms. If all guns are illegal, might as well be a very well-armed criminal with a fully-auto weapon as opposed to currently-legal Glocks or AR-15 semi-automatic weapons.
Guns will never disappear in the US no matter what laws or Amendments are passed. Those horses left the barn over 2 centuries ago. It would require the genocide of the vast majority of people living in the US with the remainder put in prison camps. Not a viable option for anyone who is sane.
Strat
How do you make online transactions? It's one of the best ways to shop, and sometimes the best deals are online. I do what I can to minimize my exposure, but there are some very clear benefits to dealing with things online. I just steer clear of the obviously-monitoring-you-for-ad-money type of things. My debit card (from a credit union, NEVER a bank) opens me up to opportunities (like Square Cash) that I just couldn't take advantage of without a card and doing (a little) business online.
IANAL, IANAFA (I am not a financial advisor), this is only my personal thoughts.
I would say set up multiple checking accounts under your shareholder account and use separate accounts so that if, for instance, some internet vendor payment service screws up and sends a freeze, you won't lose the use of the account which receives your direct deposit employer paychecks, SS benefit payments, or whatever your income source is. When you want to make an online transaction, transfer just that amount to that separate checking account.
Talk to an account manager first at your financial institution, as not all laws, regulations, and policies and/or account-structure design are the same everywhere and/or at every CU. You may have to actually open another share account in order to protect yourself.
Another nice benefit is that you can set alerts/alarms on that online transaction checking account so you know if there's an attempt to make an unauthorized charge, etc without having the landlord cashing the rent check setting off the alarms and possible protective measures like a temporary transaction freeze.
Like I said, these are just my thoughts. None of this constitutes financial, accounting, or legal advice, nor does it impose any liabilities and/or responsibilities for any party in any way. (And somewhere right now, a high ranking US federal official and/or high office-holder is snorting coke off a hooker's ass and laughing his or her ass off.)
Strat
Personal point:
keeping the secret agencies in check & under control = good/wise
abolishing everything = idiotic
bolstering secret agencies further = equally idiot as abolishing them
Hint:
Never choose an extreme, because you can certainly be sure that you are wrong even when you are right.
Somebody else had some thoughts on similar choices in the past which are to a large extent being faced by the American people again, in this election.
https://youtu.be/qXBswFfh6AY
"Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you and good evening. The sponsor has been identified, but unlike most television programs, the performer hasn't been provided with a script. As a matter of fact, I have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks.
I have spent most of my life as a Democrat. I recently have seen fit to follow another course. I believe that the issues confronting us cross party lines. Now, one side in this campaign has been telling us that the issues of this election are the maintenance of peace and prosperity. The line has been used, "We've never had it so good."
But I have an uncomfortable feeling that this prosperity isn't something on which we can base our hopes for the future. No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income. Today, 37 cents out of every dollar earned in this country is the tax collector's share, and yet our government continues to spend 17 million dollars a day more than the government takes in. We haven't balanced our budget 28 out of the last 34 years. We've raised our debt limit three times in the last twelve months, and now our national debt is one and a half times bigger than all the combined debts of all the nations of the world. We have 15 billion dollars in gold in our treasury; we don't own an ounce. Foreign dollar claims are 27.3 billion dollars. And we've just had announced that the dollar of 1939 will now purchase 45 cents in its total value.
As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.
Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.
And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.
This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or
Lighter than air craft have a lot of problems. The energy use isn't as as low as you might imagine - there is no drag due to drift, but the large frontal area resulst in a lot of parasitic drag except at very low speeds. Winds, ice etc can be a serious problem, and they typically can't climb above weather.
one example at http://www.zeppelinflug.de/en/
carries 16 people, 80mph, 600hp total engines, range 600 miles (they don't give detailed specs).
Compare with a 1960s beechcraft baron:
6 people, 230mph, 600HP total engines, range ~800miles
person miles / gallon seems to be in the same ballpark. The airship may be a lot more pleasant to fly in, but its isn't substantially more efficient .
Wasn't talking about lighter-than-air craft. What I'm talking about nobody has built an analog of yet that I'm aware of.
Basically a giant electric powered airliner/cargo plane/lifting body that is capable of landing/taking off from land or sea which has *some* of the lift requirements met by adjustable/controllable gas cells located inside the craft. I'm talking on the scale of one of the giant container ships or "supertanker" oil ships, maybe even much larger. I'm thinking something that uses a combination of lifting-body design and surface-effect-cushion aerodynamics at just a few meters altitude above the sea, possibly, rather than lifting to a multiple-kilometers altitude? Not sure at this point what might be possible versus pragmatic and practical/efficient in that regard.
Haven't thought out all the details yet. The comparisons you cite also both utilize '50s/'60s/'70s era engineering, technology, & materials and also uses internal combustion engines for power. Even in the example you cite, there is *some* savings, just not an impressive and/or worthwhile amount.
Like I said, I'm basically typing a 'stream-of-consciousness' here as I consider the problem.
Strat
(London to paris)
In two days.
Depending on number of factors, that in itself may not be a bad thing.
Where I can see possibilities here is possibly as propulsion for fractional-buoyancy/buoyancy-compensated mass air cargo/passenger transport craft design using gas filled cells to lessen the demands for lift and thrust.
Some thing somewhere between a dirigible, a sea-going ship, and a passenger/cargo plane. Something that could take advantage of large scale economy savings combined with lower environmental impact. Imagine a large cargo or passenger ship that, once it clears a harbor/port area (or simply takes off from an airport), can lift itself into the air and proceed on course for it's destination on electric power with a significant percentage of the need for lift and thrust cancelled by positive-buoyancy gas cells, most or all of the electricity coming from photo-voltaic cells covering the upper hull/fuselage and lifting/control surfaces.
Having the ability to land on land or sea and at the lower speeds involved adds a large safety factor as well in the event of unforeseen weather or technical/mechanical problems in the craft itself on long global navigation legs.
If a ticket from London to Tokyo or Singapore to LA took two days but cost around the $100USD price point or even lower, many more people would travel and shipping costs included in the price of many things shipped long distances would plummet.
The current state of energy storage technology and the energy densities achievable currently do not lend themselves to small craft yet to a level approaching the ranges, loads, speeds, and costs of current small aircraft. That will likely eventually change, but it will also likely be a while yet before the balance scales tip the other way
But as I pointed out above, electric propulsion for aircraft may well scale up quite nicely with some creative engineering.
Strat
Fire his ass. Preferably, out of a very large cannon, pointed straight at the Moon.
"One of these days, Alice, one of these days!
Bang, zoom!
To the moon, Alice, to the moon!"
https://youtu.be/98qw86DsdZ0
Strat
Pfft!
Where have *you* been, Mr. Late-To-The-Party?
http://phys.org/news/2009-07-t...
Heck, it was even on Slashdot!
https://science.slashdot.org/s...
Strat
just checking in to say "me too"
Its amazing to me how many people seem to forget that life goes on just fine when everything is unplugged.... instead they start freaking out for some reason
From my perspective, I wonder "where do they find all that spare time?
I'm usually far too busy to watch a lot of movies/video/TV. I'm very selective and choose carefully, I have to. There is simply just so much to do, so many guitars to play, circuits to build, programs to write, news/science/technology sources to check, etc etc, on and on it seems at times.
It's a lot of work to accomplish even a fraction of all the project goals and tasks one would wish to in 24 hours while also trying to stay informed and current, and still get some damn sleep, ha!
Strat
"I also don't use any social media"
Yet here you are!
I dunno, I'd consider Slashdot to be one of the closest things to an "antisocial media" website on the 'net except maybe for 4chan, at least as far as toxicity/hostility-factors go, heh!
Strat
Let me guess -- you don't own a television either?
I have one, I just don't find myself using it. Between lack of worthwhile content and cable-service monopoly pricing, and adding that I can watch pretty much anything I like on the interwebs in full HD and on-demand at much lower costs ala carte or free on a big ViewSonic HD monitor with no or very little advertising, I just don't have much use for a traditional TV (or what passes for one these days), except maybe testing out game consoles, etc, for friends & family.
Nice attempt at pigeon-holing me, though.
Strat
Let me guess. You're a big Alex Jones fan, amirite?
BRRRT!
Aww, sorry AC!
Johnny, give the man a consolation internets! Better luck next time!
AJ is waaay out there, LOL! I don't think they even *make* the composition of tin-foil he apparently fashions his personal head-wear from, anymore!
Strat
Yes. Firing a high-power rifle round or a shotgun blast in the air, with no backstop, is a fantastic idea. Especially in an urban environment.
I never made any statement in my post which advocates for a particular method/tool/location for any or every situation.
I agree that being unsafe with a gun is being unsafe with a gun or any type of tool, for that matter. Those were just the first few methods/tools that came to mind that had a very high likelihood of disabling even a hardened unit.
As a long time builder in construction, mechanical/automation, and radio and navigation/guidance electronics-related fields and disciplines, among many others, "The proper tool for the job!" is a maxim in one's life (yes, I've been around a while, watched X-15 flights and Shepard's and Glenn's first Mercury launches). Crowbars, hammers, etc can be extremely useful as well depending on the situation, location, etc etc. As a bonus, those tools are the easiest and least expensive to procure, as well as least likely to attract undue LE attention nor engender the more-severe legal penalties for possession.
As a matter of fact, either whole or parted-out, those things might be worth a tidy sum of cash. Mighty tempting for drug addicts, etc that don't concern themselves much with legalities, particularly in lower-rent urban/ghetto areas as found in many large cities in the US. Heck, there are areas in Detroit that police and emergency services will not go, and I don't mean just in the outer-'burbs! I wouldn't give one of those cameras more than 2 weekends at the most there before some crack/meth-heads try to salvage it for anything they can, the metal content if nothing else!
It may even be possible to re-purpose and/or compromise them for counter-surveillance, possibly even such that they are not aware that it has even happened, but yet being capable of total control of the data they see. Like any exposed system, they could never be 100% certain it had not occurred.
That kind of technical challenge should be right up a large number of nerd/geek's wheelhouses. I wonder if the contractor/supplier/builder's sales representative pointed this serious security vulnerability out to the FBI/DHS procurement office during his sales presentation/contract proposal or related paperwork?
Strat