This is a prime example of why we need the federal budget process to be a lot more transparent and need laws that limit the ability to attach riders to legislation.
You might be interested in "read the laws" site listed in my sig. sorry it's not a proper link.
The child could easily suffer irreversible mental anguish from this.
Really? Irreversible mental anguish, seems kinda strong for what amounts to an embarrassing picture. (that very few people will ever see and those that do will not advertise the fact) Embarrassing stuff happens to kids, then they get over it. I got pants-ed on the playground in fourth grade, and had to put up with "Adam Bair, has no hair, even in his underwear" being sung to me for most of the rest of the year. I remember that it happened but it hasn't scarred me for life. By junior high everyone, including me, had pretty much forgotten it. I figure that's about the same level of embarrassment and "mental anguish" as getting photoshopped into a porn photo. The real damage done to real children is by people producing real child porn, namely because they are abusing the child in question. Prosecute the abuse, not the byproduct.
It doesn't matter if it sticks or gets struck down.
Until the next election when absolutely no congressmen want to face ads that say "Senator X voted AGAINST a bill to stop child pornography". Based on that alone, this bill could be 100% pure pork-barrel with an extra one billion in earmarks added on and it would still pass.
It doesn't matter how simple you make the process (e.g. "Just put in an X in one of these two boxes"), a certain percentage of the electorate (e.g. the mentally ill, the illiterate, the very elderly, the mentally handicapped) will screw it up.
I think the mental acuity to put a mark in the box beside the candidate you are voting for is an acceptable minimum competency level for someone's vote to count. I would actually like to see a more purposeful minimum competency/knowledge requirement for voter eligibility, but I supposed that makes me elitist for thinking people should have to demonstrate accurate knowledge before making an important decision.
There was a case in 2004 (can't remember the details offhand) in which a person was convicted for owning cartoon child porn.
So they had an anime/hentai collection? Seriously, most of the main characters in anime are high school age (read: under 18), and there are frequently purposefully erotic scenes (if not tentacle rape) Does this mean that everyone with a Sailor Moon DVD is open to prosecution for child porn?
He's in jail because the jury was improperly instructed.
Not long ago I sat in the jury box and was instructed many things by the Judge. Most of those instruction were things we could not discuss, and how we should decide based on the judges interpretation of the law, not the wording of the law itself (which was not provided to us) I thought to myself: "If we have to follow all of these rules, what is the purpose of a jury other than to be a puppet for the judge?" Based on my experience as a juror, trial by jury in the US is a sham.
I wasn't saying that any one should stop building universities, I was pointing towards a likelihood of graduates using their new degrees as a tool to leave the country and never return. South Africa is a country with plenty of possibilities to make real progress and have a good life if you are equipped with a good education, there are reasons for graduates to stay. I would hope that SA would be the home to many fine universities, and like the US, SA is entirely capable of establishing a new university without major outside assistance. That makes SA the exception in sub-Saharan Africa. The majority of the other countries on your continent are severely lacking in the stability and reliability of government and other social institutions. This is a major cause of continuing poverty:
World Bank environmental economist Kirk Hamilton and his team in the bank's environment department have found that most of humanity's wealth isn't made of physical stuff. It is intangible. In their extraordinary but vastly underappreciated report, Where Is The Wealth Of Nations?: Measuring Capital for the 21st Century, Hamilton's team found that "human capital and the value of institutions (as measured by rule of law) constitute the largest share of wealth in virtually all countries."
They are only more of an asset to their country by staying home, if the countries problems can be solved with math. Brilliant engineering isn't going to make Darfur a good place to live. Ethiopia's famines are not brought on by a lack of agricultural knowledge. Proving corruption mathematically isn't going to make corrupt government officials suddenly altruistic.
Disclaimer: I grew up in Virgina Beach, VA most of my friends and their families from back home are in the Navy. I want our Navy to be strong and safe, but I don't want to mutilate whales to do it. Good sonar didn't do jack shit for the USS Cole, and I don't think Iraq or Afghanistan has much of a Navy to worry about. How about a new better technology instead of just turning the volume up on the sonar.
They might be making progress just by being Google. Connecting people to information is what they do. Look at it this way, is information more accessible in China because Google is there? Apparently when an illegal search is made, the person is disconnected from Google. So the Chinese know how they are being censored. Ending the censor ship isn't Google's job, it's the Chinese people's job. Having Google there under partial functionality is a good daily reminder of what they are being denied.
To view it another way, how is Google helping human rights in North Korea by not being there?
someone didn't do a proper business risk review when they made an investment in China
They didn't investigate where their business intersected the one aspect of China that you can't bribe your way out of: saving face. Although with the amount of anti-American sentiment going around in China right now, they might be lucky simply to avoid having their hotels "liberated for the good of the people".
"Oh no your Honor I didn't steal the game, I simple facilitated an unintended demo release." Good luck with that one. For the lawyers out there, Is there any kind of requirement to allow for a return of an untestable product if it proves unsatisfactory? Honest game reviews are only written by consumers and are often overrun by paid reviews and marketing postings in "Consumer Review" listings, so a worthless product is quite difficult to detect and as the parent post points out "software retailers don't take games back." Is there a way to demand a refund from a software company in exchange for invalidating our license?(which we don't need because the software isn't worth using)
Shareholders and rights groups including Amnesty International... continue to push Google to improve its policies in countries known for human rights abuses and limits on freedom of speech.
The only way that Google can ever have any influence in opening China's information control policies is if Google is actually operating in China. Right now, that means that they must comply with the PRC minimum standards. If the China kicks Google out, then Google's sway in China is reduced to zero. If you really want to be concerned with censorship in China, then you should want Google to gain as much prominence there as possible, and for Google to always be pushing in the right direction. Not making some idealistic stand that alienates them, but being a valued part of China that moves the entire cultural body of China gently towards better human rights.
Adaware updates don't make me feel spied on, or like my computer is being hijacked. Why couldn't Spore content update work the same way? Download a package of new creature at will, upload yours at will, never feel betrayed by your game.
I wonder how far away fully automated surgical systems, the "autodocs" of Larry Niven stories like Crashlander , are.
I would think that the combination of MRI tech and facial recognition type software could enable robots to see and "understand" the precise physiology of a patient. I don't know how well the triage process or dealing with non-standard problems would work without significant human help. More routine procedures might not be too far away, Lasik surgery is already half way there. I would think an autodoc that could procedures that are not life or death like plastic surgery or setting a broken bone would be possible in the next ten years if there was a well funded organization with that as the goal. But I would be surprised to see a robot that could diagnose and treat serious trauma in less than 50 years.
Just as the barrier is there to keep wayward cars from getting on to the other side of the highway (and killing/injuring a multitude of others), police are there to keep order -- which some times includes stopping an unruly individual....
This approach can certainly be (ab)used to excuse police excesses -- but blaming police/taser for all taser-related deaths is highly inaccurate.
No it it very accurate, but that doesn't necessitate that the police where wrong in choosing to use their taser. Let's take your argument and apply it to when the police have to resort to their gun. Let us assume (to prevent side arguments) that the police are completely in the right in their decision to use lethal force. Two well aimed shots hit the criminal in the chest, both penetrating the heart. Would you say that the cause of death was "delusion"? Of course not, the cause of death was the two gunshots to the chest. Now the officer who fire the shots may have some extra paperwork, and very close examination of the choice to use lethal force, but if the officer is found to be in the right, they should be commended for a job well done. The very same applies to Taser use. It is less lethal, not non-lethal. It provides the officer with a possible option, but should still be regarded with the same gravity as a firearm. Non-lethal is waiting for backup and having a large number of strong well trained cops restrain and handcuff an individual, I see the NYPD do it all the time. It is not uncommon for me to see six officers grab a violent drunk or dangerous suspect, the only times I've seen a taser used is by abusive cops.
Now if only Apple would get their shit together when it comes to their server products.
Or conversely they could get out of the server market entirely. They do the consumer electronics thing very very well. They should continue to focus and improve on that, let some other company do the server thing well. Trying to be "all things computer" is a mistake. Apple has done well by ignoring the corporate world, and they should continue to do so. If they happen to have some proprietary architecture that would be a wonderful blessing to the server market, they can always lease the rights to Cisco.
If gas were REALLY 'too high' people would be trading in Hummers[1] for Celicas in numbers that would have used car lots up to their butts in the things. But people bitch and whine and fill em up. Which tells me the price isn't too high yet. When it is the invisible hand of the marketplace will act.
You assume that the pampered self entitled bitches I have to call my countrymen have the slightest clue how to be good capitalists. The outrageous National Debt, the massive number of foreclosures, and plummeting value of the dollar are what we have to show for our national understanding of capitalism. Oh and an oil war to protect people's "right" to cheap gas. So yes you are right, "The half capitalist half socialist economy we currently have here in the US can have some problems adapting to changes in reality but it usually manages to work out in the end." But the way it will work out is with the good ol' USA dropping to the back of the pack in the post-industrialized world. Get ready for $8.00 gas, and the Dollar being worth less than half a Euro for the foreseeable future, as the Euro becomes the international currency all of our National Debt (read foreign subsidizing of US consumerism) will come flooding back. But don't you worry while we lose our place as a super power and one of the wealthiest nations, that's just the invisible hand of the market telling us that the rest of the world doesn't want to put up with our self indulgent shit any more.
Detroit and Tokyo live in the world where trial lawyers will rip ya a fresh asshole if a jury can be convinced your design wasn't 'perfectly safe.'
Well then perhaps they should start with the automakers that make over sized Soccer-Mom Assault Vehicles and over powered Impotence Compensators. The trend towards ever larger and more powerful cars is what is increasing the danger of our roads. The gains made by auto safety improvements has only served to As Click and Clack pointed out in a recent Nova show about the "Car of the Future", no commuter needs 500hp, and that is ridiculous to even offer it. Automakers will be quick to point out that consumers (as a broad trend) buy the most horsepower they can afford for the car type they buy. But huge monster cars are not a true necessity for a car to be a success. Lets look at one of the most successful cars of all time. The 1967 VW Beetle weighed 1850lbs and had 53hp, and they worked just fine. With modern techniques it should be easy enough to make a vehicle with enough room, with a curb weight of under a ton. Then a simple 75 hp engine can get you where you are going just fine. There is no need to go 0-60 in under ten seconds if most cars on the road do it in fifteen seconds. Perhaps if there were tighter regulations on vehicle size (without a special license) and size to horsepower ratio limits, then there would be more room for innovative cars like the Aptera. Structural engineering of cars is really only half the crash test, the other half is the size of the other car they collide with.
And getting all of those SUVs off the road is easy, it's called $10-a-gallon gas.
The Pentagon seeks a positive public image. The UN seeks a positive public image.
The Pentagon has departments and individuals whose sole job is giving whatever they do a positive public image. The UN has deparments and inviduals whose sole job is to give whatever they do a positive public image.
Where is the line between "putting your best foot forward" and PsyOps being used against the American people? "Spin" is a dirty word in my book. Particularly when it interferes with the ability of the American people to act as a check against bad government. That is one of the founding principles of our system of government. The only influencing that the US government should have to do to sway the opinion of the American people, is to deliver on promises and providing positive results. The Pentagon "seeking to provide a positive public image" for it's invasion of Iraq has failed miserably on both counts.
Maybe the DoJ and all other government agencies should be permanently banned. Not as a punishment, but as a matter of appropriateness. Think of the recent upset when it was discovered that the "military analyst" on most news shows was just a Pentagon mouthpiece. Why was that bad? Because in order for a democracy to function well, the people need access to clear unbiased information. While most everyone knows that various News programs have a slant, Wikipedia wants to (and should continue to) maintain as balanced a voice as possible. The more that Wikipedia become the first place many people go for information, the more important it becomes in having a well informed public. After all a well informed public is what things like "freedom of the press" is about, right?
Slashdot Mirror
This is a prime example of why we need the federal budget process to be a lot more transparent and need laws that limit the ability to attach riders to legislation.
You might be interested in "read the laws" site listed in my sig. sorry it's not a proper link.
The child could easily suffer irreversible mental anguish from this.
Really? Irreversible mental anguish, seems kinda strong for what amounts to an embarrassing picture. (that very few people will ever see and those that do will not advertise the fact) Embarrassing stuff happens to kids, then they get over it. I got pants-ed on the playground in fourth grade, and had to put up with "Adam Bair, has no hair, even in his underwear" being sung to me for most of the rest of the year. I remember that it happened but it hasn't scarred me for life. By junior high everyone, including me, had pretty much forgotten it. I figure that's about the same level of embarrassment and "mental anguish" as getting photoshopped into a porn photo. The real damage done to real children is by people producing real child porn, namely because they are abusing the child in question. Prosecute the abuse, not the byproduct.
It doesn't matter if it sticks or gets struck down.
Until the next election when absolutely no congressmen want to face ads that say "Senator X voted AGAINST a bill to stop child pornography". Based on that alone, this bill could be 100% pure pork-barrel with an extra one billion in earmarks added on and it would still pass.
It doesn't matter how simple you make the process (e.g. "Just put in an X in one of these two boxes"), a certain percentage of the electorate (e.g. the mentally ill, the illiterate, the very elderly, the mentally handicapped) will screw it up.
I think the mental acuity to put a mark in the box beside the candidate you are voting for is an acceptable minimum competency level for someone's vote to count. I would actually like to see a more purposeful minimum competency/knowledge requirement for voter eligibility, but I supposed that makes me elitist for thinking people should have to demonstrate accurate knowledge before making an important decision.
There was a case in 2004 (can't remember the details offhand) in which a person was convicted for owning cartoon child porn.
So they had an anime/hentai collection? Seriously, most of the main characters in anime are high school age (read: under 18), and there are frequently purposefully erotic scenes (if not tentacle rape) Does this mean that everyone with a Sailor Moon DVD is open to prosecution for child porn?
He's in jail because the jury was improperly instructed.
Not long ago I sat in the jury box and was instructed many things by the Judge. Most of those instruction were things we could not discuss, and how we should decide based on the judges interpretation of the law, not the wording of the law itself (which was not provided to us) I thought to myself: "If we have to follow all of these rules, what is the purpose of a jury other than to be a puppet for the judge?" Based on my experience as a juror, trial by jury in the US is a sham.
They are only more of an asset to their country by staying home, if the countries problems can be solved with math. Brilliant engineering isn't going to make Darfur a good place to live. Ethiopia's famines are not brought on by a lack of agricultural knowledge. Proving corruption mathematically isn't going to make corrupt government officials suddenly altruistic.
India and China have seriously better prospects than say Sierra Leone or Ethiopia. By contrast to many Sub-Saharan African countries where there is no wealth to be had, China gained 50 new billionaires in 2007 and India has three of the world's ten richest people. While they aren't yet at the EU's standard of living, to call modern day China or India impoverished is laughable.
pollution of various kinds, and too much noise meaning that they can't communicate.
It's not just that it's noisy so they can't communicate. The Navy is maiming whales with it deep sea sonar. Kinda like how a gunshot blast beside your head damages your hearing. They are perfectly aware of this and they don't really care other than the PR problems, but that is being addressed. First they just tried to use bad science to make it OK. And then the blinded whales started beaching themselves. But at least one court isn't fooled by the carte blanc of "national security".
Disclaimer: I grew up in Virgina Beach, VA most of my friends and their families from back home are in the Navy. I want our Navy to be strong and safe, but I don't want to mutilate whales to do it. Good sonar didn't do jack shit for the USS Cole, and I don't think Iraq or Afghanistan has much of a Navy to worry about. How about a new better technology instead of just turning the volume up on the sonar.
Yeah, it sucks but what am I going to do?
First, sign a petition like the reply before me has suggested. Then give the CCTV cameras the same treatment as speed cameras are getting. Prove to the government that the presence of CCTV actually increases crime, mostly arson.
Spare the dog, shoot the owner. But check for cameras first.
So what are they doing?
They might be making progress just by being Google. Connecting people to information is what they do. Look at it this way, is information more accessible in China because Google is there? Apparently when an illegal search is made, the person is disconnected from Google. So the Chinese know how they are being censored. Ending the censor ship isn't Google's job, it's the Chinese people's job. Having Google there under partial functionality is a good daily reminder of what they are being denied.
To view it another way, how is Google helping human rights in North Korea by not being there?
someone didn't do a proper business risk review when they made an investment in China
They didn't investigate where their business intersected the one aspect of China that you can't bribe your way out of: saving face. Although with the amount of anti-American sentiment going around in China right now, they might be lucky simply to avoid having their hotels "liberated for the good of the people".
"Oh no your Honor I didn't steal the game, I simple facilitated an unintended demo release." Good luck with that one.
For the lawyers out there, Is there any kind of requirement to allow for a return of an untestable product if it proves unsatisfactory? Honest game reviews are only written by consumers and are often overrun by paid reviews and marketing postings in "Consumer Review" listings, so a worthless product is quite difficult to detect and as the parent post points out "software retailers don't take games back." Is there a way to demand a refund from a software company in exchange for invalidating our license?(which we don't need because the software isn't worth using)
Shareholders and rights groups including Amnesty International... continue to push Google to improve its policies in countries known for human rights abuses and limits on freedom of speech.
The only way that Google can ever have any influence in opening China's information control policies is if Google is actually operating in China. Right now, that means that they must comply with the PRC minimum standards. If the China kicks Google out, then Google's sway in China is reduced to zero. If you really want to be concerned with censorship in China, then you should want Google to gain as much prominence there as possible, and for Google to always be pushing in the right direction. Not making some idealistic stand that alienates them, but being a valued part of China that moves the entire cultural body of China gently towards better human rights.
Adaware updates don't make me feel spied on, or like my computer is being hijacked. Why couldn't Spore content update work the same way? Download a package of new creature at will, upload yours at will, never feel betrayed by your game.
the US has offered Burma (Myanmar) $3m in aid.
To put that into perspective, that is about 24 minutes worth of war in Iraq.
I wonder how far away fully automated surgical systems, the "autodocs" of Larry Niven stories like Crashlander , are.
I would think that the combination of MRI tech and facial recognition type software could enable robots to see and "understand" the precise physiology of a patient. I don't know how well the triage process or dealing with non-standard problems would work without significant human help. More routine procedures might not be too far away, Lasik surgery is already half way there. I would think an autodoc that could procedures that are not life or death like plastic surgery or setting a broken bone would be possible in the next ten years if there was a well funded organization with that as the goal. But I would be surprised to see a robot that could diagnose and treat serious trauma in less than 50 years.
Just as the barrier is there to keep wayward cars from getting on to the other side of the highway (and killing/injuring a multitude of others), police are there to keep order -- which some times includes stopping an unruly individual. ...
This approach can certainly be (ab)used to excuse police excesses -- but blaming police/taser for all taser-related deaths is highly inaccurate.
No it it very accurate, but that doesn't necessitate that the police where wrong in choosing to use their taser. Let's take your argument and apply it to when the police have to resort to their gun. Let us assume (to prevent side arguments) that the police are completely in the right in their decision to use lethal force. Two well aimed shots hit the criminal in the chest, both penetrating the heart. Would you say that the cause of death was "delusion"? Of course not, the cause of death was the two gunshots to the chest. Now the officer who fire the shots may have some extra paperwork, and very close examination of the choice to use lethal force, but if the officer is found to be in the right, they should be commended for a job well done. The very same applies to Taser use. It is less lethal, not non-lethal. It provides the officer with a possible option, but should still be regarded with the same gravity as a firearm. Non-lethal is waiting for backup and having a large number of strong well trained cops restrain and handcuff an individual, I see the NYPD do it all the time. It is not uncommon for me to see six officers grab a violent drunk or dangerous suspect, the only times I've seen a taser used is by abusive cops.
Now if only Apple would get their shit together when it comes to their server products.
Or conversely they could get out of the server market entirely. They do the consumer electronics thing very very well. They should continue to focus and improve on that, let some other company do the server thing well. Trying to be "all things computer" is a mistake. Apple has done well by ignoring the corporate world, and they should continue to do so. If they happen to have some proprietary architecture that would be a wonderful blessing to the server market, they can always lease the rights to Cisco.
If gas were REALLY 'too high' people would be trading in Hummers[1] for Celicas in numbers that would have used car lots up to their butts in the things. But people bitch and whine and fill em up. Which tells me the price isn't too high yet. When it is the invisible hand of the marketplace will act.
You assume that the pampered self entitled bitches I have to call my countrymen have the slightest clue how to be good capitalists. The outrageous National Debt, the massive number of foreclosures, and plummeting value of the dollar are what we have to show for our national understanding of capitalism. Oh and an oil war to protect people's "right" to cheap gas. So yes you are right, "The half capitalist half socialist economy we currently have here in the US can have some problems adapting to changes in reality but it usually manages to work out in the end." But the way it will work out is with the good ol' USA dropping to the back of the pack in the post-industrialized world. Get ready for $8.00 gas, and the Dollar being worth less than half a Euro for the foreseeable future, as the Euro becomes the international currency all of our National Debt (read foreign subsidizing of US consumerism) will come flooding back. But don't you worry while we lose our place as a super power and one of the wealthiest nations, that's just the invisible hand of the market telling us that the rest of the world doesn't want to put up with our self indulgent shit any more.
Detroit and Tokyo live in the world where trial lawyers will rip ya a fresh asshole if a jury can be convinced your design wasn't 'perfectly safe.'
Well then perhaps they should start with the automakers that make over sized Soccer-Mom Assault Vehicles and over powered Impotence Compensators. The trend towards ever larger and more powerful cars is what is increasing the danger of our roads. The gains made by auto safety improvements has only served to As Click and Clack pointed out in a recent Nova show about the "Car of the Future", no commuter needs 500hp, and that is ridiculous to even offer it. Automakers will be quick to point out that consumers (as a broad trend) buy the most horsepower they can afford for the car type they buy. But huge monster cars are not a true necessity for a car to be a success. Lets look at one of the most successful cars of all time. The 1967 VW Beetle weighed 1850lbs and had 53hp, and they worked just fine. With modern techniques it should be easy enough to make a vehicle with enough room, with a curb weight of under a ton. Then a simple 75 hp engine can get you where you are going just fine. There is no need to go 0-60 in under ten seconds if most cars on the road do it in fifteen seconds. Perhaps if there were tighter regulations on vehicle size (without a special license) and size to horsepower ratio limits, then there would be more room for innovative cars like the Aptera. Structural engineering of cars is really only half the crash test, the other half is the size of the other car they collide with.
And getting all of those SUVs off the road is easy, it's called $10-a-gallon gas.
The Pentagon seeks a positive public image. The UN seeks a positive public image. The Pentagon has departments and individuals whose sole job is giving whatever they do a positive public image. The UN has deparments and inviduals whose sole job is to give whatever they do a positive public image.
Where is the line between "putting your best foot forward" and PsyOps being used against the American people? "Spin" is a dirty word in my book. Particularly when it interferes with the ability of the American people to act as a check against bad government. That is one of the founding principles of our system of government. The only influencing that the US government should have to do to sway the opinion of the American people, is to deliver on promises and providing positive results. The Pentagon "seeking to provide a positive public image" for it's invasion of Iraq has failed miserably on both counts.
Maybe the DoJ and all other government agencies should be permanently banned. Not as a punishment, but as a matter of appropriateness. Think of the recent upset when it was discovered that the "military analyst" on most news shows was just a Pentagon mouthpiece. Why was that bad? Because in order for a democracy to function well, the people need access to clear unbiased information. While most everyone knows that various News programs have a slant, Wikipedia wants to (and should continue to) maintain as balanced a voice as possible. The more that Wikipedia become the first place many people go for information, the more important it becomes in having a well informed public. After all a well informed public is what things like "freedom of the press" is about, right?