The right to swing your first extends to the tip of my nose. That isn't a police state.
When we went to war with Iraq in 2003, protesters were laying down in streets of New York to block traffic. They have every right in the world to express their displeasure. They don't have the right to stop other people from going to work. So while it seems evil to tell protestors to stand in a designated area (only done for particularly large protests designed to interfere with other people and events) it is actually a means of protecting everyone's rights.
But it sure is sexier to sell it as some notion that you don't have a right to free speech.
I'm shocked the news reports don't mention this, so I watched it a few more times. The car definitely hits a cone. The person is jumping out of the way of the car. I'm not sure if the car ends up hitting him or not. But the car drives right past two people in the street and whips a quick u-turn. Either they were drunk out of their minds, or they were trying to hit someone.
I'm guessing here, but because of the amount of money coming into an account that didn't have massive amounts of money coming in before, and because it is coming in from multiple countries, it got flagged as suspicious. PayPal is required by law to report cases like that to the government as part of money laundering prevention. If the government upon receiving the report decides to investigate further, PayPal is forbidden by law to let that party know they're being investigated. Yeah, government regulation! Banks have the same stipulations, and in my experience they're worse with them.
When I got laid off years back, my father in law lent me some money to pay my mortgage that month. My bank held the deposit for over two weeks because they had to investigate an unexpected deposit as being suspicious. That was one transaction, which was less than one of my paychecks but someone decided it was suspicious. That's all it takes. And everyone is trained to over-report as opposed to under-report, because you can get thrown in jail if you fail to report.
I ran a security company about 11 years back. We changed banks and payroll services (through that bank, Wells Fargo). We deposited about $200,000 into the payroll account for our first payroll, which Wells Fargo promptly held for being a suspiciously large deposit. We were transferring it from another Wells Fargo account at the same location for the payroll service they were maintaining. Every payroll check bounced and they had the gall to come after us for the fees. Thankfully they dropped all those when we pointed out they caused the whole situation.
It may be there wasn't a serious fight. The video isn't too clear, but it does look like some punches/slaps were being thrown. Maybe these were drunk friends getting upset, but they weren't going to seriously beat each other to a pulp.
However, it is hard for the officer to say a fight never occurred when he showed up 13 minutes after it broke up. The fact that the video shows these friends chasing down Phoenix, hitting him and throwing rocks at him shows that they should have all been arrested and charged with assault. Were they?
The fact that police abuse is reported on, and prosecuted shows this isn't a total police state. And the fact that you do have the freedom to question police proves it isn't a police state.
But Wikileaks is not located in the US. How can you break the law of a place where you're not?
They encourage people in the US to break US law if they're asking people to give them confidential government data. Even data from private corporations is protected by law as intellectual property. Leaking company files can be prosecuted as theft. There is no point in trying to prosecute Assange, as he isn't in the US and can't be held accountable by US law. The those who steal the data in the first place are breaking US law.
Encouraging people to do that is a violation of the TOS.
Even when both you and the porn/gambling site are located in countries where it's legal? Then PayPal does take a stance.
I agree. And that's why I called that out. PayPal doesn't take a stance on most issues, but it has chosen to do so on some. But if they refused to allow people to take donations for an organization simply because they don't agree with the views of that organization, then you start walking down a very slippery slope.
Who has determined that Wikileaks encourages people to break the law?
I've explained this a few times now, including again in this post. Asking people to steal data is encouraging them to break the law.
The problem is if he flees the scene of a crime and can't tell his side of the story, then he looks guilty. The other parties blame everything on him, and if he is caught just once, then he is screwed.
There is a fine line to walk because most cops don't want vigilantes. I'd organize a neighborhood watch. I'd start up a Guardian Angel chapter. I'd sign up to be a reserve sheriff. But the moment you jump into a fight you know nothing about and pepper spray everyone involved, you are inviting trouble.
I live in a relatively low crime city (Omaha). And I believe the cops are good guys for the most part. But I've personally witnessed a cop beating a handcuffed 14 year old who did nothing wrong to begin with. The cops stopped three teenagers who were walking down the street because they looked like punks. Then the officers handcuffed them, put them on the curb and started smacking them around because they felt the kids simply weren't respectful. Shit like this happens, ends up on YouTube, and then the world hates all cops.
There is a corner (24th and Leavenworth) where 2-3 cop cars sit all day, and yet prostitution and drug sales occur openly in front of the cops daily. And honestly, it sure seems like the cops have an arrangement to allow it in one location to keep it out of other locations.
I don't think all cops are corrupt or perfect. And I think some compromises are made in an almost impossible job. Such is the way of life. But I do applaud the good officers who put their ass on the line to protect me and mine. I won't disrespect their sacrifices.
The cops didn't seem concerned with that, but neither was Phoenix Jones. He reported it, but never did he stop to check on the guy hit by the car to see if he needed medical attention.
It wasn't clear if the guy getting hit by the car was a result of some drunk not paying attention, or was related to the fight. News reports of the incident say everyone involved denies there was a fight. But if someone intentionally hit me with a car, I'd be pretty dang upset. So I'm not sure it was related to that group of friends.
The issue I think stems from the very beginning of the video. He sees a large argument and jumps in the middle of it and apparently sprayed pepper spray early on to break up the group. People then follow and harass him for ten minutes because they were upset they were sprayed to begin with.
The people arguing in the street to begin with might have been friends that got drunk and starting screaming/pushing. It wasn't necessarily a mugging, or some random guy getting beat senseless by a group. It looks like he was so eager to find a situation to get involved in, that he overreacted.
And if he was a hero, he should have focused primarily on the guy hit by a car. Grab the license plate real quick if you want, but attend to the injured man. No one seemed focused on that.
Leaking classified government data is always against the law. Asking people to provide it is encouraging people to break US laws.
The New York Times didn't ask people to steal the data in the first place. The reported on something that was now already in public circulation.
PayPal doesn't take stands on political or moral beliefs for the most part (though you can't use PayPal to pay for porn or gambling), so you can donate to an organization, whether or not people agree with the beliefs of that organization. I don't make it a point to check out the KKK's web page. But if you see any examples they encourage people to break the law, and they accept PayPal, then report it and they may get their account suspended.
PayPal's TOS state that if you encourage people to break the law (which Wikileaks did) then your account can be frozen. PayPal enforced TOS that Wikileaks agreed to.
Two reasons come to mind, but these obviously don't cover all scenarios.
1 - You are a non-profit and open a PayPal account to accept donations. PayPal then is required by law to verify your non-profit status within a certain time frame. If they don't receive proper paperwork, they have to freeze your account. 2 - If something looks suspicious, and there is any reason to think that money might be laundered, then PayPal is required by law to file a report. That might lead to the account being frozen while an investigation takes place.
For instance, if a non-profit suddenly receives considerably more money than they did before, or changes their payment habits, or starts sending money overseas when they didn't before. These all could be legitimate transactions. But they may need to be investigated. Again, this is mandated by government regulation.
You don't leave a car rental lot without a working car. Website subscriptions are tough. If you contested the charges within an hour if you immediately discovered you couldn't use the site, you'd probably have a good case. If you wait a day or more, then someone may feel you tried to access paywall content for free by demanding a refund.
People usually wear Halloween costumes for a single day. I don't know of anyone who accepts returns on them otherwise a good chunk of people would wear them the once and then demand a refund. You can't understand why a business would have such a policy?
Wikileaks (whether you agree with them or not) encouraged people to steal and leak confidential data. If PayPal enables someone who might be breaking the law, then PayPal can be held liable. And while no one from Wikileaks has been charged in a US court (which would be pointless because they won't be extradited to the US), it doesn't matter.
PayPal is legally bound to act on anything they suspect might be illegal. Again, government regulation is at play here. Every bank and payment processor is bound by the same legislation.
Except that is a reasonable policy. If I pay for a subscription, and want a refund on the subscription later, the payment processor can't arbitrate whether or not I got benefit from the subscription.
Is Amazon evil for not accepting returns on Halloween costumes? There are circumstances where it makes sense to place restrictions on refunds otherwise you'll get taken advantage of. PayPal has an obligation to protect both seller and merchant.
So there is a website you couldn't access without certain software, which in and of itself is pretty fucked up. But somehow that is PayPal's fault?
I initially misread you. I thought you were implying that there was a New York Times story.
Something documented by a reputable news source would suggest (I would hope) that investigation was done to verify the story is legit. If such behavior happened all the time, then it isn't unreasonable that someone was able to get a story in the news. The New York Times did have a story about fraudulent sales through one particular online eyewear company I discovered in searching for PayPal stories.
A Google search for "site:www.nytimes.com Boy Scout PayPal" finds no such examples.
I have news alerts for eBay and PayPal. I do my best to keep track of my employer in the news. I've never once seen a documented case in the news of PayPal freezing funds without telling someone as you describe happens all the time, even though I do know that government regulation does mandate such behavior in the right scenario.
Show me a documented example where they froze the account of a Boy Scout troop with no explanation.
And the Boy Scouts are a non-profit, as are most summer camps and schools.
You continue to miss the point that government regulation specifically mandates that in certain scenarios you not tip off the person being investigated. You're saying regulation would prevent this behavior, when regulation is causing it.
Shadowgrounds was part of the previous bundle. If you purchased the previous bundle, then this bundle is only 3 games, and the smallest bundle to date. And initially it was only 1 game, which really isn't a bundle.
The Patriot Act (and several laws passed since then) really heavily regulate financial transactions to non-profits, because they've been used to launder money for terrorists. Banks are bound by the same laws as PayPal, and are required to freeze accounts if paperwork isn't on file. In this case, they notify you what paperwork is missing. When X.org's account was frozen, I know this was the case. And it later came out they were notified repeatedly, and dropped the ball by not submitting paperwork.
And they can be required to freeze accounts for suspicious activity, and in those cases, PayPal is not allowed to tip off the customer that they are under investigation for suspicious activity. Again, government regulation is what is screwing you here.
Slashdot Mirror
The right to swing your first extends to the tip of my nose. That isn't a police state.
When we went to war with Iraq in 2003, protesters were laying down in streets of New York to block traffic. They have every right in the world to express their displeasure. They don't have the right to stop other people from going to work. So while it seems evil to tell protestors to stand in a designated area (only done for particularly large protests designed to interfere with other people and events) it is actually a means of protecting everyone's rights.
But it sure is sexier to sell it as some notion that you don't have a right to free speech.
The link you provided is a hypothetical, not an actual example. So you're adamant you know what happened in a hypothetical situation.
You've somehow turned a fictional narrative into a real life story whose details you know.
I'm shocked the news reports don't mention this, so I watched it a few more times. The car definitely hits a cone. The person is jumping out of the way of the car. I'm not sure if the car ends up hitting him or not. But the car drives right past two people in the street and whips a quick u-turn. Either they were drunk out of their minds, or they were trying to hit someone.
I'm guessing here, but because of the amount of money coming into an account that didn't have massive amounts of money coming in before, and because it is coming in from multiple countries, it got flagged as suspicious. PayPal is required by law to report cases like that to the government as part of money laundering prevention. If the government upon receiving the report decides to investigate further, PayPal is forbidden by law to let that party know they're being investigated. Yeah, government regulation! Banks have the same stipulations, and in my experience they're worse with them.
When I got laid off years back, my father in law lent me some money to pay my mortgage that month. My bank held the deposit for over two weeks because they had to investigate an unexpected deposit as being suspicious. That was one transaction, which was less than one of my paychecks but someone decided it was suspicious. That's all it takes. And everyone is trained to over-report as opposed to under-report, because you can get thrown in jail if you fail to report.
I ran a security company about 11 years back. We changed banks and payroll services (through that bank, Wells Fargo). We deposited about $200,000 into the payroll account for our first payroll, which Wells Fargo promptly held for being a suspiciously large deposit. We were transferring it from another Wells Fargo account at the same location for the payroll service they were maintaining. Every payroll check bounced and they had the gall to come after us for the fees. Thankfully they dropped all those when we pointed out they caused the whole situation.
It may be there wasn't a serious fight. The video isn't too clear, but it does look like some punches/slaps were being thrown. Maybe these were drunk friends getting upset, but they weren't going to seriously beat each other to a pulp.
However, it is hard for the officer to say a fight never occurred when he showed up 13 minutes after it broke up. The fact that the video shows these friends chasing down Phoenix, hitting him and throwing rocks at him shows that they should have all been arrested and charged with assault. Were they?
The fact that police abuse is reported on, and prosecuted shows this isn't a total police state. And the fact that you do have the freedom to question police proves it isn't a police state.
But Wikileaks is not located in the US. How can you break the law of a place where you're not?
They encourage people in the US to break US law if they're asking people to give them confidential government data. Even data from private corporations is protected by law as intellectual property. Leaking company files can be prosecuted as theft. There is no point in trying to prosecute Assange, as he isn't in the US and can't be held accountable by US law. The those who steal the data in the first place are breaking US law.
Encouraging people to do that is a violation of the TOS.
Even when both you and the porn/gambling site are located in countries where it's legal? Then PayPal does take a stance.
I agree. And that's why I called that out. PayPal doesn't take a stance on most issues, but it has chosen to do so on some. But if they refused to allow people to take donations for an organization simply because they don't agree with the views of that organization, then you start walking down a very slippery slope.
Who has determined that Wikileaks encourages people to break the law?
I've explained this a few times now, including again in this post. Asking people to steal data is encouraging them to break the law.
The problem is if he flees the scene of a crime and can't tell his side of the story, then he looks guilty. The other parties blame everything on him, and if he is caught just once, then he is screwed.
There is a fine line to walk because most cops don't want vigilantes. I'd organize a neighborhood watch. I'd start up a Guardian Angel chapter. I'd sign up to be a reserve sheriff. But the moment you jump into a fight you know nothing about and pepper spray everyone involved, you are inviting trouble.
I live in a relatively low crime city (Omaha). And I believe the cops are good guys for the most part. But I've personally witnessed a cop beating a handcuffed 14 year old who did nothing wrong to begin with. The cops stopped three teenagers who were walking down the street because they looked like punks. Then the officers handcuffed them, put them on the curb and started smacking them around because they felt the kids simply weren't respectful. Shit like this happens, ends up on YouTube, and then the world hates all cops.
There is a corner (24th and Leavenworth) where 2-3 cop cars sit all day, and yet prostitution and drug sales occur openly in front of the cops daily. And honestly, it sure seems like the cops have an arrangement to allow it in one location to keep it out of other locations.
I don't think all cops are corrupt or perfect. And I think some compromises are made in an almost impossible job. Such is the way of life. But I do applaud the good officers who put their ass on the line to protect me and mine. I won't disrespect their sacrifices.
Sure sounds like the undercover cop was abusing his position to rape prostitutes. And I'm not one who assumes all cops are evil.
The cops didn't seem concerned with that, but neither was Phoenix Jones. He reported it, but never did he stop to check on the guy hit by the car to see if he needed medical attention.
It wasn't clear if the guy getting hit by the car was a result of some drunk not paying attention, or was related to the fight. News reports of the incident say everyone involved denies there was a fight. But if someone intentionally hit me with a car, I'd be pretty dang upset. So I'm not sure it was related to that group of friends.
The issue I think stems from the very beginning of the video. He sees a large argument and jumps in the middle of it and apparently sprayed pepper spray early on to break up the group. People then follow and harass him for ten minutes because they were upset they were sprayed to begin with.
The people arguing in the street to begin with might have been friends that got drunk and starting screaming/pushing. It wasn't necessarily a mugging, or some random guy getting beat senseless by a group. It looks like he was so eager to find a situation to get involved in, that he overreacted.
And if he was a hero, he should have focused primarily on the guy hit by a car. Grab the license plate real quick if you want, but attend to the injured man. No one seemed focused on that.
Leaking classified government data is always against the law. Asking people to provide it is encouraging people to break US laws.
The New York Times didn't ask people to steal the data in the first place. The reported on something that was now already in public circulation.
PayPal doesn't take stands on political or moral beliefs for the most part (though you can't use PayPal to pay for porn or gambling), so you can donate to an organization, whether or not people agree with the beliefs of that organization. I don't make it a point to check out the KKK's web page. But if you see any examples they encourage people to break the law, and they accept PayPal, then report it and they may get their account suspended.
PayPal's TOS state that if you encourage people to break the law (which Wikileaks did) then your account can be frozen. PayPal enforced TOS that Wikileaks agreed to.
Two reasons come to mind, but these obviously don't cover all scenarios.
1 - You are a non-profit and open a PayPal account to accept donations. PayPal then is required by law to verify your non-profit status within a certain time frame. If they don't receive proper paperwork, they have to freeze your account.
2 - If something looks suspicious, and there is any reason to think that money might be laundered, then PayPal is required by law to file a report. That might lead to the account being frozen while an investigation takes place.
For instance, if a non-profit suddenly receives considerably more money than they did before, or changes their payment habits, or starts sending money overseas when they didn't before. These all could be legitimate transactions. But they may need to be investigated. Again, this is mandated by government regulation.
You don't leave a car rental lot without a working car. Website subscriptions are tough. If you contested the charges within an hour if you immediately discovered you couldn't use the site, you'd probably have a good case. If you wait a day or more, then someone may feel you tried to access paywall content for free by demanding a refund.
People usually wear Halloween costumes for a single day. I don't know of anyone who accepts returns on them otherwise a good chunk of people would wear them the once and then demand a refund. You can't understand why a business would have such a policy?
Wikileaks (whether you agree with them or not) encouraged people to steal and leak confidential data. If PayPal enables someone who might be breaking the law, then PayPal can be held liable. And while no one from Wikileaks has been charged in a US court (which would be pointless because they won't be extradited to the US), it doesn't matter.
PayPal is legally bound to act on anything they suspect might be illegal. Again, government regulation is at play here. Every bank and payment processor is bound by the same legislation.
Except that is a reasonable policy. If I pay for a subscription, and want a refund on the subscription later, the payment processor can't arbitrate whether or not I got benefit from the subscription.
Is Amazon evil for not accepting returns on Halloween costumes? There are circumstances where it makes sense to place restrictions on refunds otherwise you'll get taken advantage of. PayPal has an obligation to protect both seller and merchant.
So there is a website you couldn't access without certain software, which in and of itself is pretty fucked up. But somehow that is PayPal's fault?
I can still see the Grues!
We had to imagine games in our minds, and only using black and white. Color imagination was too expensive.
Please provide me one documented case of each.
I initially misread you. I thought you were implying that there was a New York Times story.
Something documented by a reputable news source would suggest (I would hope) that investigation was done to verify the story is legit. If such behavior happened all the time, then it isn't unreasonable that someone was able to get a story in the news. The New York Times did have a story about fraudulent sales through one particular online eyewear company I discovered in searching for PayPal stories.
A Google search for "site:www.nytimes.com Boy Scout PayPal" finds no such examples.
I have news alerts for eBay and PayPal. I do my best to keep track of my employer in the news. I've never once seen a documented case in the news of PayPal freezing funds without telling someone as you describe happens all the time, even though I do know that government regulation does mandate such behavior in the right scenario.
Show me a documented example where they froze the account of a Boy Scout troop with no explanation.
And the Boy Scouts are a non-profit, as are most summer camps and schools.
You continue to miss the point that government regulation specifically mandates that in certain scenarios you not tip off the person being investigated. You're saying regulation would prevent this behavior, when regulation is causing it.
Shadowgrounds was part of the previous bundle. If you purchased the previous bundle, then this bundle is only 3 games, and the smallest bundle to date. And initially it was only 1 game, which really isn't a bundle.
You're mistaken.
http://www.nonprofitlawblog.com/home/2006/09/patriot_act_and.html
The Patriot Act (and several laws passed since then) really heavily regulate financial transactions to non-profits, because they've been used to launder money for terrorists. Banks are bound by the same laws as PayPal, and are required to freeze accounts if paperwork isn't on file. In this case, they notify you what paperwork is missing. When X.org's account was frozen, I know this was the case. And it later came out they were notified repeatedly, and dropped the ball by not submitting paperwork.
And they can be required to freeze accounts for suspicious activity, and in those cases, PayPal is not allowed to tip off the customer that they are under investigation for suspicious activity. Again, government regulation is what is screwing you here.