Oh, and Trump will have The Button and there's not a damned thing anyone could do to stop him from pressing it whenever he wanted, short of Congress pre-emptively legislating that the system be dismantled (and if Trump commanded the armed forces not to comply?).
Fortunately you're wrong. There are checks and balances in place. Read this... it cheered me up no end.
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11...
The issues haven't magically gone away, have they? If we keep mum, Trump Supporters may not even realise they're being duped by the guy they, being so "mad", got elected. Or they might simply fail to catch on when President Trump (as I fervently hope) totally fails to make good on his election promises.
Even Trump Supporters will be able to discern things aren't looking up for them... they will just need a little assistance in thinking through various cause and effect chains and realising what went wrong.
We should be willing to help them out. don't you think? Or they might not catch on and make the same mistake again in four years time.
Ok, I get it, you're an advanced case of Trump Supporter. The problem with Trump supporters is however: they may be angry but they're really, really uninformed. I don't have the time to walk you down the list, but take health insurance now.
Go to "interstate insurance" says you. Alas... that won't work.
Healthcare is expensive. And no matter how you slice the cake (just Google "risk pools"), those slices adds up to the same total. Cost has to be met through insurance premiums. That's how insurance works. And inter state insurance was already a possibility (states allowing). So unless you can drive costs down it's only a matter of spreading the burden, Ok? You'll end up paying the same as under the ACA. Read: your premiums aren't coming down.
How about trying to drive costs down then, eh? Well, you may have a point there. US health care is inefficient. See e,g, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Besides which, about one third seems to go to administrative overhead. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
So there clearly is scope for improvement. Go to a single payer system? Nope: that's Bernie Sanders idea... and both Democrat and Republican voters closed that line of approach very firmly. Democrats preferred Clinto and Republicans vetoed anything but privatised insurance. Wanted market mechanisms. Hence the "exchanges" we're all so wild about. Got any other ideas? Lets hear 'em !
Operating costs then? Let's see how we might get there.
Hospitals in the US are still mostly non-profit. See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... But they're being privatised, and with it implementation of health care. So you're losing a bit of leverage there. Now what could you still do?
Drive down nurses salaries across the board? Really? You're going to need a lot of illegal Mexicans (or robots) to accomplish that. Wait... your other objective was not to push working Americans out of their job? Hmm... that's a problem.
Reduce doctors' salaries? Won't get you there 'cause they're not the biggest expense.
Reduce hospital costs? They're either privatised or not wildly unreasonable in cost/benefit terms. People have tried for decades. So: good luck with that.
Reduce the amount of money going into advanced medical technology accessible to collective insurance? Really? Tell people they're going to get second-class care unless they pay extra?
Reduce the potential for medical liability claims? And undermine the most entrenched checks-and-balances mechanism in US law?
Exclude people who are likely to incur more costs? Well, that's the medical insurer's traditional way. Just don't smoke, don't be obese, don't be old, don't have hereditary diseases... and above all don't get ill and you'll be just fine.
Cap insurance coverage and let people who are uninsured or insufficiently drop dead? Well... that seems viable. We're doing a bit of that already. Simply set the premium you think people should pay, multiply by the number of people, and there's your budget. Limit care to match the budget. Wait... did anyone say: "Death panels"?
If anyone can come up with a working solution that isn't the ACA I'll cheer. Only I don't see one. People have been looking for only 20 years now. Pardon me if I'm the tiniest bit sceptic ab
- prepare for an increase in racism and gender discrimination in society
- expect the education system to get worse
- expect environmental protection laws and oversight to be gutted
Foreign policy
- prepare for disastrously stupid and venal politics in Iraq and Syria, including the targeting of innocent civilians to get one or two terrorists
- prepare for extended US military commitment in Iraq, Syria
- prepare for major loss of US influence, partners, and significance in Asia
- prepare for disastrous policy with respect to China, probably leading to a trade war the US is going to lose, perhaps the start of a major military conflict in Asia
- prepare to lose big in geopolitical manoeuvring against a wily and resurgent Russia due to terminally stupid policies
Did I miss anything? Probably. I have total confidence in President Trump to exceed expectations on the above list.
I viewed the video clip and Barak Obama never said and never even suggested that illegals should vote.
Besides which, the whole idea is ridiculous. If you're not a citizen, you're not eligible to vote in federal elections. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ). You won't even appear on the voting roll unless somebody makes an administrative mistake. And that's quite uncommon, despite conspiracy theorist ramblings.
I might understand that you could have honestly missed that if you're not used to listening closely (unlike your average media person) and/or paying close attention to what is being said (unlike your average media person) or simply don't care much about getting your facts right (unlike your average media person). Or if you're too busy feeling indignant to pay attention but focus instead on getting a post out. But you're still wrong.
Your first amendment rights guarantee your right to spout nonsense (in good faith). Practicality virtually guarantees you won't be be prosecuted for slander. There are simply far too many people saying dumb things in good faith to be able to spot something who maliciously spreads disinformation.
However, this is the perfect illustration of what Obama means by Facebook posters muddying the waters.
Except you're doing it on Slashdot instead of Facebook.
In the UK where this insurer is based, businesses need permission to access this data. Facebook can't just sell it to them. They can do some targeting on behalf of advertisers, but they can't pass on the content of non-public posts or personal details.
Not a problem. Users can give their consent by signing up or continuing to use Facebook, or even by consenting explicitly on a case by case basis. And strictly speaking, Facebook will only be selling meta-information on people that companies could have obtained for themselves (if Facebook let them).
Of course people need to have an incentive to give their consent. A rebate on the normal premium would do. Remember the flap about Facebook allowing advertisers to racially profile properties for rent advertisements? You may well be able to say something about a prospective tenant's likelihood to cause trouble from his Facebook page. So why not mine that data and avoid potential problems? After all, references are used for the same purpose.
Sorry, but I see your objections as surmountable. I can see FARTS catching on yet.
I'm fairly confident that this kind of data mining will become mainstream within a few years.
A less charitable (but imho more realistic) view of Facebook's uncooperative attitude would be that Facebook objects to someone extracting value from their data without paying them first. And wants to make sure they're covered against legal fallout about the quality of the data they're providing. After all, they wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of a class action suit for not exercising due diligence in providing tamper-proof data.
As to Facebook's "rules", look at e.g. LinkedIn. I'm quite certain that headhunters take people's LinkedIn profile into consideration and use it to co-determine whether to contact someone and who to recommend them to at what salary level. So why not Facebook? One might say it's because Facebook is not explicitly aimed at job-marketing yourself, but that's but an extra service (agreement) away.
This sort of development would markedly increase the commercial value of Facebook's data.
I therefore believe it won't be long now before Facebook launches something comparable, as a paid service. Lets call it the "Facebook Automatic Reference Transmission Service", whereby Facebook (for a fee) asserts to third parties that person ABC has maintined a Facebook presence and that the user's posts satisfy criteria XYZ. Whereby XYZ would be configurable by the party doing the asking (and paying Facebook's fees).
I'm by no means an expert in military aviation, but those who are point out that the A10 lacks survivability in a "high threat environment" (see e.g. http://nationalinterest.org/bl... ).
Meaning it's not a good idea to send it on missions where you don't have air superiority or your adversary has effective anti-aircraft missiles. So it's great against ISIS and such, but against forces properly supplied with Russian or Chinese anti aircraft missiles, your A10's would last approximately 1 mission each.
As far as I can tell, the F35 is supposed to be much more survivable in such an environment. No matter how good a plane is at mud moving, it's of little use if it's easy to kill.
So it's entirely a question of: "what mission and what threat do you have in mind", and adapt your armament to that. You don't decide to keep the A10 just to have something flying. Even if it's cheap.
Keeping the A10 may serve a purpose, but it probably won't be of much use if the adversary is Russia, China, or Iran.
You tacitly admit that Facebook's options squarely amount to offering a means for racial discrimination, but you argue that not all racial discrimination is to the detriment of the party discriminated against and hence not illegal.
A reasonable point. However I'd say that the one offering this mechanism (Facebook) has an obligation to take reasonable precautions that it's not used for illegal forms of racial discrimination.
See also: http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/us... and specifically sections (b) which governs the ability to "make and enforce contracts" and (c) which governs "Protection against impairment".
Those sections suggest to me that any mechanism offered by Facebook that provides a means of racial discrimination in targeting advertisements, where not receiving those ads (which constitute commercial information) is *detrimental* to the party being discriminated against, runs afoul of the law.
Your point basically is that you feel that an approach that would amount to "strict constructionism" (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...) is the one and only legal theory that's acceptable.
Counter to what you make it out to be, that's an *opinion*, and a highly political one at that, rather than a fact.
One of the main purposes of the court system (in addition to weighing evidence) is to *interpret* laws in specific cases to see if they apply. Not even former justice Antonin Scalia disagreed with that (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ). In Scalia's words: "A text should not be construed strictly, and it should not be construed leniently; it should be construed reasonably, to contain all that it fairly means.". I don't have to remind you that former justice Scalia was on the extreme side of "strictness" in interpreting the law, right?
In other words: both the thrust and the phrasing of your argument run counter to established legal doctrine in the US.
There is a big difference between having an ad that states there is a racial preference and targeting readers by race.
No, not really. The only purpose and intended effect of this construct is to achieve racial discrimination in who sees these properties for rent. What you're doing is trying to construct an excuse based on an extremely narrow and literal interpretation of the law cited in the article.
I am not a lawyer, but I really doubt whether a court would let either the advertiser or Facebook get away with such an obvious ploy.
However if you insist on arguing you can wiggle out of it by splitting semantic hairs, you might want to take a look at this site, which explains a little about anti-discrimination laws:
http://civilrights.findlaw.com...
Check out the third item from the top in the list of banned actions: "Making housing unavailable". I'd say that deliberately flagging advertisements to exclude blacks, asians, and hispanics (as Facebook is offering as a service here) can be construed as "making housing unavailable" to those groups.
It's interesting to see Facebook doing this because it provides an extremely clear example of just how pervasive racial discrimination still is in the US.
And now we know what Obama meant when he claimed that he'd run the most transparent administration in history: absolutely nothing.
You realise that you're being totally ridiculous as well as having your partisan bias show though, right?
It's insane (and party-political) to suggest that an ongoing counter-intelligence operation, that has been confirmed by a judge to meet the criteria agreed on by law, should be splattered on the front page just to satisfy your idle curiosity.
It's insane because counter-intelligence operations are needed to prevent spies and/or terrorists from being effective when they work here and in doing so and thereby to protect our security.
We have laws and procedures in place to ensure that snooping is done only when warranted. They are being followed and it has been determined that in this case the snoop order is warranted. Even the House Intelligence committee has been briefed (as it should), and apparently they agree too. So much for your smear that it might be "unconstitutional".
Yet there you are posting unjustified, snide, and derogatory comments. Well, that's your right. But it makes your comments squarely party-political because you're trying to make a government, that is simply doing its job, look bad just because you don't like it.
(1) On reading reports of the transcripts on Fox news and CNN it's striking how moderate and sensible Mrs. Clinton's remarks are. If these transcripts are "news" I think they're good publicity for Mrs. Clinton. It shows that she'll think twice before laying into Wall Street. Regardless of whether or not you like her, her opinions and policies are well thought through and make sense.
.
People bashing Wall Street forget the following :
(a) we (the electorate) have busily shaped the societal and legal environment in which Wall Street could become what it is now. Republicans have always vigorously supported business *in all of its facets) and Wall Street, with Democrats coming in closely behind. That policy has served us well, but is now starting to show some cracks. Time to figure out the minimum change required to fix that. That requires ingenuity. Lots of people see their personal interest compromised (job loss, no perspectives, feeling of not being needed by society, etc.), get "as mad as hell" and demand instant action. Well, they won't get it. Not with either candidate. One tells then they won't get instant gratification (but more of the same instead), the other does (sort of), but is so obviously clueless that his word is worth nothing.
(b) the idea of "Give Enterprise a Free Run and only regulate when the body count becomes too high to ignore" is part and parcel of our society and our culture. There certainly is a lot of anger and an appetite for "change", but I still can't get my head around what it actually wants. It's not prepared to accept the consequence that more prevention means less freedom. Being proactive with policy, (or even enforcing existing laws aimed at e.g. environmental protection) is violently opposed (sometime literally with guns in hand). Take for example that Bundy fellow. In violation of federal laws. Lost several court cases. Shouts his head off in the counterculture media, assembles a band of rogue hillbillies that actually point guns as federal officers. Is cheered on by a certain segment of society, and actually gets away with it. Unlike a steady trickle of you-know-who's who are shot dead in or near their car by police officers for making a false move or not complying fast enough or clearly enough with officers' commands..
(c)" Wall street is the nexus of how we as a country manage wealth. It's a giant market that can (and does) set a price on goods, services, policies, and lives. In doing that, it is a forum that co-shapes a certain part of our national decision making. In that sense it's what has always set the US apart from e.g. the Soviet Union (plan economy) or China. You don't steer or reform a market like that by dropping corporate taxes to 10% as some Republicans (among which a presidential candidate) propose, prohibiting municipalities from offering public services that compete with private enterprise (think broadband initiatives), or annulling wide swaths of environmental protection laws. You might be able to steer it by imposing regulations. Not so much regulations on how it's supposed to trade, but laws that regulate what it's trading in. Well... try that and watch the (mostly conservative) nay-sayers come out of the woodwork in force.
It's also a major source of our wealth. We need it and we should regulate it only with care and insight. To dump on a presidential candidate for displaying that insight is beyond ridiculous. It's adversarial politics.
(d) It so happens I would have preferred Sen. Sanders to be the Democratic candidate. Or at least see a substantial part of his views acted upon and some of his policies enacted. But there is simply no support for that. The inertia of mainstream politics (well, lets be thankful for that) and Wall-street related views. So it's compromise time. We're going to get a much more business-friendly candidate. Oh, and in case anyone wishes to cavil about Wall Street's influence on politics, remember the rulings those fine Conservative gents on the Supreme Court handed down? Com
That's what worrying me. It is as if people (especially his voters and journalists) have totally given up on holding mr. Trump to account on anything he says, much less on whether his words are true or reasonable. Mr. Trump has turned politics into a "reality show". Substance doesn't matter, but tone and appearance do. And personal attacks. Mr. Trump's one area of competence is personal attacks.
It seems as if mrs. Clinton is held to a different standard of decency and veracity. One that simply doesn't apply to Mr. Trump because he's so far off the scale all of the time.
Like mr Trump's constant tendency to say whatever sounds good at the time, no matter how misleading, counter-factual or how much it contradicts what he said earlier (Putin comes to mind: first he calls him his buddy, now he says he doesn't know).
Most Trump supporters overlook all of that all of the time. What they forget is that no-one else in the world will.
Especially foreign powers. And that's dangerous because the US's strength has irrevocably decreased compared to the rest of the world. Therefore consistent policy and competent diplomacy is the only way to safeguard US interests... and security. Mr. Trump's volatile character will ensure he'll scupper whatever policy framework his GOP aides erect. And this time, if he tries to bankrupt his way out of trouble again, it's the entire US that will be saddled with his debts.
Only a video tape with tacky (and in my opinion largely irrelevant because we already knew he's a nasty piece of work) locker room banter and a review of several years' worth of appearance on the Howard Stern show seem to be able to somehow get through to them where obvious deficiencies in competence and intelligence don't.
There are really excellent reasons to view this possibility to sell guns between citizens as a loophole.
Think of it this way: it's illegal so to sell prescription drugs (say Oxycontin) outside of licensed retail channels shops (chemists, apothecaries) especially if it's between private persons. Notwithstanding the fact that prescription drugs of course aren't illegal in and by themselves. Just like firearms.
As you say, the NICS is a simple process. Besides it's the absolute rock-bottom minimum safeguard against the unhinged and nefarious stocking up on guns. Can you think of any reason why it shouldn't be mandatory for gun sales between private citizens?
Unfortunately your assertion that "the media frenzy" of their loophole confirms my ideas about the refusal of of gun-show organisers to take responsibility. Only the threat of public denouncement seems to be influencing their stance. Not their sense of responsibility or their conscience.
If they were at all serious about the need to conduct background checks they would have welcomed a statutory obligation to have such checks in place.
It's clear that gun shows are venues that concentrate and facilitate non-dealer gun sales. Therefore (despite nitpicking that doesn't affect the essence of the issue) the net effect of gun shows really is to facilitate gun sales that bypass background checks. That alone makes them eligible for police scrutiny.
Therefore it's reasonable for e.g. the FBI to trace people who attend such shows.
I agree that there are mental health issues that won't cause a red flag in a NICS check. I believe this should be reviewed more carefully. It's not as if the existing oversights mean that it's the way things should be.
Gun shows are often exempt from requirements to conduct background checks on people who buy a gun. All that's needed is that you buy from a private individual (not a dealer).
So if I had a history of being mentally unstable or had a criminal conviction and wanted to buy a gun anyway (for my next visit to movies perhaps) I couldn't go to a normal gun shop, right? Couldn't risk having a background check run on me. But visiting a gun show with a wad of cash in my pocket would be a neat way to sidestep that pesky background check thing, right?.
If it's OK for the FBI to keep track of people who exercise their First Amendment rights to make radical undemocratic leftist noises, come out in favour of violence to protect animal rights, or to profess support for radical Islam (all cases in which I would consider surveillance reasonable), then why shouldn't it be OK for the FBI to keep track of people who may well be trying to avoid the normal background check when buying a gun?
I know people are a bit touchy about their second amendment rights, but defending loopholes that let you avoid background checks is ridiculous,
Come on! Just because Mr. Trump started chewing out that website by email doesn't mean there's a DDOS attack going on. Mr. Trump is just a Great Emailer like he's Great at everything else.
For some people (e.g. partisans) no fact, outcome, or thought is acceptable that doesn't trash Clinton.
There's no room for the outcome of an FBI investigation that concludes the technician in question was engaged in legitimate work.
There's no room for the fact that of all emails that passed through Mrs. Clinton's email server only a minority seem to have been classified as the time they were sent. See e.g. http://www.politifact.com/trut...
The FBI called the setup "extremely careless" but noted "Comey said the Justice Department shouldnâ(TM)t prosecute Clinton because there isnâ(TM)t enough evidence that she intentionally mishandled classified information. FBI investigators didnâ(TM)t find vast quantities of exposed classified material, and they also did not turn up evidence that Clinton intended to be disloyal to the United States or that she intended to obstruct justice."
Well... no such nuance will ever be accepted in a political contest. That tells me how to interpret the snide and insinuating remarks by AC.
I don't blame the Trump campaign (and Fox News) for bashing away at this single point... but let's at least see it for what it is: political ammunition for someone who doesn't have all that much leverage aside from insinuations and mud-slinging.
Mrs. Clinton is as competent as Dick Cheney. If we can put up with him, we can put up with Mrs. Clinton.
Mr. Trump however is another kettle of fish altogether. Intellectually he's in the same league as Sarah Palin. And he's the kind of guy you cannot tell that a stove is hot. He has to put his finger on it before he believes it. That's fine for a businessman, but it's a terrible liability in a prospective president because in international politics you don't often get a second chance, so you'd best be extremely careful and self-controlled.
As I see it, that rules out Mr. Trump no mater who he's running against.
There's absolutely nothing "bad" about a CEO putting the interests of a company first. I think we can all agree about that.
If blame is to be dispensed, we can blame this CEO for doing a poor job of keeping the high-profile CIO under control and for being insufficiently aggressive and proactive on the publicity angle.
With hindsight she might have been better advised to leverage the good reputation of the CIO by stroking him into sponsoring an "innovative and systemic approach" towards security.
For example convince him to commission an AI system to look after security against modest cost. That would have staved off disaster on the PR front for the time being, it might have kept the reputable CIO in place, and it would have prevented any really disruptive measures.
That would have been the American Way... because who knows... maybe some nerd would have come up with an effective AI system. That would have been a great cost-saving, a potential new profit centre and a PR bonanza.
For any doubters among you, this is why China really needs the untiring services of its patriotic censors.
With one message an unauthorised non-party member held up the entirety of the Chinese scientific leadership to ridicule! One can only suspect that his motives are thoroughly un-patriottic, aimed at fomenting dissent, perhaps even sedition, unrest, and a dispute of the Mandate of Heaven currently held by the Communist Party.
We must support China's censors and help them to monitor private communications more closely. Slip-throughs like this must be avoided!
What I miss in this thread is are excited posts from Angry White Men or Libertarians telling us that this is Yet Another Example of "Da Gubbamint" stifling private anterprise and a ploy to promote Big Government.
What happend to those good folks?
Busy? Distracted? Overslept? Tired? Despirited? Think they're all right? Should we worry?
And there was me thinking that Systemd enjoyed acceptance among many distro maintainers and end-users (me for example).
I'm not a kernel programmer and I don't particularly care about whether functionality is spread across binaries or integrated. I want it to "just work" on my desktop and server machine with minimum fuss. I have more than enough to do when the underlying system "just works" without being bogged down by sysadmin details. Ok?
Plus I'm persuaded by the automatic filesystem cleanup this wrapper does for USB sticks, which I happen to use on a regular basis.
As a matter of fact, I think that each and every commenter who howls about systemd being the work of the devil should sit a (modest) examination in kernel programming and a basic one in system administration. Those who fail to obtain at least 70% marks should have all their slashdot posts and comments on the subject wiped.
Call it a professional deformation: in my workplace I (and most of my colleagues) like to shut up people who don't know what the hick they're talking about. Our time is too precious to allow it to be wasted in that way. We're truly authoritarian and fascist in that respect, and we've obtained excellent results with, and broad support for, that policy for over 15 years.
I agree. Just look at Donald Knuth's algorithms and see how "while structured" they are. Well... they aren't.
I thoroughly understand the need to keep vast wodges of code structured, modular, and (if possible) even while-structured. But when it comes to the core algorithms (numerical or non-numerical) buried deep in library routines, CSC dogmatism should (and usually does) go out of the window.
Slashdot Mirror
Fortunately you're wrong. There are checks and balances in place. Read this ... it cheered me up no end.
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11...
The issues haven't magically gone away, have they? If we keep mum, Trump Supporters may not even realise they're being duped by the guy they, being so "mad", got elected. Or they might simply fail to catch on when President Trump (as I fervently hope) totally fails to make good on his election promises.
Even Trump Supporters will be able to discern things aren't looking up for them ... they will just need a little assistance in thinking through various cause and effect chains and realising what went wrong.
We should be willing to help them out. don't you think? Or they might not catch on and make the same mistake again in four years time.
Ok, I get it, you're an advanced case of Trump Supporter. The problem with Trump supporters is however: they may be angry but they're really, really uninformed. I don't have the time to walk you down the list, but take health insurance now.
Go to "interstate insurance" says you. Alas ... that won't work.
See e.g. http://www.forbes.com/sites/br... and here http://www.naic.org/documents/...
Healthcare is expensive. And no matter how you slice the cake (just Google "risk pools"), those slices adds up to the same total. Cost has to be met through insurance premiums. That's how insurance works. And inter state insurance was already a possibility (states allowing). So unless you can drive costs down it's only a matter of spreading the burden, Ok? You'll end up paying the same as under the ACA. Read: your premiums aren't coming down.
How about trying to drive costs down then, eh? Well, you may have a point there. US health care is inefficient. See e,g, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Besides which, about one third seems to go to administrative overhead. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... So there clearly is scope for improvement. Go to a single payer system? Nope: that's Bernie Sanders idea ... and both Democrat and Republican voters closed that line of approach very firmly. Democrats preferred Clinto and Republicans vetoed anything but privatised insurance. Wanted market mechanisms. Hence the "exchanges" we're all so wild about. Got any other ideas? Lets hear 'em !
Operating costs then? Let's see how we might get there.
Hospitals in the US are still mostly non-profit. See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... But they're being privatised, and with it implementation of health care. So you're losing a bit of leverage there. Now what could you still do?
Drive down nurses salaries across the board? Really? You're going to need a lot of illegal Mexicans (or robots) to accomplish that. Wait ... your other objective was not to push working Americans out of their job? Hmm ... that's a problem.
Reduce doctors' salaries? Won't get you there 'cause they're not the biggest expense.
Reduce hospital costs? They're either privatised or not wildly unreasonable in cost/benefit terms. People have tried for decades. So: good luck with that.
Reduce the amount of money going into advanced medical technology accessible to collective insurance? Really? Tell people they're going to get second-class care unless they pay extra?
Reduce the potential for medical liability claims? And undermine the most entrenched checks-and-balances mechanism in US law?
Exclude people who are likely to incur more costs? Well, that's the medical insurer's traditional way. Just don't smoke, don't be obese, don't be old, don't have hereditary diseases ... and above all don't get ill and you'll be just fine.
Cap insurance coverage and let people who are uninsured or insufficiently drop dead? Well ... that seems viable. We're doing a bit of that already. Simply set the premium you think people should pay, multiply by the number of people, and there's your budget. Limit care to match the budget. Wait ... did anyone say: "Death panels"?
If anyone can come up with a working solution that isn't the ACA I'll cheer. Only I don't see one. People have been looking for only 20 years now. Pardon me if I'm the tiniest bit sceptic ab
My predictions:
Home politics
- say goodbye to collective medical insurance
- prepare for a radical right-wing supreme justice
- prepare for a tax system that's even more favourable for the rich, expect inequality in income net worth to increase sharply
- expect tax rises on the middle class to fill budgetary holes
- prepare for really stupid (and non-functional) "trickle down" economic policies
- prepare for an increase in racism and gender discrimination in society
- expect the education system to get worse
- expect environmental protection laws and oversight to be gutted
Foreign policy
- prepare for disastrously stupid and venal politics in Iraq and Syria, including the targeting of innocent civilians to get one or two terrorists
- prepare for extended US military commitment in Iraq, Syria
- prepare for major loss of US influence, partners, and significance in Asia
- prepare for disastrous policy with respect to China, probably leading to a trade war the US is going to lose, perhaps the start of a major military conflict in Asia
- prepare to lose big in geopolitical manoeuvring against a wily and resurgent Russia due to terminally stupid policies
Did I miss anything? Probably. I have total confidence in President Trump to exceed expectations on the above list.
I viewed the video clip and Barak Obama never said and never even suggested that illegals should vote.
Besides which, the whole idea is ridiculous. If you're not a citizen, you're not eligible to vote in federal elections. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ). You won't even appear on the voting roll unless somebody makes an administrative mistake. And that's quite uncommon, despite conspiracy theorist ramblings.
I might understand that you could have honestly missed that if you're not used to listening closely (unlike your average media person) and/or paying close attention to what is being said (unlike your average media person) or simply don't care much about getting your facts right (unlike your average media person). Or if you're too busy feeling indignant to pay attention but focus instead on getting a post out. But you're still wrong.
Your first amendment rights guarantee your right to spout nonsense (in good faith). Practicality virtually guarantees you won't be be prosecuted for slander. There are simply far too many people saying dumb things in good faith to be able to spot something who maliciously spreads disinformation.
However, this is the perfect illustration of what Obama means by Facebook posters muddying the waters. Except you're doing it on Slashdot instead of Facebook.
Not a problem. Users can give their consent by signing up or continuing to use Facebook, or even by consenting explicitly on a case by case basis. And strictly speaking, Facebook will only be selling meta-information on people that companies could have obtained for themselves (if Facebook let them).
Of course people need to have an incentive to give their consent. A rebate on the normal premium would do. Remember the flap about Facebook allowing advertisers to racially profile properties for rent advertisements? You may well be able to say something about a prospective tenant's likelihood to cause trouble from his Facebook page. So why not mine that data and avoid potential problems? After all, references are used for the same purpose.
Sorry, but I see your objections as surmountable. I can see FARTS catching on yet.
A less charitable (but imho more realistic) view of Facebook's uncooperative attitude would be that Facebook objects to someone extracting value from their data without paying them first. And wants to make sure they're covered against legal fallout about the quality of the data they're providing. After all, they wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of a class action suit for not exercising due diligence in providing tamper-proof data.
As to Facebook's "rules", look at e.g. LinkedIn. I'm quite certain that headhunters take people's LinkedIn profile into consideration and use it to co-determine whether to contact someone and who to recommend them to at what salary level. So why not Facebook? One might say it's because Facebook is not explicitly aimed at job-marketing yourself, but that's but an extra service (agreement) away.
This sort of development would markedly increase the commercial value of Facebook's data.
I therefore believe it won't be long now before Facebook launches something comparable, as a paid service. Lets call it the "Facebook Automatic Reference Transmission Service", whereby Facebook (for a fee) asserts to third parties that person ABC has maintined a Facebook presence and that the user's posts satisfy criteria XYZ. Whereby XYZ would be configurable by the party doing the asking (and paying Facebook's fees).
Meaning it's not a good idea to send it on missions where you don't have air superiority or your adversary has effective anti-aircraft missiles. So it's great against ISIS and such, but against forces properly supplied with Russian or Chinese anti aircraft missiles, your A10's would last approximately 1 mission each.
As far as I can tell, the F35 is supposed to be much more survivable in such an environment. No matter how good a plane is at mud moving, it's of little use if it's easy to kill.
So it's entirely a question of: "what mission and what threat do you have in mind", and adapt your armament to that. You don't decide to keep the A10 just to have something flying. Even if it's cheap.
Keeping the A10 may serve a purpose, but it probably won't be of much use if the adversary is Russia, China, or Iran.
You tacitly admit that Facebook's options squarely amount to offering a means for racial discrimination, but you argue that not all racial discrimination is to the detriment of the party discriminated against and hence not illegal.
A reasonable point. However I'd say that the one offering this mechanism (Facebook) has an obligation to take reasonable precautions that it's not used for illegal forms of racial discrimination.
See also: http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/us... and specifically sections (b) which governs the ability to "make and enforce contracts" and (c) which governs "Protection against impairment".
Those sections suggest to me that any mechanism offered by Facebook that provides a means of racial discrimination in targeting advertisements, where not receiving those ads (which constitute commercial information) is *detrimental* to the party being discriminated against, runs afoul of the law.
But as I said, I am not a lawyer.
Your point basically is that you feel that an approach that would amount to "strict constructionism" (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...) is the one and only legal theory that's acceptable.
Counter to what you make it out to be, that's an *opinion*, and a highly political one at that, rather than a fact.
One of the main purposes of the court system (in addition to weighing evidence) is to *interpret* laws in specific cases to see if they apply. Not even former justice Antonin Scalia disagreed with that (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ). In Scalia's words: "A text should not be construed strictly, and it should not be construed leniently; it should be construed reasonably, to contain all that it fairly means.". I don't have to remind you that former justice Scalia was on the extreme side of "strictness" in interpreting the law, right?
In other words: both the thrust and the phrasing of your argument run counter to established legal doctrine in the US.
No, not really. The only purpose and intended effect of this construct is to achieve racial discrimination in who sees these properties for rent. What you're doing is trying to construct an excuse based on an extremely narrow and literal interpretation of the law cited in the article.
I am not a lawyer, but I really doubt whether a court would let either the advertiser or Facebook get away with such an obvious ploy.
However if you insist on arguing you can wiggle out of it by splitting semantic hairs, you might want to take a look at this site, which explains a little about anti-discrimination laws: http://civilrights.findlaw.com...
Check out the third item from the top in the list of banned actions: "Making housing unavailable". I'd say that deliberately flagging advertisements to exclude blacks, asians, and hispanics (as Facebook is offering as a service here) can be construed as "making housing unavailable" to those groups.
It's interesting to see Facebook doing this because it provides an extremely clear example of just how pervasive racial discrimination still is in the US.
You realise that you're being totally ridiculous as well as having your partisan bias show though, right?
It's insane (and party-political) to suggest that an ongoing counter-intelligence operation, that has been confirmed by a judge to meet the criteria agreed on by law, should be splattered on the front page just to satisfy your idle curiosity.
It's insane because counter-intelligence operations are needed to prevent spies and/or terrorists from being effective when they work here and in doing so and thereby to protect our security.
We have laws and procedures in place to ensure that snooping is done only when warranted. They are being followed and it has been determined that in this case the snoop order is warranted. Even the House Intelligence committee has been briefed (as it should), and apparently they agree too. So much for your smear that it might be "unconstitutional".
Yet there you are posting unjustified, snide, and derogatory comments. Well, that's your right. But it makes your comments squarely party-political because you're trying to make a government, that is simply doing its job, look bad just because you don't like it.
In a word: deplorable.
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People bashing Wall Street forget the following :
(a) we (the electorate) have busily shaped the societal and legal environment in which Wall Street could become what it is now. Republicans have always vigorously supported business *in all of its facets) and Wall Street, with Democrats coming in closely behind. That policy has served us well, but is now starting to show some cracks. Time to figure out the minimum change required to fix that. That requires ingenuity. Lots of people see their personal interest compromised (job loss, no perspectives, feeling of not being needed by society, etc.), get "as mad as hell" and demand instant action. Well, they won't get it. Not with either candidate. One tells then they won't get instant gratification (but more of the same instead), the other does (sort of), but is so obviously clueless that his word is worth nothing.
(b) the idea of "Give Enterprise a Free Run and only regulate when the body count becomes too high to ignore" is part and parcel of our society and our culture. There certainly is a lot of anger and an appetite for "change", but I still can't get my head around what it actually wants. It's not prepared to accept the consequence that more prevention means less freedom. Being proactive with policy, (or even enforcing existing laws aimed at e.g. environmental protection) is violently opposed (sometime literally with guns in hand). Take for example that Bundy fellow. In violation of federal laws. Lost several court cases. Shouts his head off in the counterculture media, assembles a band of rogue hillbillies that actually point guns as federal officers. Is cheered on by a certain segment of society, and actually gets away with it. Unlike a steady trickle of you-know-who's who are shot dead in or near their car by police officers for making a false move or not complying fast enough or clearly enough with officers' commands..
(c)" Wall street is the nexus of how we as a country manage wealth. It's a giant market that can (and does) set a price on goods, services, policies, and lives. In doing that, it is a forum that co-shapes a certain part of our national decision making. In that sense it's what has always set the US apart from e.g. the Soviet Union (plan economy) or China. You don't steer or reform a market like that by dropping corporate taxes to 10% as some Republicans (among which a presidential candidate) propose, prohibiting municipalities from offering public services that compete with private enterprise (think broadband initiatives), or annulling wide swaths of environmental protection laws. You might be able to steer it by imposing regulations. Not so much regulations on how it's supposed to trade, but laws that regulate what it's trading in. Well ... try that and watch the (mostly conservative) nay-sayers come out of the woodwork in force.
It's also a major source of our wealth. We need it and we should regulate it only with care and insight. To dump on a presidential candidate for displaying that insight is beyond ridiculous. It's adversarial politics.
(d) It so happens I would have preferred Sen. Sanders to be the Democratic candidate. Or at least see a substantial part of his views acted upon and some of his policies enacted. But there is simply no support for that. The inertia of mainstream politics (well, lets be thankful for that) and Wall-street related views. So it's compromise time. We're going to get a much more business-friendly candidate. Oh, and in case anyone wishes to cavil about Wall Street's influence on politics, remember the rulings those fine Conservative gents on the Supreme Court handed down? Com
It seems as if mrs. Clinton is held to a different standard of decency and veracity. One that simply doesn't apply to Mr. Trump because he's so far off the scale all of the time.
Like mr Trump's constant tendency to say whatever sounds good at the time, no matter how misleading, counter-factual or how much it contradicts what he said earlier (Putin comes to mind: first he calls him his buddy, now he says he doesn't know).
Most Trump supporters overlook all of that all of the time. What they forget is that no-one else in the world will.
Especially foreign powers. And that's dangerous because the US's strength has irrevocably decreased compared to the rest of the world. Therefore consistent policy and competent diplomacy is the only way to safeguard US interests ... and security. Mr. Trump's volatile character will ensure he'll scupper whatever policy framework his GOP aides erect. And this time, if he tries to bankrupt his way out of trouble again, it's the entire US that will be saddled with his debts.
Only a video tape with tacky (and in my opinion largely irrelevant because we already knew he's a nasty piece of work) locker room banter and a review of several years' worth of appearance on the Howard Stern show seem to be able to somehow get through to them where obvious deficiencies in competence and intelligence don't.
There are really excellent reasons to view this possibility to sell guns between citizens as a loophole.
Think of it this way: it's illegal so to sell prescription drugs (say Oxycontin) outside of licensed retail channels shops (chemists, apothecaries) especially if it's between private persons. Notwithstanding the fact that prescription drugs of course aren't illegal in and by themselves. Just like firearms.
As you say, the NICS is a simple process. Besides it's the absolute rock-bottom minimum safeguard against the unhinged and nefarious stocking up on guns. Can you think of any reason why it shouldn't be mandatory for gun sales between private citizens?
Unfortunately your assertion that "the media frenzy" of their loophole confirms my ideas about the refusal of of gun-show organisers to take responsibility. Only the threat of public denouncement seems to be influencing their stance. Not their sense of responsibility or their conscience.
If they were at all serious about the need to conduct background checks they would have welcomed a statutory obligation to have such checks in place.
See e.g. here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and here: http://www.governing.com/gov-d...
Some states don't require background checks {see http://www.governing.com/gov-d...
It's clear that gun shows are venues that concentrate and facilitate non-dealer gun sales. Therefore (despite nitpicking that doesn't affect the essence of the issue) the net effect of gun shows really is to facilitate gun sales that bypass background checks. That alone makes them eligible for police scrutiny.
Therefore it's reasonable for e.g. the FBI to trace people who attend such shows.
I agree that there are mental health issues that won't cause a red flag in a NICS check. I believe this should be reviewed more carefully. It's not as if the existing oversights mean that it's the way things should be.
Gun shows are often exempt from requirements to conduct background checks on people who buy a gun. All that's needed is that you buy from a private individual (not a dealer).
So if I had a history of being mentally unstable or had a criminal conviction and wanted to buy a gun anyway (for my next visit to movies perhaps) I couldn't go to a normal gun shop, right? Couldn't risk having a background check run on me. But visiting a gun show with a wad of cash in my pocket would be a neat way to sidestep that pesky background check thing, right?.
If it's OK for the FBI to keep track of people who exercise their First Amendment rights to make radical undemocratic leftist noises, come out in favour of violence to protect animal rights, or to profess support for radical Islam (all cases in which I would consider surveillance reasonable), then why shouldn't it be OK for the FBI to keep track of people who may well be trying to avoid the normal background check when buying a gun?
I know people are a bit touchy about their second amendment rights, but defending loopholes that let you avoid background checks is ridiculous,
Come on! Just because Mr. Trump started chewing out that website by email doesn't mean there's a DDOS attack going on. Mr. Trump is just a Great Emailer like he's Great at everything else.
For some people (e.g. partisans) no fact, outcome, or thought is acceptable that doesn't trash Clinton.
There's no room for the outcome of an FBI investigation that concludes the technician in question was engaged in legitimate work.
There's no room for the fact that of all emails that passed through Mrs. Clinton's email server only a minority seem to have been classified as the time they were sent. See e.g. http://www.politifact.com/trut...
The FBI called the setup "extremely careless" but noted "Comey said the Justice Department shouldnâ(TM)t prosecute Clinton because there isnâ(TM)t enough evidence that she intentionally mishandled classified information. FBI investigators didnâ(TM)t find vast quantities of exposed classified material, and they also did not turn up evidence that Clinton intended to be disloyal to the United States or that she intended to obstruct justice."
Well ... no such nuance will ever be accepted in a political contest. That tells me how to interpret the snide and insinuating remarks by AC.
I don't blame the Trump campaign (and Fox News) for bashing away at this single point ... but let's at least see it for what it is: political ammunition for someone who doesn't have all that much leverage aside from insinuations and mud-slinging.
Mrs. Clinton is as competent as Dick Cheney. If we can put up with him, we can put up with Mrs. Clinton.
Mr. Trump however is another kettle of fish altogether. Intellectually he's in the same league as Sarah Palin. And he's the kind of guy you cannot tell that a stove is hot. He has to put his finger on it before he believes it. That's fine for a businessman, but it's a terrible liability in a prospective president because in international politics you don't often get a second chance, so you'd best be extremely careful and self-controlled.
As I see it, that rules out Mr. Trump no mater who he's running against.
If blame is to be dispensed, we can blame this CEO for doing a poor job of keeping the high-profile CIO under control and for being insufficiently aggressive and proactive on the publicity angle.
With hindsight she might have been better advised to leverage the good reputation of the CIO by stroking him into sponsoring an "innovative and systemic approach" towards security.
For example convince him to commission an AI system to look after security against modest cost. That would have staved off disaster on the PR front for the time being, it might have kept the reputable CIO in place, and it would have prevented any really disruptive measures.
That would have been the American Way ... because who knows ... maybe some nerd would have come up with an effective AI system. That would have been a great cost-saving, a potential new profit centre and a PR bonanza.
With one message an unauthorised non-party member held up the entirety of the Chinese scientific leadership to ridicule! One can only suspect that his motives are thoroughly un-patriottic, aimed at fomenting dissent, perhaps even sedition, unrest, and a dispute of the Mandate of Heaven currently held by the Communist Party.
We must support China's censors and help them to monitor private communications more closely. Slip-throughs like this must be avoided!
What happend to those good folks?
Busy? Distracted? Overslept? Tired? Despirited? Think they're all right? Should we worry?
No other country within 1000 Km of Israel depends quite so much on US good will for its survival.
I'm not a kernel programmer and I don't particularly care about whether functionality is spread across binaries or integrated. I want it to "just work" on my desktop and server machine with minimum fuss. I have more than enough to do when the underlying system "just works" without being bogged down by sysadmin details. Ok?
Plus I'm persuaded by the automatic filesystem cleanup this wrapper does for USB sticks, which I happen to use on a regular basis.
As a matter of fact, I think that each and every commenter who howls about systemd being the work of the devil should sit a (modest) examination in kernel programming and a basic one in system administration. Those who fail to obtain at least 70% marks should have all their slashdot posts and comments on the subject wiped.
Call it a professional deformation: in my workplace I (and most of my colleagues) like to shut up people who don't know what the hick they're talking about. Our time is too precious to allow it to be wasted in that way. We're truly authoritarian and fascist in that respect, and we've obtained excellent results with, and broad support for, that policy for over 15 years.
I agree. Just look at Donald Knuth's algorithms and see how "while structured" they are. Well ... they aren't.
I thoroughly understand the need to keep vast wodges of code structured, modular, and (if possible) even while-structured. But when it comes to the core algorithms (numerical or non-numerical) buried deep in library routines, CSC dogmatism should (and usually does) go out of the window.