People seem to forget that the police is not some amorphous entity but is, in fact, comprised of police-men (and -women), fallible human beings with all the weaknesses inherent in our race.
Wearing a police uniform does not suddenly make them flawless (especially since the requirements to get on the force are quite low). They can get high on power trips. They can have bad days. They can be petty, vindictive jerks.
The subpoena is needed to ensure that the officer in question actually follows a legitimate investigation and didn't just decide to make some poor schmuck his/her personal hobby and is now stalking them while hiding behind the protection of their badge.
Fallingcow wrote: > I wish that there were some way to record incidents like this, report them, and have those responsible punished. > > Abusing and threatening a citizen who has done nothing wrong should be a jailable offense. > > These people seek special power, and we give it to them. In exchange, they should be HARSHLY punished for any abuse of said power. > That goes for politicians, too.
This is the most insightful post I have seen on/. in a long while.
Read it. Read it again. Think about it.
Why do those who are granted a mandate by the people to wield power on the people's behalf, employ this power in their own interests -- often against those who bestowed it upon them?
Because they can.
Abuse of authority should be one of the most serious offences in the book. It is a crime against democracy, society, justice, freedom and human rights.
It is equal to treason and should be treated as such.
Yet, strangely, it isn't.
Don't you find it strange that in most (all?) "civilized" countries, abuses of power often go unpunished, and when punishment cannot be avoided, there are always "mitigating circumstances" that result in a slap on the wrist or other mockery of justice?
Perhaps it is because those who are given the power to write, interpret and enforce the laws, do not wish themselves to be constrained by those laws.
Here is my suggestion to minimize corruption: If an offence involved abuse of authority, the minimum sentence should be twice the maximum that the law prescribes.
Let this apply to policemen, teachers, abusive parents, JUDGES, politicians, members of government, PRESIDENTS.
The first party that makes this their platform and (adheres to it!) gets my vote for life. Hell, I'll donate and volunteer for the cause.
> It seems that most any time privacy issues are called into question, one group > always retreats to the "how dare you interfere" concept. They consider the rules > irrlelvent because "the good guys would never abuse their power".
And I completely agree. The good guys never abuse their power!
> If it were up to them it would be a police state, where the police did not > have to follow the same laws the rest of us do.
Whoa there, Cowboy! Since when the police are the "good guys"?
> Lightening is one of those non-threats that people (especially the media) like to blow out of proportion. > There are an average of 73 people killed by lightening every year in the U.S.
Just for the sake of comparison, how many people per year are killed in the US by terrorism acts?
"The intellectual property industry and law enforcement officials estimate U.S. companies lose as much as $250 billion per year to Internet pirates [...]"
Yup. Potential loss of extortion money always pisses the mob off.
I'm going to move my Bank of America accounts to another bank who employs solely domestic workers, and encourage friends and family to do likewise. If such loss of customers affected BOA enough, [...]
I applaud your idealism and wish you luck in finding enough people that give a shit to make a measurable impact in BOF's bottom line.
I will not be placing any bets on your chances of success though.
After reading the whole thread with the rest of LK's replies I think that I begin to see what the real problem with the US is.
Education
Seems that the two major parties finally managed to ensure the populace is dumb enough to fall for empty slogans and quash all semblance of a thought process come election day.
The only solution I can see is requiring a person to pass a critical thinking test before they are allowed to vote.
ummitwrote: > You realize, of course, that Dick was advocating that not 'cause he thought the lawyers > were scum, but because he was afraid they'd be righteous and unmasking of the atrocites that > Cade and his rabble were contemplating...
> I have a catch-all email address set up on my domain - so $anything@$mydomain gets to me. > [...] a few months ago, some [...] decided to use my domain name in forged From: addresses. > I now receive on the order of a thousand spams, bounces and assorted related crap per day. > [...] (Yes, I could switch off the catch-all addressing, but I actually find it useful, > inconsiderate wankers trying to ruin the entire net for everyone not withstanding)
I use a Fastmail account. The Sieve filtering is pretty good so I don't usually get more than a couple of spam messages/day while still being conservative about false positives.
However, the "secondary" spam -- mostly automated replies to forged addresses -- are getting quite annoying.
Slashdot Mirror
> what makes the music industry so special?
Money
Bette Davis, of course.
People seem to forget that the police is not some amorphous entity but is, in fact, comprised of police-men (and -women), fallible human beings with all the weaknesses inherent in our race.
Wearing a police uniform does not suddenly make them flawless (especially since the requirements to get on the force are quite low).
They can get high on power trips. They can have bad days. They can be petty, vindictive jerks.
The subpoena is needed to ensure that the officer in question actually follows a legitimate investigation and didn't just decide to make some poor schmuck his/her personal hobby and is now stalking them while hiding behind the protection of their badge.
Fallingcow wrote:
> I wish that there were some way to record incidents like this, report them, and have those responsible punished.
>
> Abusing and threatening a citizen who has done nothing wrong should be a jailable offense.
>
> These people seek special power, and we give it to them. In exchange, they should be HARSHLY punished for any abuse of said power.
> That goes for politicians, too.
This is the most insightful post I have seen on
Read it. Read it again. Think about it.
Why do those who are granted a mandate by the people to wield power on the people's behalf, employ this power in their own interests -- often against those who bestowed it upon them?
Because they can.
Abuse of authority should be one of the most serious offences in the book.
It is a crime against democracy, society, justice, freedom and human rights.
It is equal to treason and should be treated as such.
Yet, strangely, it isn't.
Don't you find it strange that in most (all?) "civilized" countries, abuses of power often go unpunished, and when punishment cannot be avoided, there are always "mitigating circumstances" that result in a slap on the wrist or other mockery of justice?
Perhaps it is because those who are given the power to write, interpret and enforce the laws, do not wish themselves to be constrained by those laws.
Here is my suggestion to minimize corruption:
If an offence involved abuse of authority, the minimum sentence should be twice the maximum that the law prescribes.
Let this apply to policemen, teachers, abusive parents, JUDGES, politicians, members of government, PRESIDENTS.
The first party that makes this their platform and (adheres to it!) gets my vote for life. Hell, I'll donate and volunteer for the cause.
> It seems that most any time privacy issues are called into question, one group
> always retreats to the "how dare you interfere" concept. They consider the rules
> irrlelvent because "the good guys would never abuse their power".
And I completely agree. The good guys never abuse their power!
> If it were up to them it would be a police state, where the police did not
> have to follow the same laws the rest of us do.
Whoa there, Cowboy! Since when the police are the "good guys"?
> Lightening is one of those non-threats that people (especially the media) like to blow out of proportion.
> There are an average of 73 people killed by lightening every year in the U.S.
Just for the sake of comparison, how many people per year are killed in the US by terrorism acts?
What are the rules in Canada?
> Do we, as consumers, have any recourse against these businesses?
Nope.
You, as consumers, do not have any recourse against any business.
There used to be a time where people had rights and corporations were non-entities.
Now it's the other way around.
> Since when does anyone "own" an acronym?
Since when does anyone "own" an idea?
This is just the cost of doing business.
The difference is that, if you are a US resident, the Russian mob does not use any force against you.
They do not coerce you to do anything, they do not limit your choices, they do not threaten to fine/imprison/facilitate-suing-into-bankruptcy you.
They offer you a product at a price.
Yup. Potential loss of extortion money always pisses the mob off.
They both stopped being funny about 6 years ago.
I applaud your idealism and wish you luck in finding enough people that give a shit to make a measurable impact in BOF's bottom line.
I will not be placing any bets on your chances of success though.
Put a moratorium on copyrights and patents for 10 years then see how it affected "the incentive to create".
> Interestingly, in russian the word "communism" became also a verb ("kommunizdit'").
> It means "to steal".
For the sake of brevity and better communications, the "kommun" in that word is often replaced by the single letter "p".
> Dear US citizen,
> Who is running your country?
The same entities that will soon be running yours.
> Why First Generation Apple Products Suck
Tell that to Hoover.
LK wrote:
> Because the other constitutional rights are not under constant assault.
As long as there are cordoned "free speech zones", the 1st amendment is safe.
LK wrote:
> I'm a two time Bush voter.
After reading the whole thread with the rest of LK's replies I think that I begin to see what the real problem with the US is.
Education
Seems that the two major parties finally managed to ensure the populace is dumb enough to fall for empty slogans and quash all semblance of a thought process come election day.
The only solution I can see is requiring a person to pass a critical thinking test before they are allowed to vote.
ummitwrote:
> You realize, of course, that Dick was advocating that not 'cause he thought the lawyers
> were scum, but because he was afraid they'd be righteous and unmasking of the atrocites that
> Cade and his rabble were contemplating...
I find the other opinion more to my liking.
However, you are somewhat right. Not all lawyers are scum.
The problem is that 99% of them give the others a bad name.
Henry VI, part 2, Act 4, Scene 2 (excerpt)
> Fuck me, it worked.
Given that the two previous posters got exactly wha they wished for,
I think that you should be more careful with your phrasing.
> I have a catch-all email address set up on my domain - so $anything@$mydomain gets to me.
> [...] a few months ago, some [...] decided to use my domain name in forged From: addresses.
> I now receive on the order of a thousand spams, bounces and assorted related crap per day.
> [...] (Yes, I could switch off the catch-all addressing, but I actually find it useful,
> inconsiderate wankers trying to ruin the entire net for everyone not withstanding)
I use a Fastmail account.
The Sieve filtering is pretty good so I don't usually get more than a couple of spam messages/day while still being conservative about false positives.
However, the "secondary" spam -- mostly automated replies to forged addresses -- are getting quite annoying.