You can read the Statement of Organization on the FEC's website. Note that Grayson has accused Mycongressmanisnuts.com of checking box f instead of box c, thus misrepresenting the function of their PAC and violating the law. Additionally Grayson has alleged the PAC is in fact a connected committee due to her status as the former head of the Lake County Republican Party. They will haul you away if you file your taxes improperly, and this isn't any different. The FEC even gives you a guide to filling out the paperwork, which believe it or not is actually pretty simple for the relevant form.
The applicable instructions read as follows:
Line 5. Type of CommitteeCheck box (f) if the committee supports or opposes more than one federal candidate. Box (c) applies if the committee supports or opposes only one candidate. (These are the only boxes on Line 5 applicable to nonconnected committees.)
I think the problem they would have here is demonstrating intent. Nevermind the political idiocy of it. I think that filing the complaint was ok, but specifically asking for jail time was a bit much in my opinion.
It has been a while since I studied physics (as is plainly apparent at this point), and I thank you for your informative response. It just crushes me to think that if we ever got our shit together and got off this rock, it wouldn't matter anyway because humanity (or whatever) will still live a fragmented existence of "nations". Except then it would be fundamental properties of the universe holding us apart, instead of our own greed and stupidity.
No, he's probably just saying that any revisions/replacements to Einsten's theory are much more likely to be minor corrections rather than complete reversals. I'll refer to The Relativity of Wrong, and say that revisions to Relativity are most likely going to be like going from the theory that the earth is an Oblate Spheroid to it's actual, more complicated but still extremely Oblate Spheroidal geometry, not finding out that the earth is actually a cube or a torus. The Oblate Spheroid theory was wrong, but it wasn't horribly, horribly wrong. It was extremely close to precisely correct.
My point is that I hope that the speed of light isn't the ultimate speed limit of the universe, not that everything about relativity is wrong. Please correct me if I am mistaken, but it is my understanding the biggest issue known (until the late 19th century) with classical mechanics was the precession of Mercury. It took a very long time for our understanding of related fields to become expansive enough to see the holes in classical mechanics. I never suggested we should be using rockets anyway, just that I am hopeful some undiscovered physics will enable us to build FTL capable vessels. I completely agree that rockets are useless for exploring the universe.
It's possible that Einsten's theory is wrong in such a way that FTL travel is possible. However it is highly doubtful that it's wrong in such a way that FTL travel is easy, or even possible via conventional means. For example the Relativistic Kinetic Energy equation is extremely well verified, any post-Relativity theory is likely to only add a couple significant digits to the end of it, so achieving FTL with a rocketship is still going to be out of the question.
Einstein is almost certainly wrong, but it's very very doubtful that he's "horribly, horribly" wrong.
Hence my lament. Perhaps that was a poor choice of words, but my point stands.
No offense, but we'd probably already know if he were horribly, horribly wrong.
I'm confused by this. Are you saying we already know everything about physics? Please elaborate.
And we already know that if we go a few billion years in the future, the Sun won't be there any more
I'm not saying it is pointless to leave, and I sincerely hope we make it out of our solar system without killing ourselves first. It just saddens me that all those colonies of humanity (or whatever we are at that point) will never be able to communicate with each other on a reasonable time scale. Who cares if there is life out there besides our own if we can never see it, or if we do see it, we wouldn't have anyone like us to tell about it by the time we got back.
I would gladly give up my little blue planet to get a glimpse at the rest of the universe. You shouldn't lash out at people unless you understood what was written, because you clearly did not comprehend my post.
Since I need to spell it out for you, here goes:
What is the point of sending people into the universe never to return if we can never get useful data out of it during our lifetimes? Even if you are willing to wait for longer than humanity has existed the trip would still be futile. It would be a hell of a ride... and that is about it. Utterly pointless from a scientific perspective. And who cares if we can colonize the universe if we can never communicate between colonies? Assuming we colonized the entire universe, the result would be millions if not billions of independent civilizations with very little if any bi-directional communication beyond the edges. Not completely pointless, but our progress thus far is based on mutual cooperation and learning from others. What about a civilization on the other side of the universe? By the time we got over there, said hi, and came back we would be visiting yet another alien civilization, the remnants of our own. Yes you can have personal knowledge about what is out there, but humanity as a whole can not.
Current theories suggest that dark matter does not interact with baryonic matter except through gravity, which is why we can see its effects on other matter but can't actually see it. Personally I think the theory is crap, but its the best we have right now.
As a side note, I really hope Einstein was horribly horribly wrong; what kind of sick joke would it be to be given this mind bogglingly gigantic and beautiful universe, destined never to venture further than a few light years from the star that gave us life, lest we condemn ourselves to never seeing our home again. We know he was wrong, just not in the ways he needs to be.
> That's because at my core I am a greedy self-serving animal. The only difference between me and the apes is that I horde money instead of food. You'll never change this.
I used to be a libertarian too, with a card and everything. Then I realized that I don't live in a vacuum, my peer group is actually the entirety of mankind, and there is no "other". Communism as implemented was flawed, to understate it, but to hold capitalism up as the best we can manage while simultaneously portraying humans as incapable of evolving beyond our basest instincts is perverse, to make another understatement.
If you're going to reference Sci-Fi, at least quote a good author:
"The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom."
"The Earth should not be cut up into hundreds of different sections, each inhabited by a self-defined segment of humanity that considers its own welfare and its own 'national security' to be paramount above all other consideration. [...] There are no nations! There is only humanity. And if we don't come to understand that right soon, there will be no nations, because there will be no humanity. "
"Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'"
You have to clean a fountain though, this requires zero maintenance. One thing I like about it is the fuzz emitted is adjustable; if there is something bothering me I can tune it to the same frequency range to a certain extent to help mask the noise. The same device works equally well for masking a TV as it does for a lawnmower, with slight adjustment of course.
> I've got a whole bunch of PATA DVD burners from 2007 that don't even show up in modern linux distros.
I find that extremely hard to believe; ATA has been standardized for years.
> Ubuntu 9.10 doesn't like my board's SiliconImage SATA controller.
Don't buy trash and you won't have that problem. I'm willing to bet your problems were the result of something being incorrectly configured in the BIOS. Which chipset is it? I can tell you from experience the 3112 in particular works fine.
I can tell you that the tree farms I have seen (northern Florida, and southern Georgia) are nothing but endless rows of fast growing pine, with absolutely nothing else. The real forests down there are so dense that during the summer you can't see but a few feet into them, and good luck trying to walk through it without a machete or a trail. I'm sorry but a tree farm is not a forest in any sense of the word.
You should really at least read the drivel you link to before posting, because as crazy as that blog is, that is not what it even says. And those quotes aren't even from him, just a bad Youtube video with a crappy audio track and a picture of Jennings (as if he is the one speaking). I'd laugh if there weren't so many of you fuckwits out there.
lmao all those evil capital 'R' have ruined days for me, oh how I long to change them to lowercase of all priorities in life. All 3 people in the world are affected by this, come on seriously is that a real big priority?
It is called an example. A simple one at that.
Anyways there are plenty of programs
Plenty of programs that what, wrote all their own code? You tell me that only 3 people would ever need to do this kind of thing then proceed to refer to a multitude of programs that do exactly that. What if one of them doesn't do exactly what you need? You're SOL because it is inflexible. And if the GUI was truly awesome for absolutely every task, why does the example program you give accept regular expressions? Nevermind the fact that I didn't have to download an untrusted executable from some random website.
I work with AutoCAD all day long in my construction/engineering business, we have 2 old commandline guys here who used to be able to school me any day in the amount of work they could do but once AutoDesk figured out the commandline was the way of the past and started integrating more GUI features to their newer versions. It was game over for command line as using the GUI was faster, now AutoDesk in their next version will be integrating the Ribbon Bar.
Like I said, you don't hear me advocating lynx for web browsing. AutoCAD by its very nature lends itself to a GUI. Apparently my point was lost on you so let me reiterate. I never said the CLI was the best interface ever invented. Depending on what you are doing, if you have taken the time to learn how to use your computer, the command line is much faster and easier for certain tasks. I don't need a special app for mass renames (which is the simplest example I could come up with) because the shell has that capability already.
You took the time to learn the command line, but maybe you should take the time to automate some of your stuff so you don't have to repeat such an exhaustive spread out combination of different keys just to accomplish that task.
That makes no sense. Why would I have to repeat anything? And how are you supposed to automate commands with a GUI if that capability wasn't programmed in?
AND it's non-user friendly. I grew-up using command lines, but was thrilled when I bought my first mouse. It made it possible to do the same stuff, but without memorizing the commands or digging through a manual.
What I'm hearing is "waah, computers are hard. I want someone to hold my hand mommy." Technology is complicated. Doubly so if you want to do something complicated.
Replacing the CLI with a mouse improves usability.
Not always, as I will demonstrate.
find -type f -name "?r*" -exec mv \{\} all_files_that_have_r_as_second_letter \;
Do that in a GUI in the less than 5 seconds it took me to type that. Yeah you could do a search, then copy and paste all the files. But that takes more than 5 seconds (and no I didn't look at a manual).
Slightly more complicated:
for f in *; do mv $f `echo $f | tr 'r' 'R'`; done
Change all instances of r to R in filenames for all files in the current directory. You could modify this to be a little more picky with sed instead of tr. How do you do this in a GUI without a special program? I certainly don't know how. Something tells me that you don't know either.
The power of the command line is it's versatility, not that any slack jawed moron can drive it. Those of us who use our computers for more than trolling slashdot are glad to take the time to learn how to use them properly, and are rewarded with a much more capable interface for specific kinds of tasks (you don't see me advocating lynx as a web browser). Those commands might look complicated but it took me all of 10 seconds to come up with them, because I took the time to learn how to use the command line. But hey if you don't need the extra power, feel free to fumble around with right clicking on files and hitting rename.
Say there was a dirty bomb attack on a city. Is it not the government's job to get everyone out of there? Why is it any different with a natural disaster? I watched as Katrina exploded into a category 5 storm and couldn't believe that the government (state and federal) was just sitting on their hands. They didn't walk anywhere because there was nowhere for them to go. We all know how well the Superdome turned out. You ever tried to get a hotel on the gulf coast when there is a hurricane anywhere near there? It is fucking impossible. Never mind the fact that most of the people who got stuck didn't have the money to rent a room to begin with. So I ask you again, where were they supposed to walk to?
The road that goes by my house benefits far less than 5% of the state I live in, yet it it was paid for out of state funds. Likewise, I have help build roads that I will never see, never drive on, and never directly benefit from. Building infrastructure allows all of society to enjoy a higher standard of living, not just those with the resources to pave their way. That road that I will never see lets my neighbors have easier access to the small business I work at, thus indirectly increasing revenues, and (theoretically) my pay.
You might only use the internet for trolling slashdot, but some of us actually buy stuff. Some people do this thing called "telecommuting" where you work from home using your internet connection. You can take classes online now, do your taxes, even vote in some countries. There will be a point where you will not be able to be a functional member of society without an internet connection. We aren't there yet so this may be a little early, but isn't it prudent to build the infrastructure before you need it?
You are against public education. I'd rather pay for my neighbor's kid to get a proper education so that they can become a productive member of society, than pay to lock up some uneducated idiot that can't make a living. For the record, I do not have children of my own. I think the underlying problem is that you are too shortsighted to see that most of the things that government does are for the indirect good. It may be that many policies are implemented poorly but that is a separate problem. Police mostly benefit you indirectly as well. I know I sure as hell don't have a police escort everywhere I go, but somehow I don't get mugged every time I step out my door.
On a related note, what are your ideas for ending the cycle of poverty? I have yet to hear a libertarian approach that doesn't consist of "people will give more money to charity when taxes are eliminated." And it doesn't matter if you pay 10% less on your taxes if your income is $0 to begin with. This is why libertarianism is just as unrealistic as any other pure political philosophy, and it would do you well to be less dogmatic. I really want to know what you propose to do about the 40 million people that are in poverty right here in the United States.
Virgina v. Black was about burning a cross. Burning a cross in your front yard is not the same as someone saying "I'm going to kill you".
Brandenburg v. Ohio was a ruling regarding general statements made against a class of people, not specific statements made against a specific person.
In Watts v. United States it was determined that Watts' statement did not constitute an actual death threat against the president. From the decision: "[his comments were] held to be crude political hyperbole which, in light of its context and conditional nature, did not constitute a knowing and willful threat against the President within the coverage of 18 U.S.C. 871(a)." Watts was freed because he didn't threaten the president.
All fifty states have statutes similar to this one, or classify death threats as "coercion" (also a criminal offense). All fifty of them are perfectly constitutional.
As expected, a perfectly reasoned response. Thanks for the laugh.
Slashdot is great because of the insightful commentary. The signal to noise ratio used to be much higher back in 1998, when you were getting your first IBM PC.
Exactly that happened to my wife a few years ago while she was driving through Virginia on I-95. We had some work done on the car which involved the removal of a wheel. About a week later while on her trip, the wheel came off and rolled across the median into oncoming traffic, colliding with a brand new Cadallac (only cosmetic damage). She got a ticket for "failure to maintain the vehicle", though the insurance company considered it a no-fault accident.
Slashdot Mirror
You can read the Statement of Organization on the FEC's website. Note that Grayson has accused Mycongressmanisnuts.com of checking box f instead of box c, thus misrepresenting the function of their PAC and violating the law. Additionally Grayson has alleged the PAC is in fact a connected committee due to her status as the former head of the Lake County Republican Party. They will haul you away if you file your taxes improperly, and this isn't any different. The FEC even gives you a guide to filling out the paperwork, which believe it or not is actually pretty simple for the relevant form.
The applicable instructions read as follows:
Line 5. Type of CommitteeCheck box (f) if the committee supports or opposes more than one federal candidate. Box (c) applies if the committee supports or opposes only one candidate. (These are the only boxes on Line 5 applicable to nonconnected committees.)
I think the problem they would have here is demonstrating intent. Nevermind the political idiocy of it. I think that filing the complaint was ok, but specifically asking for jail time was a bit much in my opinion.
It has been a while since I studied physics (as is plainly apparent at this point), and I thank you for your informative response. It just crushes me to think that if we ever got our shit together and got off this rock, it wouldn't matter anyway because humanity (or whatever) will still live a fragmented existence of "nations". Except then it would be fundamental properties of the universe holding us apart, instead of our own greed and stupidity.
No, he's probably just saying that any revisions/replacements to Einsten's theory are much more likely to be minor corrections rather than complete reversals. I'll refer to The Relativity of Wrong, and say that revisions to Relativity are most likely going to be like going from the theory that the earth is an Oblate Spheroid to it's actual, more complicated but still extremely Oblate Spheroidal geometry, not finding out that the earth is actually a cube or a torus. The Oblate Spheroid theory was wrong, but it wasn't horribly, horribly wrong. It was extremely close to precisely correct.
My point is that I hope that the speed of light isn't the ultimate speed limit of the universe, not that everything about relativity is wrong. Please correct me if I am mistaken, but it is my understanding the biggest issue known (until the late 19th century) with classical mechanics was the precession of Mercury. It took a very long time for our understanding of related fields to become expansive enough to see the holes in classical mechanics. I never suggested we should be using rockets anyway, just that I am hopeful some undiscovered physics will enable us to build FTL capable vessels. I completely agree that rockets are useless for exploring the universe.
It's possible that Einsten's theory is wrong in such a way that FTL travel is possible. However it is highly doubtful that it's wrong in such a way that FTL travel is easy, or even possible via conventional means. For example the Relativistic Kinetic Energy equation is extremely well verified, any post-Relativity theory is likely to only add a couple significant digits to the end of it, so achieving FTL with a rocketship is still going to be out of the question.
Einstein is almost certainly wrong, but it's very very doubtful that he's "horribly, horribly" wrong.
Hence my lament. Perhaps that was a poor choice of words, but my point stands.
No offense, but we'd probably already know if he were horribly, horribly wrong.
I'm confused by this. Are you saying we already know everything about physics? Please elaborate.
And we already know that if we go a few billion years in the future, the Sun won't be there any more
I'm not saying it is pointless to leave, and I sincerely hope we make it out of our solar system without killing ourselves first. It just saddens me that all those colonies of humanity (or whatever we are at that point) will never be able to communicate with each other on a reasonable time scale. Who cares if there is life out there besides our own if we can never see it, or if we do see it, we wouldn't have anyone like us to tell about it by the time we got back.
I would gladly give up my little blue planet to get a glimpse at the rest of the universe. You shouldn't lash out at people unless you understood what was written, because you clearly did not comprehend my post.
Since I need to spell it out for you, here goes:
What is the point of sending people into the universe never to return if we can never get useful data out of it during our lifetimes? Even if you are willing to wait for longer than humanity has existed the trip would still be futile. It would be a hell of a ride... and that is about it. Utterly pointless from a scientific perspective. And who cares if we can colonize the universe if we can never communicate between colonies? Assuming we colonized the entire universe, the result would be millions if not billions of independent civilizations with very little if any bi-directional communication beyond the edges. Not completely pointless, but our progress thus far is based on mutual cooperation and learning from others. What about a civilization on the other side of the universe? By the time we got over there, said hi, and came back we would be visiting yet another alien civilization, the remnants of our own. Yes you can have personal knowledge about what is out there, but humanity as a whole can not.
Current theories suggest that dark matter does not interact with baryonic matter except through gravity, which is why we can see its effects on other matter but can't actually see it. Personally I think the theory is crap, but its the best we have right now.
As a side note, I really hope Einstein was horribly horribly wrong; what kind of sick joke would it be to be given this mind bogglingly gigantic and beautiful universe, destined never to venture further than a few light years from the star that gave us life, lest we condemn ourselves to never seeing our home again. We know he was wrong, just not in the ways he needs to be.
$174.80.
> That's because at my core I am a greedy self-serving animal. The only difference between me and the apes is that I horde money instead of food. You'll never change this.
FTFY. You speak only for yourself. You are also dead wrong.
I used to be a libertarian too, with a card and everything. Then I realized that I don't live in a vacuum, my peer group is actually the entirety of mankind, and there is no "other". Communism as implemented was flawed, to understate it, but to hold capitalism up as the best we can manage while simultaneously portraying humans as incapable of evolving beyond our basest instincts is perverse, to make another understatement.
If you're going to reference Sci-Fi, at least quote a good author:
"The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom."
"The Earth should not be cut up into hundreds of different sections, each inhabited by a self-defined segment of humanity that considers its own welfare and its own 'national security' to be paramount above all other consideration. [...] There are no nations! There is only humanity. And if we don't come to understand that right soon, there will be no nations, because there will be no humanity. "
"Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'"
-- Isaac Asimov
You have to clean a fountain though, this requires zero maintenance. One thing I like about it is the fuzz emitted is adjustable; if there is something bothering me I can tune it to the same frequency range to a certain extent to help mask the noise. The same device works equally well for masking a TV as it does for a lawnmower, with slight adjustment of course.
> I've got a whole bunch of PATA DVD burners from 2007 that don't even show up in modern linux distros.
I find that extremely hard to believe; ATA has been standardized for years.
> Ubuntu 9.10 doesn't like my board's SiliconImage SATA controller.
Don't buy trash and you won't have that problem. I'm willing to bet your problems were the result of something being incorrectly configured in the BIOS. Which chipset is it? I can tell you from experience the 3112 in particular works fine.
Ever try one of these?. I can't sleep without some level of fuzz in the background, and this had done wonders for my sleep.
Nevermind
The lowest I've seen in a very long time is a three digit UID.
The problem is when people try to call a tree farm a forest, as the GGP did. A forest is a lot more than a bunch of trees.
I can tell you that the tree farms I have seen (northern Florida, and southern Georgia) are nothing but endless rows of fast growing pine, with absolutely nothing else. The real forests down there are so dense that during the summer you can't see but a few feet into them, and good luck trying to walk through it without a machete or a trail. I'm sorry but a tree farm is not a forest in any sense of the word.
You should really at least read the drivel you link to before posting, because as crazy as that blog is, that is not what it even says. And those quotes aren't even from him, just a bad Youtube video with a crappy audio track and a picture of Jennings (as if he is the one speaking). I'd laugh if there weren't so many of you fuckwits out there.
And insightful? Really?
PS: it is whether, not weather.
lmao all those evil capital 'R' have ruined days for me, oh how I long to change them to lowercase of all priorities in life. All 3 people in the world are affected by this, come on seriously is that a real big priority?
It is called an example. A simple one at that.
Anyways there are plenty of programs
Plenty of programs that what, wrote all their own code? You tell me that only 3 people would ever need to do this kind of thing then proceed to refer to a multitude of programs that do exactly that. What if one of them doesn't do exactly what you need? You're SOL because it is inflexible. And if the GUI was truly awesome for absolutely every task, why does the example program you give accept regular expressions? Nevermind the fact that I didn't have to download an untrusted executable from some random website.
I work with AutoCAD all day long in my construction/engineering business, we have 2 old commandline guys here who used to be able to school me any day in the amount of work they could do but once AutoDesk figured out the commandline was the way of the past and started integrating more GUI features to their newer versions. It was game over for command line as using the GUI was faster, now AutoDesk in their next version will be integrating the Ribbon Bar.
Like I said, you don't hear me advocating lynx for web browsing. AutoCAD by its very nature lends itself to a GUI. Apparently my point was lost on you so let me reiterate. I never said the CLI was the best interface ever invented. Depending on what you are doing, if you have taken the time to learn how to use your computer, the command line is much faster and easier for certain tasks. I don't need a special app for mass renames (which is the simplest example I could come up with) because the shell has that capability already.
You took the time to learn the command line, but maybe you should take the time to automate some of your stuff so you don't have to repeat such an exhaustive spread out combination of different keys just to accomplish that task.
That makes no sense. Why would I have to repeat anything? And how are you supposed to automate commands with a GUI if that capability wasn't programmed in?
AND it's non-user friendly. I grew-up using command lines, but was thrilled when I bought my first mouse. It made it possible to do the same stuff, but without memorizing the commands or digging through a manual.
What I'm hearing is "waah, computers are hard. I want someone to hold my hand mommy." Technology is complicated. Doubly so if you want to do something complicated.
Replacing the CLI with a mouse improves usability.
Not always, as I will demonstrate.
find -type f -name "?r*" -exec mv \{\} all_files_that_have_r_as_second_letter \;
Do that in a GUI in the less than 5 seconds it took me to type that. Yeah you could do a search, then copy and paste all the files. But that takes more than 5 seconds (and no I didn't look at a manual).
Slightly more complicated:
for f in *; do mv $f `echo $f | tr 'r' 'R'`; done
Change all instances of r to R in filenames for all files in the current directory. You could modify this to be a little more picky with sed instead of tr. How do you do this in a GUI without a special program? I certainly don't know how. Something tells me that you don't know either.
The power of the command line is it's versatility, not that any slack jawed moron can drive it. Those of us who use our computers for more than trolling slashdot are glad to take the time to learn how to use them properly, and are rewarded with a much more capable interface for specific kinds of tasks (you don't see me advocating lynx as a web browser). Those commands might look complicated but it took me all of 10 seconds to come up with them, because I took the time to learn how to use the command line. But hey if you don't need the extra power, feel free to fumble around with right clicking on files and hitting rename.
Say there was a dirty bomb attack on a city. Is it not the government's job to get everyone out of there? Why is it any different with a natural disaster? I watched as Katrina exploded into a category 5 storm and couldn't believe that the government (state and federal) was just sitting on their hands. They didn't walk anywhere because there was nowhere for them to go. We all know how well the Superdome turned out. You ever tried to get a hotel on the gulf coast when there is a hurricane anywhere near there? It is fucking impossible. Never mind the fact that most of the people who got stuck didn't have the money to rent a room to begin with. So I ask you again, where were they supposed to walk to?
And I call bullshit on your anecdote.
The road that goes by my house benefits far less than 5% of the state I live in, yet it it was paid for out of state funds. Likewise, I have help build roads that I will never see, never drive on, and never directly benefit from. Building infrastructure allows all of society to enjoy a higher standard of living, not just those with the resources to pave their way. That road that I will never see lets my neighbors have easier access to the small business I work at, thus indirectly increasing revenues, and (theoretically) my pay.
You might only use the internet for trolling slashdot, but some of us actually buy stuff. Some people do this thing called "telecommuting" where you work from home using your internet connection. You can take classes online now, do your taxes, even vote in some countries. There will be a point where you will not be able to be a functional member of society without an internet connection. We aren't there yet so this may be a little early, but isn't it prudent to build the infrastructure before you need it?
You are against public education. I'd rather pay for my neighbor's kid to get a proper education so that they can become a productive member of society, than pay to lock up some uneducated idiot that can't make a living. For the record, I do not have children of my own. I think the underlying problem is that you are too shortsighted to see that most of the things that government does are for the indirect good. It may be that many policies are implemented poorly but that is a separate problem. Police mostly benefit you indirectly as well. I know I sure as hell don't have a police escort everywhere I go, but somehow I don't get mugged every time I step out my door.
On a related note, what are your ideas for ending the cycle of poverty? I have yet to hear a libertarian approach that doesn't consist of "people will give more money to charity when taxes are eliminated." And it doesn't matter if you pay 10% less on your taxes if your income is $0 to begin with. This is why libertarianism is just as unrealistic as any other pure political philosophy, and it would do you well to be less dogmatic. I really want to know what you propose to do about the 40 million people that are in poverty right here in the United States.
The rifle. Cuz' big bad government would come and put you up for the rest of your life ;P
Virgina v. Black was about burning a cross. Burning a cross in your front yard is not the same as someone saying "I'm going to kill you".
Brandenburg v. Ohio was a ruling regarding general statements made against a class of people, not specific statements made against a specific person.
In Watts v. United States it was determined that Watts' statement did not constitute an actual death threat against the president. From the decision: "[his comments were] held to be crude political hyperbole which, in light of its context and conditional nature, did not constitute a knowing and willful threat against the President within the coverage of 18 U.S.C. 871(a)." Watts was freed because he didn't threaten the president.
Google does not make you a lawyer.
Go ahead and threaten the president. See how long it takes for the Secret Service to show up at your door. They take even the most ludicrous threats seriously.
In addition:
Virginia Code Title 18.2-60 A. 1. Any person who knowingly communicates, in a writing, including an electronically transmitted communication producing a visual or electronic message, a threat to kill or do bodily injury to a person, regarding that person or any member of his family, and the threat places such person in reasonable apprehension of death or bodily injury to himself or his family member, is guilty of a Class 6 felony. However, any person who violates this subsection with the intent to commit an act of terrorism as defined in 18.2-46.4 is guilty of a Class 5 felony.
All fifty states have statutes similar to this one, or classify death threats as "coercion" (also a criminal offense). All fifty of them are perfectly constitutional.
As expected, a perfectly reasoned response. Thanks for the laugh.
Slashdot is great because of the insightful commentary. The signal to noise ratio used to be much higher back in 1998, when you were getting your first IBM PC.
You are part of the noise:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1359291&cid=29326585
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1359291&cid=29326429
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1359291&cid=29338677
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1358997&cid=29339347
And what the fuck are you spending so much time posting to slashdot if you don't have a job?
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1358997&cid=29339113
Please stop posting to /.
Exactly that happened to my wife a few years ago while she was driving through Virginia on I-95. We had some work done on the car which involved the removal of a wheel. About a week later while on her trip, the wheel came off and rolled across the median into oncoming traffic, colliding with a brand new Cadallac (only cosmetic damage). She got a ticket for "failure to maintain the vehicle", though the insurance company considered it a no-fault accident.