tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-65010567413428477322024-03-12T22:16:06.465-04:00The DarkTechObserver Blog!JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.comBlogger147125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-50999475157379722302016-06-20T07:11:00.001-04:002020-07-29T19:14:54.677-04:00Why I Left The Republican PartyFirst and foremost, the party nominated Donald Trump, a spoiled rich kid whose primary goal in life is to beat other people. But worse than nominating an egocentric crybaby, the party abandoned all their principles and nominated an un-moored leftist.<br /><a name='more'></a><br />Conservatives have fought against over-reaching government attempting to control every aspect of citizens’ lives. Donald Trump has made a living through that kind of government. He brags about bribing officials and manipulating the government to serve him. He supports the Kelo decision, which held that the government could seize property from a poor person and give it to a rich person, on the grounds that the rich person would pay more in taxes. This is, essentially, voting against Mafia corruption in Chicago by electing Al Capone to mayor.<br /><br />Conservatives have fought against higher taxes. But Trump has taken the approach of Bernie Sanders, in raising taxes on the wealthy. Because Trump inherited his wealth, he assumes that everyone can absorb higher taxes, and doesn’t even realize the punitive effects of high taxes, both on upstart businesses and as a deterrent to new businesses. This has been a core tenet of the Republican Party for at least fifty years.<br /><br />The foundational principle of the Republican Party was racial equality, first expressed as abolition of slavery and later as civil rights. Democrats founded the Klu Klux Klan to stop blacks and Republicans from reaching elected office in the South. Trump has embraced the quasi-ethnic nationalism found in fringe parties in Europe. He’s attacked Mexicans for border security, Muslims for terrorism and Chinese for sneaky trade deals. The only things left are to accuse African countries of laziness and Israel of being greedy.<br /><br />Republicans have rejected otherwise strong candidates for insufficient or insufficiently sincere opposition to abortion. These same Republicans, who have tanked viable candidates on this one issue now back a man whose lifelong position was a mainstream Democratic “personally opposed”. Only after Trump started running for President did he flip to pro-life. But even that was a ham-fisted parody of a pro-life politician, talking about punishing women and other absurd things pro-life people never say, on top of his regular praise for Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider.<br /><br />As for party loyalty, Trump has attacked successful Republican leaders in Democratic states as poor leaders and ineffectual. Not because it’s true, but because they failed to bend the knee to Trump. (And sometimes, just because he could) But Trump has made it clear that he feels he is entitled to the Party’s respect and loyalty. Il Duce doesn’t give respect, he only demands it.<br /><br />Even on issues where he, apparently, agrees, with the GOP, he sounds like a parody. From promising to make Mexico pay for border security to suggesting criminal penalties for women who abort their pregnancies, Trump sounds like a “Republican” from Family Guy or The Simpsons. His anti-terror program is to ban all Muslims, possibly including US citizens, and to murder women and children because they are related to enemies of the US. His trade policy is basically a temper tantrum of tariffs and import taxes, likely resulting in a destructive trade war. Trump has essentially promised to continue President Obama’s foreign policy of embracing America’s enemies and distancing the US from America’s friends. He promised neutrality on Israel and talks with the North Koreans. The end result will be the same as the talks President Obama had with the North Koreans and President Obama had with the Iranians. I withheld my support from Governor Hogan* out of fear that a lack of philosophical grounding would cause him to support Democratic failures. Here, Trump is promising to emulate the biggest foreign policy failures in the last thirty years.<br /><br />Given Trump’s complete rejection of the entire Republican platform, and his embrace by the base the same party, why would I continue to be a member of the party? Why would any serious liberty-minded individual remain?<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />*Governor Hogan has, during the drafting of this piece announced that he would not even vote for Donald Trump. Governor Hogan has demonstrated a willingness to fight on issues he promised to fight on, and now a willingness to take on a popular leader within his own party on principle. <div>
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-83662095843060538122016-05-26T23:16:00.000-04:002016-05-26T23:16:12.459-04:00Alan Walden, Republican candidate for Baltimore Mayor, is a jerkAlan Walden is running for mayor of Baltimore. If manners count, he doesn't deserve dog-catcher.<br />
<a name='more'></a>Alan Walden is running as the Republican candidate for mayor of Baltimore. He spoke at the Baltimore Young Republicans, and I was in attendance. (Despite no longer being a Republican, I know, I know)<br /><br />Alan Walden was scheduled to speak at 7:15. He was told that, while the official meeting time is 6:30, the first half-hour is social. (Because people always arrive late to these because reasons) Walden was there at 6pm, before anyone else. At first I thought he was just being super-prepared, but the reason became clear later.<br /><br />At exactly 6:58 he spoke to the Chair and demanded that the meeting start immediately. Melanie, the Chair, quickly got the meeting started and Walden began his speech.<br /><br />As is typical, the servers at <a href="http://hightoppsbackstagegrille.com/" target="_blank">Hightopps</a> came in and took orders and delivered meals during the meeting. The BAYRs are a small group relative to other events they host, so they let the group have a side-room at no charge, with the expectation of the members and visitors buying food. They run a very nice restaurant and <a href="http://hightoppsbackstagegrille.com/" target="_blank">you should totally eat there</a>. They have an amazing outdoor area and several nooks for small to mid-size groups.<br /><br />Each time the servers came in, Walden would dramatically stop and embarrass the servers. Eventually, one server came in and Walden did his dramatic pause and his wife lost her marbles. She viciously hissed the word "Leave" and cruelly waved her hand at the entrance.<br /><br />It may or may not matter, but this server only came in once and was the only non-white server there. After that, no other servers came in until they left.<br /><br />Walden's speech itself was a condescending, yet unfocused, lecture, he took no questions, talked only to the people he knew, and then left shortly after finishing. The man was classless, and his wife was even worse.<br /><br />So, Walden successfully turned an entire room of Republicans in Baltimore against him in one meeting. He will not win Baltimore City, and he deserves exactly that outcome.<br /><br />So, first, Walden is personally unqualified to hold elective office. He didn't even respect the people whose votes and effort he needs. He and his wife <i>actively</i> disrespected and demeaned the waitstaff.<br /><br />Second, I'd like to apologize to Hightopps for the treatment of their staff by the speaker. I am no longer Vice-Chair, but I still feel some degree of responsibility for the club. <a href="http://hightoppsbackstagegrille.com/" target="_blank">You should eat there.</a> Their food is very good, it's a fantastic location, and the prices are very low. I recommend the Teriyaki Chicken. It's quite good. I endorse Hightopps as a good place to meet and eat foodstuffs. I endorse Alan Walden and his wife as Worst Speaker Ever.<br /><br /><br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-80639729404359626782016-03-08T07:00:00.000-05:002022-02-07T11:50:42.249-05:00Adventures In Incarceration 2So, to finish the story of my incarceration from the previous post on the subject.<br />
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The night I entered jail for my sentence, I was in shock. During intake they give out handbooks, and in the handbook it says something about if you’re feeling suicidal please tell someone. Well, I was, so I did.<br />
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Oops.<br />
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Turns out there’s no actual help available, what they do to suicidals is strip them, give them a smock of the same material used as temporary linings for elevators, and move them to a cell with nothing but a concrete slab. Keep in mind as well, that the jail is kept at about sixty degrees to suppress illness.<br />
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Oh, and in the suicide wing they never alter the light levels and have no clocks around.<br />
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I was in there for about a week. After about five days, I get my Circuit Court habeas bail appeal hearing. I’m informed of it too late to manage to take a shower, so I wear the same clothes I wore at trial and am taken to the courthouse. I get to the courtroom were my hearing will be hearing will be and find out that not only do I have no lawyer, but the public defenders present have no idea who I am. For the last four days I’ve got no sleep and extensive isolation, and then I find out I have no lawyer for my bail hearing. Of course I begin to panic.<br />
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The prosecutor generously shares their file on me with the public defender present. (If I recall correctly, it was the head of the Public Defender’s Office) She proceeds to do client intake in the jury box, right in front of the flipping judge.<br />
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Judge King grants a bail I can’t afford so I return to jail. Sometime later, (I think a day or two) the same attorney from the bail hearing visits me and offers the same the original deal, except now in Circuit Court. Since it was never my intention to plead guilty, this one would not be appealable, and I had just been badly burned on the deal, I said no.<br />
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Skip ahead five months, I now have a public defender who is actually reviewing the evidence and building a case, ready to proceed to trial. So naturally the prosecutor offers another deal - they’re dropping the clearly made-up assault charge and bringing up the minor charges, so either I can plead guilty to trespass or the prosecution will put in a last-second continuance and send me back to jail for two months. Thoroughly out of options, and with my new public defender pushing the deal since I’ve already served almost twice the maximum sentence of the charge, I admit defeat, accept the plea and am released.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-68634581019790399672016-02-22T07:00:00.000-05:002022-02-07T11:50:40.950-05:00Adventures In Incarceration<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">AS you know, (or at least should), Pat McDonoungh sent me to jail so he didn’t face charges himself. But, obviously, he can’t </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">literally </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">send me to jail himself, so I’m going to give you the details of what happened.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After I was charged, I found out that an attorney would cost me five-hundred dollars to represent me in District Court, and five-</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">thousand</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> dollars to represent me in Circuit Court. Guess what I didn’t have? You are a good guesser and must be psychic. I applied for a public defender. After a brief intake interview, I was assigned to Stuart Lyons.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">After a half-dozen calls to his voicemail, (probably more, I lit up his phone) he got back in touch with me. I gave him several instructions;</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I intended to take the case to trial. Upon presentation of the videos and photos I took during the alleged assault, any case against me would fall apart.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To prepare the case so that it would ready for trial without need for delay</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To reject any plea offer, because, at the time, I would cave into pressure under high stress.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To get the photos and videos to prepare the case</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To interview the witness I was able to identify - the weasel who ran the local Patch.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">We also scheduled a time to go over the events of the arrest at the scene itself.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The day before we were supposed to meet (the day before the trial), I got a call from Lyon’s aide telling me that they were cancelling our meeting and review, and that we would meet in court.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So the next morning I’m sitting in the Courtroom, just a little while before my trial is supposed to start. (Everyone there had their trial ‘scheduled’ to start at the same time, and there were a large number of people there.) After a bit, I get a tap on the shoulder - it’s Lyons, and we step outside the courtroom into the hall. He has his aide with him, and one of the first things he says is that I won’t go to jail today. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;">He then offers me a plea deal - the State will null-pros the lesser charges, which likely would have been absorbed into the main charge anyway as lesser included charges, and I plead guilty to the primary charge, assault and the State will </span></span><span style="line-height: 13.4933px; white-space: pre-wrap;">recommend</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"> probation, and we appeal to a circuit jury trial. Nervous and scared, I steel myself anyway and demand to go to trial. Every time I tell him I have no intention of pleading guilty, his response is the same, </span></span><span style="line-height: 13.4934px; white-space: pre-wrap;">formulaic</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"> answer, “The plea deal is the best way to minimize your legal exposure.” (The scripted response helped communicate how screwed I was.) I asked about the photos and videos I told him to acquire - he didn’t get them. I asked about the witness - nope. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So, after about forty-five minutes of arguing with “my” lawyer, I learned that Lyons had obtained none of the exonerating evidence I had developed, flatly refused to even deposition my witness, and hadn’t even read the police report. It’s now almost an hour past my trial was ‘scheduled’ to begin, and I’m in a near-panic. Lyons then suggests I plead “Statement of Facts”, which, he says, is </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">not</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> pleading guilty. (This is a lie. I run into him several months later during my incarceration and he tells me it’s the same as a guilty plea. He never mentioned the existence of the Alford Plea, which is ‘I’m innocent but I’m taking the plea deal”) At this point, with an attorney who knows nothing about my case, an hour past my trial time, sitting in the courthouse waiting to get called, I cave and agree to it. (I am proud that I held out for nearly an hour, and only caved at all because of a lie.) He goes to tell the prosecutor, she agrees, and, surprise, we get called in. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Lyons tells me right before we go in that I need to waive my right to a jury trial, in order to get to a jury trial. Now, Maryland has a system where all many crimes and routine orders are heard in District Court where there is no jury. Circuit Court handles major cases and all jury cases. Criminal convictions appealed from District to Circuit Court are handled </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">de novo</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. (Means the District Court ruling is basically ignored) Lyons lied to me - if I had refused to waive my right the case would’ve proceeded to jury trial in Circuit Court. I even told him my understanding that a District Court ruling was required to get to Circuit Court and he ‘forgot’ to correct me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Before the hearing even begins, Judge Norman Stone tells my attorney that he’s only one degree removed from the ‘victim’ (he doesn’t phrase it that way, of course) and asks if he should recuse himself. Before he can even </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">finish the question</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, Lyons is already trying to get the judge to move on and hear the case. The prosecutor reads the police report into the record and introduces some medical records suggesting that the victim suffered a stroke. Lyons didn’t even ask for the </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Prosecution’s</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> evidence. Then Stone throws out the plea deal. Sentence of five years, four suspended, two years probation, plus an angry rant about asshole bloggers not being entitled to First Amendment protections because other people have rights too.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Then it really is go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200.</span></span></div>
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You can now <a href="https://www.facebook.com/DarkTechObserver" target="_blank">like me on Facebook</a>, <a href="https://www.patreon.com/darkTechObserver" target="_blank">contribute support to my work</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/DarkTechMonitor" target="_blank">follow me on Twitter</a> and if you run a Maryland political group or candidate, <a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2015/08/free-stuff-inside-for-baltimore-area.html" target="_blank">I am offering free video work</a> this year.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-172221603479734892016-02-15T19:29:00.001-05:002016-02-22T02:14:18.582-05:00Meet Twitter's New Censorship CouncilSorry. "Trust and Safety Council"<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
Personal assessment score:<br />
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship </span>-<span style="color: lime;"> </span>Organization is explicitly and unreservedly against censorship<br />
<div>
<br />
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span><span style="color: #bf9000;"> </span>- Organization has no clear statement in support of free speech, and has mission in which censorship would be useful.</div>
<div>
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span> - Organization has no clear statement in support of free speech, has history of questioning principles of free speech or promoting "civil discourse" or other principles which require a pro-censorship stand.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><span style="color: #cc0000;"> </span>- Organization has censored critics, demanded critics be censored, promoted censorship, or made express pro-censorship statements.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span> - Does not have mission or goals that are speech-related.<br />
<div>
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.antibullyingpro.com/" target="_blank">Anti-Bullying Pro</a> - UK school "anti-bullying" organization. Seemingly out of place on a council for a company who's terms of use require users be able to form a binding contract. (In the US that means 18+) Bundles mean words with criminal acts under banner of bullying.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #bf9000;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.adl.org/" target="_blank">Anti-Defamation League</a> - Jewish group originally focused on combating Jew hatred. Model hate crime law enhances penalty for crimes depending on motive, which sometime results in reviews of suspects' written material. Fails to disclaim hate speech laws, a close relative of hate crime law.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #bf9000;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div>
<a href="https://www.beyondblue.org.au/" target="_blank">BeyondBlue</a> - Australian depression and mental health resource. Minor notes on insults related to depression. (Suggesting either a lack of institutional awareness of how mental illness works or bandwagoning)<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: #a64d79;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<a href="http://bravehearts.org.au/" target="_blank">Bravehearts</a> - Australian Anti-Child Abuse organization</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://cdt.org/" target="_blank">Center for Democracy & Technology</a> - Free-Speech and open Internet organization with an apparent focus on the European Union<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.childnet.com/" target="_blank">Childnet</a> - Direct quote: "Childnet’s mission is to work in partnership with others around the world to help make the internet a great and safe place for children." UK based.<span style="color: #5c5c5c; font-family: , "helvetica neue light" , "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , "lucida grande" , sans-serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span><span style="color: orange;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.circleof6app.com/" target="_blank">Circle of 6</a> - Organization partnered with Joe Biden to develop app to "prevent sexual violence" through surreptitious communication on smartphone. Conflates 'Bad date' ("Call and pretend you need me") with sexual violence. Potential to inflate sense of environmental danger and paranoia, but no direct speech implications.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.connectsafely.org/" target="_blank">Connect Safely</a> - Dead website. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5Otla5157c" target="_blank">No connection is a safe connection</a>.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: magenta;">Durrrrrr</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: magenta;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<a href="http://www.crisistextline.org/" target="_blank">Crisis Text Line</a> - Text-based crisis hotline.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.cybercivilrights.org/" target="_blank">Cyber Civil Rights Initiative</a> - Misleadingly-named anti-Revenge Porn organization. Despite the mission, strong anti-censorship statements.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: lime;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://www.cybersmile.org/" target="_blank">Cybersmile</a> - Anti-Cyber-Bullying organization. Similar to Childnet.<br />
<span style="color: #5c5c5c; font-family: , "helvetica neue light" , "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , "lucida grande" , sans-serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span><span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/author/Dacher_Keltner" target="_blank">Dacher Keltner</a> - “My hope is to rely on the science of cooperation and compassion to empower Twitter users to engage in more productive free speech,” <br />
<br />
That's not the way free speech works. <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/06/22/the-university-of-california-s-insane-speech-police.html" target="_blank">Except at Berkeley</a><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://dangerousspeech.org/" target="_blank">Dangerous Speech Project</a> - Group monitoring volatile situations looking for future Hitlers, those enthralling masses of people to commit genocide. Not attempting to police speech as much as thwart mass-murder, but a dangerous line to walk.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.e-enfance.org/" target="_blank">E-Enfance</a> - French version of Cybersmile and Childnet<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/media@lse/research/EUKidsOnline/ParticipatingCountries/uk.aspx" target="_blank">EU Kids Online</a> - UK version. I suspect the inclusion of all these child-centric organizations is just list padding.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.eun.org/" target="_blank">European Schoolnet</a> - "Private" organization run by Eurozone education ministries. Speech protection within the EU is meaningless, so<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: red;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://www.fosi.org/" target="_blank">Family Online Safety Institue</a> - More padding.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://feministfrequency.com/" target="_blank">Feminist Frequency</a> - Anita Sarkeesian. Critic of video games and general media famous for getting things completely wrong and calling every possible design choice sexist. Routinely blows criticism and harassment out of proportion for media attention. Public announced her location after claiming she was going into hiding.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjl3v3e3_rKAhVF6iYKHSwaDMUQFggdMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fflip.org.co%2Fen&usg=AFQjCNGJf1vyELZxFDhFWAbLHMyIHVdUfg&sig2=ZO620d0nD9R1uD_OAD2XCg" target="_blank">Fundacion para la Libertad de Prensa</a> - Colombian press freedom group.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.glaad.org/" target="_blank">GLAAD</a> - Yeah, that one.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.ihollaback.org/" target="_blank">Hollaback</a> - Counter-Shaming app intended to intimidate cat-callers into not being obnoxious. No lobbying campaign or calls for criminalization. Speech countering speech. May simply go too far.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://icanhelpline.org/" target="_blank">iCanHelp </a>- Not an Apple product. Western US-based bullying and reputation management hotline for schools. Reports possible TOS violations to service providers to remove postings.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://ictwatch.id/" target="_blank">ICT Watch</a> - English-language Indonesian internet-promotion organization<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://ikeepsafe.org/" target="_blank">iKeepSafe</a> - Not an Apple product. Student-centric privacy group<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://inach.net/" target="_blank">INACH</a> - Online civil-discourse advocacy group<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.betterinternetforkids.eu/" target="_blank">Insafe</a> - Padding<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.iwf.org.uk/" target="_blank">Internet Watch Foundation</a> - UK child-porn reporting hotline.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.jugendschutz.net/" target="_blank">Jugendschutz</a> - German padding. Maybe Twitter should consider banning minors instead?<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.licra.org/" target="_blank">LICRA</a> - French anti-racism group<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://https//www.love146.org/" target="_blank">Love146</a> - Anti-trafficking website.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: magenta;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://ei.yale.edu/person/marc-brackett-ph-d/" target="_blank">Marc Brackett</a> - Director for Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. Works on cyber-bullying.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://staysafeonline.org/" target="_blank">National Cyber Security Alliance</a> - Cyber-Security organization<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.thehotline.org/" target="_blank">National Domestic Violence Hotline</a> - Exactly what it says on the tin. Dunno what domestic violence has to do with Twitter.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://nnedv.org/" target="_blank">National Network To End Domestic Violence</a> - What's DV got to do with Twitter?<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://www.netsafe.org.nz/" target="_blank">NetSafe </a>- New Zealand Cyber-Security organization<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://pantallasamigas.net/" target="_blank">Pantallas Amigas</a> - Spanish-language child-support organization. Padding<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://projectrockit.com.au/" target="_blank">Project Rockit</a> - Australia-based anti-meanness group.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://au.reachout.com/" target="_blank">Reachout </a>- Crisis hotline. Twitter page links to Australian branch.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://r3d.mx/" target="_blank">Red en Defensa de los Derechos Digitales</a> - Spanish-Language organization. Supports holding US companies liable to lawsuits from foreign users and the "right to be forgotten"<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Known Censor</span><br />
<span style="color: red;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.redpapaz.org/" target="_blank">Red Papaz</a> - Another "Child-proof the Internet" group. Colombian.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://new.safernet.org.br/" target="_blank">Safernet</a> - Brazilian child-trafficking hotline/activist group<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.samaritans.org/" target="_blank">Samaritans </a>- UK hotline.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://swgfl.org.uk/" target="_blank">Southwest Grid for Learning</a> - UK educational charity. Not sure if it's government operated or not. Also no clue why it's on Twitter's council.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://spunout.ie/" target="_blank">Spunout </a>- Irish Millennial news site. Unironically uses "Young people". I suspect it's government-run. Has an editorial category dedicated to "bullying".<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://www.amf.org.au/" target="_blank">The Alannah and Madeline Foundation</a> - <i>Another</i> Australian anti-bullying group.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.wahidinstitute.org/" target="_blank">The Wahid Institute</a> - Religious freedom Muslim organization which held a conference on the Holocaust to counter Holocaust deniers.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;">Anti-Censorship</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: lime;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="https://www.wearethorn.org/" target="_blank">Thorn</a> - Anti-Child Porn group.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;">Non-Issue</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.saferinternet.org.uk/" target="_blank">UK Safer Internet Centre</a> - UK Padding on top of UK padding<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;">Likely Censor</span></div>
<div>
<span style="color: orange;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.withoutmyconsent.org/">Without My Consent</a> - Anti-Revenge Porn group<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">Probable Censor</span></div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: #f1c232;"><br /></span></div>
<a href="http://www.yakinproject.org/" target="_blank">Yakin</a> - loldedz<br />
_________________________________________________________________<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-14580187483316492882016-01-27T08:06:00.001-05:002022-02-07T11:54:19.942-05:00Pat McDonough Lied To The Police And Sent Me To Jail To Cover His Own CrimesHe's running for MD-2, but he's a crook.<br />
<br />
At the 2012 Primary election, I set out with my camera to conduct on-camera exit interviews. Instead, I found Pat McDonough with a gang of about a dozen people just outside the entrance to the polling room, stopping and surrounding voters attempting to vote in the primary election.<br />
<a name='more'></a>Maryland law, in order to protect access to the voting booth, prohibits anyone from campaigning within one-hundred feet of the entrance to the polling place. While McDonough and his crew were not physically obstructing the door to the polling room, they were blocking access to the patio in which the door was located and the patio entrance was less than forty-five feet from the door.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-L221GVysxN8/Vqi8oYuD01I/AAAAAAAAB0M/Q2YoIgSnR5Q/s1600/SAM_0168Edit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="181" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-L221GVysxN8/Vqi8oYuD01I/AAAAAAAAB0M/Q2YoIgSnR5Q/s320/SAM_0168Edit.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />
<br />
I witnessed McDonough and about eight other people surround someone trying to vote. It was at the point I realized something was wrong, and turned my camera towards them. Then, most of the people who were part of the group left. Only Pat McDonough and another volunteer, Anita Schatz, remained, eventually calling the police themselves to prevent more evidence from being obtained.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mspOB4Ec38k/Vqi8uIbV7-I/AAAAAAAAB0U/kkeMLprIuag/s1600/SAM_0169edit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="181" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mspOB4Ec38k/Vqi8uIbV7-I/AAAAAAAAB0U/kkeMLprIuag/s320/SAM_0169edit.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />
<br />
Violation of Maryland Election Law result in a two-year suspension from seeking or holding public office - McDonough would’ve lost his delegate seat and been prevented from running to reclaim it next election. So instead, he lied to the police.<br />
<br />
He and Schatz fabricated a story about a vicious assault to have arrested and discredited in the eyes of law enforcement. (It worked, by the way.)</div>
<div>
<br />
But, he had to tell a different story to the “reporter” from the local Patch who witnessed the whole thing. The report from The Patch claims my arrest was for attempting to video inside the polling location, but the actual charges were completely different. McDonough told one story to the police, who knew the law, and one story to the witnesses, who knew the facts.<br />
<br />
McDonough was willing to lie to the police for his own advantage. What makes you think he’ll tell you the truth.</div>
<div>
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-79028178474090071542016-01-18T07:00:00.000-05:002016-01-23T19:06:53.813-05:00Prosecutors, concerned that an easy revenue stream is being foreclosed, have started a propaganda campaign to protect it.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
As absurd as that sentence sounds, that is exactly what State’s Attorney Joseph Cassily wrote in the <a href="http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bs-ed-funding-dealers-20160103-story.html" target="_blank">Baltimore Sun’s op-ed</a> page in opposition to an over-ride of Governor Hogan's veto on a civil forfeiture reform bill.<br />
<br />
Cassily’s focus on street-level drug dealers is a distraction from the way asset forfeiture actually works. Police just take property and the police department and District Attorney’s office liquidate it and keep it. That's the process. There’s no guarantee that the people who had their property seized were even suspected of a crime, and if they want their property back, they have to go to court themselves, at their own expense, and prove that the property was never involved in any criminal activity.<br />
<br />
The legislature’s vetoed, but up for override, prohibition on seizing amounts of less than three hundred dollars is intended to eliminate the practice of seizing assets on the tactical consideration that the victim will not attempt to recover them. Because all of the expenses of taking the issue to court are entirely borne by the person who’s property as taken, seizing small-value property insures that police and prosecutors have a reliable and unaccountable revenue stream.<br />
<br />
What’s more, police could seize and hold any asset related to drug-dealing as evidence, charge the suspect, convict him, and seize those assets after conviction no matter what happens to the legislation, as it applies only to civil, not criminal forfeiture. The legislation simply requires that the property is returned to the owner within a certain timeframe if the owner is not charged with a crime. Currently, the police can take it, seize it, and pocket it without bringing any charges or making any accusations against anyone.<br />
<br />
The second part of the legislation does not prevent Maryland’s police from acting on information or co-operating with Federal law enforcement. That is a flat lie. What it does it prohibit the practice in other states with restrictions on civil forfeiture - local police bring along a single officer from a Federal law enforcement agency who makes all the seizures in the name of his Federal agency, who then turns over the property to the state agency, sometimes (but not always) taking a cut for his own agency for his trouble. This allows police to defeat the restriction on their authority while still seizing assets effectively at-will.<br />
<br />
Cassily is right that it doesn’t matter how the money is spent, just like it doesn’t matter if a burglar spends his stolen money on himself or charity. The issue is that the government has no legitimate claim to the money. It can be seized simply because the costs to get it back exceed the value of the property. This year, civil forfeiture proceeds now exceed the amount stolen by burglars!<br />
<br />
Civil forfeiture does not require police to arrest anyone, charge anyone, or even accuse anyone. It only requires police to claim “upon training and experience I suspect the property has been involved in crime.”<br />
<br />
At a minimum, we can prohibit police from acting like schoolyard bullies and stealing people’s lunch money.<br />
_________________________________________________________________<br />
<div style="text-align: start;">
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-64262198493967169212016-01-04T07:00:00.000-05:002016-01-04T07:00:10.959-05:00Justice Scalia was Right.But there’s no easy way to say it.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
During oral argument in the case known as “Fisher 2”, Justice Scalia asked a question relating to the “Mismatch” problem - that admitting students to colleges for reasons other than academic qualifications results in higher failure rates, greater shifts from harder, scientific majors to easier, often social-justice oriented ones and higher rates of dropout with excess debt.<br />
<br />
Because the primary reason academically-unqualified students are admitted is race, there is no easy way to ask the question without sounding bigoted. But the questions is not actually “Would Blacks do better at easier schools?” but rather “Would any person do better in a school with a student body at their own level?”<br />
<br />
The accusation of racism is actually just the standard defense of racial preferences or quotas, because these programs end up saying “This student is qualified and acceptable, and would be admitted, but we are not taking anymore students of that race.” The accusation of racism against opponents of the program is actually a cover for the explicit racism of the program.<br />
<br />
The literature is absolutely clear - students do best at the highest level of academic achievement they are qualified for. They do worst at schools they are underqualified for. The only academic defense to the literature boils down to “We’ve concealed as much of the data as we can, so you can’t reach that conclusion.” That’s hardly a defense.<br />
<br />
But the thrust behind Justice Scalia’s question was this: the primary defense of racial admissions into college is the creation of a “diverse”campus that’s enables minority participation. But if racial admissions simply result in higher drop-out rates, there is really no diversity argument at all - it hurts disfavored minorities by denying them qualified admission, and hurts favored minorities by putting them in near-guaranteed failure conditions and burying them in debt or diverting them to useless, isolated majors.<br />
<br />
If the government’s “compelling interest” in diversity at college is shown to be fatuous, either by failing them or segregating them, then racial preferences themselves are unConstitutional discrimination. And if it is shown that preferences are harmful to everyone, the government cannot justify them.<br />
<br />
Given that the harm is certainly happening, defenders of racist programs must use distractions and emotional manipulation in order to protect them.<br />
<div>
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-57701419081141462512015-12-30T07:00:00.000-05:002015-12-30T07:00:10.600-05:00Why StarCraft 2 is such a disappointment<br /><br />StarCraft 2 was a bit of a letdown. Here's why:<div>
<a name='more'></a>Story:<br /><br />-Overuse of the “Undo” button<br /><br />All three campaigns are involved in some scenario where the goal or plot requires undoing some previous accomplishment. The Terran Campaign removes Kerrigan from the Zerg Swarm (a major component of the original Zerg campaign), but the new Zerg campaign has her reinfested within five missions on-purpose. Undoing the entire first campaign undercuts player accomplishment and is primarily the result of the writers have placed themselves in a corner.<br /><br />The Protoss Campaign is even worse. Not only does it undo the weight of the Zerg Invasion of Aiur (As the majority of the Zerg never left), as the survivors and refugees of the Invasion simply knock off the Zerg forces and reclaim the planet, but it then immediately undoes that in the next level. And it undoes that by undoing one of the primary differences between the Zerg and the Protoss - the villain becomes the Overmind of the Protoss.<br /><br />-Cliche Writing<br /><br />The original StarCraft had a number of characters that were re-written fairly dramatically. The worst rewrites were of Zeratul and Kerrigan. Zeratul went from a bitter, but wise and compassionate, renegade to a generic mystic/prophet. Kerrigan went from a genuine omnicidal, manipulative monster (the “Queen Bitch of the Universe”) to another redemption-seeker.<br /></div>
<div>
Worse, the “Save Kerrigan” plot is basically a rehash of the “Save Hellscream” plot of WarCraft 3. Both were rescues of mind-controlled renegade allies crucial to the victory over the “true enemy” and both allies end up killing a key agent of that enemy. (Kerrigan kills Narud and Hellscream kills Mannoroth.)<br /><br />Each of these campaigns are also “small rebel group builds allies/forces to take on larger force”. In the Zerg and Protoss campaigns, this actually requires the player’s forces be separated from the bulk of the faction they lead. There is never an explanation for why Kerrigan never claimed the Zerg on Aiur, but the Protoss explanation is “the rest of the Protoss get a hive mind”.<br /><br />Gameplay<br /><br />Gameplay in StarCraft 2 steadily devolved from Wings of Liberty. While the array of different units made it possible for an array of successful strategies and approaches to be used, the Zerg Campaign begins the restrictions by denying the use of air transports - a core element of StarCraft that allows players to maneuver around obstacles or defenses and do ambushes or assaults from unexpected directions.<br /><br />But it’s in the Protoss Campaign where the gameplay is most heavily restricted. Protoss missions developed a focus on defensive play and enemy armies resupplied by program code, not gameplay mechanics. While the final Terran mission had an enemy army with accelerated production and infinite resources, the final Protoss mission had an enemy army that spawns off-map, with non-existent bases that are completely out of reach. Most ridiculous, the absolute final mission has the player attack magic floating rocks, with enemy spawners scattered around the map, but idle.<br /><br />The final mission of StarCraft: Brood War had the player surrounded by three enemy armies and without serious starting infrastructure. Both the player and the AI attackers all had to work their way up the tech tree to develop their advanced units. The mission forced the player to assault one army while defending against two others. The final mission of StarCraft 2 gives the player one super-elite unit and an army vs. a bunch of the aforementioned floating rocks and a handful of passive, automatically generated enemies.<br /><br />The Reason<br /><br />The shift from open levels with multiple options or strategies for completion to tightly-controlled levels with one scripted solution is the result of the move to cinematic gameplay, that is, writing a movie and having the player work their way through it. <br /><br />The player can’t be allowed to airlift their army and bypass an enemy installation, because there are cutscenes and dialogue that have to take place. An FPS must be completed in exactly the right sequence because that’s how all the events are triggered and the enemies are spawned. The adventure game can’t have the player get items or access areas out of order, because that would create unbalanced gameplay and disrupt the story!<br /><br />The focus has shifted from designing fun, challenging games with multiple solutions to easy, cinematic experiences that lead the player around by the nose, unless the game is intended to be a “sandbox”.<br /><br />Technology has been it’s own nemesis here, as the advances in technology that allow for more advanced gameplay also create the opportunities for more advanced scripting. But writers and designers aren’t using the advancements to create more and better storytelling and gameplay tools, but to restrict gameplay to control the direction and flow of gameplay.</div>
JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-29097788707419790342015-10-26T07:52:00.001-04:002015-10-26T07:53:01.195-04:00Prescriptions, Monopolies, and Price-FixingFrom $13.50 to $750, but not what it seems<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So a company called Turing Pharmaceuticals took a generic drug that was selling for $13.60 and started selling it for $750. But how? It's a <i>generic</i> drug, that means anyone can sell it, so how come no one else is selling it at $13.60?<br />
<br />
Because Turing Pharmaceuticals hit on a method of getting a monopoly on generic, life-saving drugs.<br />
<br />
How it works it simple: Drugs that were developed before the FDA's regulatory compliance scheme was created were grandfathered in without going through that gauntlet, because those drugs were already proven to actually be effective.<br />
<br />
But the FDA and it's supporters in Congress still wanted to put those drugs through the FDA gauntlet, so they created a special monopoly privilege for companies that filled out that paperwork and completed the make-work for the FDA's records. Companies that filled out the FDA forms gain the right to shut down production of the drug by any other company.<br />
<br />
And, surprise, companies have started evaluating drugs to review based on the low cost of production instead of the public good. So these companies will go to the FDA, fill out the paperwork, gain monopoly privileges, and jack up the price. Turing's 5500% price hike might be the most excessive, but other companies do it less obnoxiously.<br />
<br />
This is not a patent - it's not a reward for creating a new, lifesaving medicine or quality of life drug. It's a reward for <i>filling out paperwork</i> and <i>completing forms</i>. They are not providing any value to the public, only to the FDA.<br />
<br />
Turing's price gouging is the result of bureaucracies prioritizing their own paperwork over the good of the public.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-16787591171906499882015-10-23T07:00:00.000-04:002015-10-23T07:00:08.039-04:00This isn't supposed to be a free-speech blog.But here we go again.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So, recently, a Brown University student wrote a column for the student newspaper speculating on whether white people have an <a href="https://popehat.com/2015/10/21/white-people-are-good-with-cows-brown-university-people-are-bad-with-free-speech/" target="_blank">agricultural privilege.</a> While stupid lunatic stuff is common at expensive colleges, it's the reaction that matters here.<br />
<br />
In a bit of <a href="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=teamkiller&defid=555487" target="_blank">teamkilling</a>, other Brown students attacked the first columnist, but not for writing something stupid. Instead, they attacked the columnist's right to write something stupid <i>at all</i>.<br />
<br />
Of course, that's par for the course for the modern university. No longer a place to ask hard questions, it's not a place of play-do and puppy videos. But that's not the uniquely bad part of this incident.<br /><br />This is:<br /><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Censorship has a particular meaning that has been lost in these debates. Censorship is the exercise of power to suppress challenges to the status quo. People of color calling attention to racism does not constitute an overbearing power structure that will limit free speech. The oppressed by definition cannot censor their oppressor.</blockquote>
This is a trick that was first created in the racial sphere: that one group, no matter how much they may express racial hatred or claim racial superiority, <i>cannot</i> be racist because they are "oppressed". ("Oppression" itself is defined along racial and ethnic lines in this context) And only "Oppressors" can be racist.<br /><br />Here, the word is defined to apply <u>only</u> to the restriction on speech of certain <i>policy</i> positions and not others. So, according to this definition, student groups who literally censored a <a href="https://reason.com/blog/2014/11/11/smith-college-paper-considers-the-word-c#.yxf2wi:DfcL" target="_blank">debate transcript on free speech</a> aren't actually censoring the transcript, despite replacing words with variants of [expletive deleted], because the students are "challenging the status quo".<br /><br />But the Oppression Olympics only count for defending Progressive positions, as "oppression" is not based on actual immediate power structures, but on hypothetical power structures that break down on political and racial lines.<br />
<br />
A black student who takes a right-wing position on an issue in opposition to the campus dogma, the administration and local media is dismissed as having "internalized oppression", and a white student who does is part of an established power structure <i>despite having every actual source of power set against him.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
In the reverse, a student that parrots the position of the college administration, local government, student body and campus police is "challenging the status quo" <i>solely because he holds Progressive views. </i>"Challenging the status quo" is a kind of doublespeak for "holds the right position" which is often the status quo on campus.<br />
<br />
So, in true Orwellian fashion, "challenging the status quo" means supporting it, being "oppressed" means having the power structures in support, and censoring is criticism of the non-mainstream view, not stripping funding from student newspapers or <u>literally censoring transcripts</u>.<br /><br />Up is down, black is white, male is female, and you must comply and comply enthusiastically.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-67787002968919730502015-10-21T08:49:00.000-04:002015-10-21T08:49:14.865-04:00How Competition Would Enhance EducationIt wouldn't have to improve existing schools.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>One of the major advantages to having a voucher system in public education is that it creates a competitive marketplace for schooling. But that means several things:<br />
<br />
1) It allows parents to select the school of their choice, rather than being assigned a school and told that they need to send their children there regardless of the condition of that school.<br />
<br />
2) It allows schools to develop specific focuses for different markets - music, athletics, computing, machinery, whatever. Parents and students who have an interest in a particular topic will be able to pool resources in order to see schools that serve those interests established.<br />
<br />
3) Parents are able to, if a school fails their children, move to another school. Currently, public schools can write off a certain number of students, because the only evaluation that matters is the one that comes from the government. Parents who want to see their children educated and complain to a school can, in effect, be told to take a hike without recourse.<br />
<br />
4) Schools that failed to serve the needs of their students would be bankrupted by mass defections. While the modern public school could even announce that they've written off specific students with limited repercussions, under a voucher system such a school would be compelled to close after being abandoned.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-81470876286321438302015-09-29T09:21:00.000-04:002015-09-29T09:21:09.718-04:00The Maryland Tax Refund FactsIt's not a normal refund.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So Governor Hogan is pushing this new outreach program, you might have seen the pictures or the reports:<br /><br /><img alt="" aria-busy="false" aria-describedby="fbPhotosSnowliftCaption" class="spotlight" height="300" src="https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpa1/v/t1.0-9/12065697_1043856508992447_8186044991987106572_n.jpg?oh=9127a4872f28611a77ce17d5c9c5cda9&oe=569A85DB" width="400" /><br />
<br />
So what's going on? Here are the basics:<br /><br />1) Maryland had a unique tax system, where part of the "county" tax was actually set and colleceted by the state government. This part of the total income tax did not have a credit for out of state taxes. That meant that someone who worked in a different state would by the full rate in that state, <i>and</i> the full rate of this "county" tax. A handful of states credited that "county" tax against their own income assessments, but the majority of states did not.<br /><br />2) This tax plan created a condition where any income earned across state lines was subject to double-taxation and, critically, income earned just within Maryland was not. It was, in function but not name, a tariff on interstate work.<br />
<br />
3) A fellow in Howard County, Brian Wynne, earns his living through corporate payouts from business in multiple states, including states not giving credit against MD taxes. He sued the state of Maryland, claiming a Constitutional violation of the Commerce Clause.<br /><br />4) The Supreme Court ruled that it doesn't matter if it's called an income tax or tariff, penalties against crossing state lines are unconstitutional. Period.<br /><br />5) Now Maryland has to refund all the taxes collected under that scheme for the last few years that were collected on double-taxed income.<br /><br />Those are the facts.<br /><br />You may qualify for the refund if you paid taxes on income in states that do not border Maryland except Delaware (Meaning you might get the refund for Delaware.) You have to file the relevant documents to apply for the refund, which are <a href="http://governor.maryland.gov/you-may-be-owed-a-tax-refund/" target="_blank">here</a>. If you only worked in Maryland itself, you do not qualify.<br /><br />If you paid taxes to localities in Pennsylvania, you may qualify, PA state taxes do not qualify.<br /><br />This action is required by the Court decision, and Governor Hogan, given his current agenda, is likely thrilled to have the chance to enact it. The state legislature cannot do anything about it, and Governor is <i>required</i> to follow it.<br />
<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-89825169943608298972015-09-25T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-25T07:51:35.773-04:00Chris Kefalas And The Art Of Showing UpTrouble attending events, leaving groups in the lurch<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So the Baltimore Young Republican Club (meets at the Ropewalk, last Thursday of every month, I'm Secretary, please stop in. Not writing as Secretary, see disclosure page) had, since before it's founding, scheduled for this month's meeting Chrys Kefalas, currently running for US Senate in Maryland. This had been fixed since July, when Melanie Harris decided to start up the BYRs and arranged a number of speakers so we had reliable headliners when we got going. (Really, she did a fantastic job setting everything up). I was looking forward to meeting him.<br />
<br />
Kefalas's staff contacted Melanie (Our chair) this morning, letting her know that he'd actually be in Chicago, speaking to big-money fundraisers, super-important deal. So he canceled the event he was headlining with less than 12 hours notice. His team even asked Melanie to make a statement to the effect that he was sorry but he had an important meeting to attend. In essence, he asked the people he canceled on to let everyone know he had something better to do.<br />
<br />
Now, Melanie scrambled and got State Senator Johnny Ray Salling to speak instead. Credit to Melanie for being so quick and gratitude to Sen. Salling for agreeing to step in on such short notice, such kindness does not go unnoticed. (His Facebook page is <a href="https://www.facebook.com/senatorjohnsalling" target="_blank">here</a>, he's not up for re-election until next cycle, but his campaign site is <a href="http://www.johnnysalling.com/" target="_blank">here</a>.)<br />
<br />
Kefalas's people then called back and said that he could do a Skype call to the club from Chicago, so that's what we got. Instead of a chance to meet and speak with the candidate, we got a cell-phone Skype video for about 5 minutes.<br />
<br />
And, I hear, that the Reagan Republican club was also supposed to have Kefalas speak at a recent event for them as well, and was cancelled on too.<br />
<br />
Half of politics is showing up, and a lot of the other half is treating people respectfully. Cancelling with roughly ten hours notice and then coming back and asking for a remote feed is disrespectful and selfish. Dropping everything to go chase big-dollar donors doesn't speak well of a candidate's priorities either. Every aspect of this move was a mistake, from prioritizing fundraising over prior commitments, to cancelling with no notice and even the nature of the explanation.<br />
<br />
Kefalas's choice deeply damaged his standing within the MDYRs, perhaps irreparably.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-19796435812620368692015-09-23T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-23T07:00:00.814-04:00Because You Missed It: Multi-Member Districts<br />Cheating writ large<br /><a name='more'></a><br />Multi-member districts cheat the voters out of clear choices in their elections, are open to gamesmanship and are more easily gerrymandered than single-member districts.<br /><br />Multi-member districts are districts with multiple members of the legislature serving the same geographic area. These districts are far larger than they should otherwise be, and have a number of slots (generally 2 or 3) to fill with the top vote-getters.<br /><br />There are multiple problems with multi-member districts (MMD). First, MMDs insulate incumbent politicians from losing elections by allowing members to survive their election in as low as third-place. This means that incumbent politicians don't have to <b>win </b>elections, they just have to avoid <b>losing</b> them. <br /><br />It also makes it nearly impossible to campaign <b>against </b>an incumbent. Since the incumbent only has to come in third (in three-member districts), they will survive a challenge if there are only three candidates. Any attempt to unseat him in a competitive race would have to be an exclusively negative campaign to get people to not vote for that candidate, giving that target of the campaign tons of free name recognition and the chance to cast himself as the underdog. Whereas in a single-member district, such a campaign could focus on promoting the alternative, rather than simply butchering the incumbent. In a MMD, such a strategy could result in <b>both</b> candidates achieving office.<br /><br />In addition to that, MMDs lend themselves more easily to gerrymandering and gamesmanship. The more space and population in each district, the more opportunities there are to rig districts in favor of one party. To make the point clear, imagine if there were only 7 MMDs in Maryland, aligned to the Congressional map. The only Republicans would come from the Eastern Shore, and there would be almost no opportunity to expand the party beyond MD-1, ensuring permanent Democratic control.<br /><br />On top of the ease of gerrymandering districts, MMDs can also be split in Maryland. So, in the case of a strong Republican district with a Democratic enclave, Annapolis Democrats can split off the enclave and net themselves an extra vote. Likewise, in a competitive MMD, Democrats can pack enough of the Republican voters into one sub-district, spin it off, and make two seats secure for themselves. What's more, this process is <b>optional </b>and expressly open to gamesmanship. This allows Democrats to maximize their legislative control without having the voters that would otherwise be required.<br /><br />Even unpopular incumbents can continuously win re-election because the size of MMDs discourages challengers from running. The larger the district, the greater protection the natural advantages of incumbency provide.<br /><br />Larger districts enhance the effectiveness of spending disparities and media coverage. In a small district, a large advertising purchase or media campaign can be partially overcome simply by through direct contact - knocking on doors, waving signs, small public events, etc. The smaller the district is, the less effective advertising or media are. But the reverse is also true - large districts are much more difficult to campaign in, because the costs are greater. Again, compare the effort and money needed to run in a Congressional race with the effort needed to win a *current* statehouse seat.<br /><br />MMDs also insulate incumbents from accountability. Whereas the representative of a small district is likely to be well-known in the community and easily reachable, the representative of a larger district will find it easier to ignore or evade difficult problems or challenging voters. They may hide behind staff, be unavailable, or simply pass the matter off to another delegate in the district. This also diffuses accountability - which of the three delegates do you blame for not addressing an issue?<br /><br />MMDs are perfect for avoiding responsibility and cheating the voters out of a fair choice. That is why they must go.<br /><div>
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-78412062073926830912015-09-21T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-21T07:35:23.160-04:00Bomb Safety 101How to handle a suspected explosive:<br />
<a name='more'></a>There are important steps to resolve a potential bomb situation, and several important things to <b>not</b> do.<br />
<br />
If you were to discover a bomb at a venue where there are children, here is Step 1, Clear The Area:<br />
<div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dhFIfjZ78jI/Vf-OUyz6eAI/AAAAAAAABpg/QbKtAHxfMOc/s1600/BombSafety1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="217" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dhFIfjZ78jI/Vf-OUyz6eAI/AAAAAAAABpg/QbKtAHxfMOc/s400/BombSafety1.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fA5OA4NaRmU/Vf-PyPGRkuI/AAAAAAAABps/04cF_B3nC-c/s1600/BombSafety2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fA5OA4NaRmU/Vf-PyPGRkuI/AAAAAAAABps/04cF_B3nC-c/s400/BombSafety2.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
You should not keep the room occupied while you pick up the suspected bomb and play with it.<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ip45xAbvkVM/Vf-RVkojswI/AAAAAAAABp8/LmqjDOfZZQk/s1600/BombSafety3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="217" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ip45xAbvkVM/Vf-RVkojswI/AAAAAAAABp8/LmqjDOfZZQk/s400/BombSafety3.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Having evacuated the room or area, you should make sure to keep the area clear and the suspected bomb.<br />
<br />
Step 2, Keep the area clear:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Vz0FRZ79MmU/Vf-XagtPzNI/AAAAAAAABqY/G4JsodavfiU/s1600/Hall1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Vz0FRZ79MmU/Vf-XagtPzNI/AAAAAAAABqY/G4JsodavfiU/s400/Hall1.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
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Under no circumstances should you pick up and carry the bomb through an occupied building as if you were showing off a fish you caught.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Jmael7c8tA0/Vf-Xak7PBtI/AAAAAAAABqc/1rFBdcMrDZU/s1600/Hall2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Jmael7c8tA0/Vf-Xak7PBtI/AAAAAAAABqc/1rFBdcMrDZU/s400/Hall2.png" width="400" /></a></div>
Finally, you should call the police and have the send in the bomb squad, not regular patrolmen.<br />
<br />
Step 3, Call The Bomb Squad:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lBZH3IMoftc/Vf-cQw5N8CI/AAAAAAAABqw/s3ZZBiCQwko/s1600/BombSquad.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lBZH3IMoftc/Vf-cQw5N8CI/AAAAAAAABqw/s3ZZBiCQwko/s400/BombSquad.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KMsxFvhF0EY/Vf-eK04epFI/AAAAAAAABrA/CdC2geS2Rm0/s1600/NotBombSquad.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KMsxFvhF0EY/Vf-eK04epFI/AAAAAAAABrA/CdC2geS2Rm0/s400/NotBombSquad.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Given the basic, correct responses to the discovery of a bomb, and that the Irving school that had someone <i>arrested</i> for exposed electronics made <u>every worst decision they could manage</u> if they really believed the electronics were a bomb, the only logical conclusion is that they lied about their belief. Whether it was religious or racial bigotry, or just assuming that anything that breaks their routine is dangerous because public educators are brick-stupid, it doesn't matter.<br />
<br />
What matters is that the claim that the school or the police genuinely believed there was a bomb is bull.<br />
<br />
And the conspiracy claim that the student's father built the clock out of stripping off the casing of a 1970's vintage clock bought on eBay (with no proof at all) in order to spark an incident doesn't speak well of public education, if all it takes to cause a fake panic is stripping the casing off of cheap electronics.<br />
<br />
Lastly, the claim that, because the student is Muslim he is therefore guilty, is simple bigotry. The religious victim group used to be Jews, Mormons, and Catholics at various points in history, with mostly the same histrionics as today. It's as much bullshit now as it was then.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-2955527893724809052015-09-17T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-17T07:00:01.789-04:00Ahmed And His SchoolAnd plain-faced racism in Texas.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So a 14 year-old kid in Texas decided to show off his electrical engineering ability and built a digital clock. Being a computer-based clock, it contained circuits and motherboards and stuff, rather than gears. It looked like just about any other piece of uncased technology.<br />
<br />
Naturally, school officials reacted rationally and were impressed by the kid's skill in constructing the device himself, and applauded his efforts.<br />
<br />
Just kidding. His name is Ahmed and he's Sudanese, so he was arrested and charged with making a fake bomb.<br />
<br />
And that's not a joke.<br />
<br />
Ahmed had the clock confiscated by his English teacher, who reached the conclusion that is was a bomb. While his Engineering teacher told him to not show it to anyone, it began to beep in his English class. The teacher, understanding that <i>no other piece of technology other than bombs</i> makes any kind of electronic beep, and demonstrating the totally rational fear of a reasonable person from any potential explosive, took the clock from him and stuck it in her bomb-proof desk drawer.<br />
<br />
Then she took it to the principal's office, and the principal studied the device carefully. The principal came to the entirely reasonable conclusion that, since real clocks have cases and this had exposed components, it must be a bomb. He then called the police. He did not evacuate the building. He did not call the bomb squad.<br />
<br />
The police came and poked at the clock. From the advanced training of watching movies and cartoons with tense "red or blue wire" scenes, the police determined that it was a bomb. They then had Ahmed brought into the room, with the bomb and the police and the principal, and one of the police, upon seeing him, said something to the equivalent of "I knew it", reflecting the brilliant deduction that modern bomb-makers are Arab. (Or close enough, whatever)<br />
<br />
After a totally consensual and not-at-all intimidating interrogation of Ahmed by his principal and five police officers, they were not able to obtain a confession of even joking terrorist activity from Ahmed and concluded that it was not a bomb. They concluded instead that it was a hoax bomb, containing no explosives but many components found in movie bombs, like electrical wiring, batteries, circuit boards and a digital display. They then arrested him for bringing a hoax bomb to school.<br />
<br />
--<br />
<br />
That's bullshit. What actually happened is that racist redneck assholes saw a Muslim kid with electronics and pretended they thought it was a bomb to harass him. <i>Nobody</i> says "Hey that's a bomb I'm gonna pick it up and play with it". Not one single person involved here acted like they thought it was actually dangerous. No one brought in a bomb squad or took even basic precautions, they just play-acted like they thought the kid named <i>Mohammed</i> was a terrorist.<br />
<br />
Every adult involved here should lose their job over this. This was, at least in part, open racism.<br />
<br />
But more than that, it's about <a href="http://popehat.com/2015/09/16/willful-paranoia-the-classic-excuse-for-willful-paranoia-istandwithahmed/" target="_blank">idiot school officials</a> who couldn't understand why a 14 year-old boy interested in science would actually <i>build</i> something, or why his parents would let him play with those things. Intelligence is a very frightening thing to people who have a deficit in it. What's more, Ahmed missed the lesson that learning is terribly boring and exclusively comes from books. After all, who <i>does</i> things things to learn anymore? The proper way is to sit still and read the dullest material possible!<br />
<br />
Look, I know a little bit about what Ahmed is going through. While I was never arrested, and have little skill in electronics (and glow in the dark), when I was in high school my vice-principal one day flat-out asked me if I was going to come in shooting one day. Why? Because I was eccentric and picked on, and I didn't fit any of the molds of the Stereotypical American Student. Today, the SAS mindlessly accepts whatever drivel his teachers deliver, challenges nothing, attempts nothing, and accomplishes nothing, outside of pre-authorized and well-trod paths.<br /><br />Not only that, but the Zero Tolerance mindset that guides school administrators today is premised on the idea that anything that might possibly potentially appear to be a threat if looked at a certain way is to be treated the same as an actual threat. From suspending students for pop-tart and finger guns, to expelling them for drawing dinosaur hunters, <i>everything</i> is to be punished at the maximum level of severity. <b>Ahmed was arrested and incarcerated for building a timepiece.</b> The charges were dropped, but only after the message was sent.<br /><br />
Today, the purpose of <a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2015/05/because-you-missed-it-education.html" target="_blank">government education</a> is to stifle inquisitive minds and screen out independent thinkers. And then we wonder why there's an innovation gap.<br /><br />
The officers involved should be fired. The principal should be fired. The teachers who filed a <i>criminal complaint</i> should be fired. But they work for the government, so they will never suffer any consequences whatsoever.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-4587641756928167952015-09-16T07:20:00.000-04:002015-09-16T07:20:12.674-04:00My written testimony to the Governor's Redistricting Commission<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
This is what I was originally going to say in testimony, but it was largely covered by others.</div>
<a name='more'></a>Instead I spoke about multi-member districts, based from t<a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2014/12/multi-member-districts-undercut.html" target="_blank">his previous piece</a>.<br /><br />Here is my original testimony, which will be submitted in writing:<br /><br />Everyone knows that gerrymandering is a
problem. But I'd like to explore some aspects of gerrymandering that
have escaped the notice of most people. First, it breaks up
communities. This advantages incumbents because, for any concerns a
community may have, responsibility is spread between multiple
representatives. Any issue of local concern falls into the category
of “someone else's problem” and therefore becomes no one's
problem. It, intentionally or not, strips away the voice of the
community in order to protect a favored incumbent, or at least a
favored political party.<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The second problem is that the process
is, by design, outcome determinative. While most people recognize
that, what they miss is that gerrymandering is, in effect, an open
conspiracy between the map-makers and their supporters in some areas
to their political opponents representation. That is, in fact, the
entire point.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
While an independent commission would
alleviate some of the problems inherent to the issue for a time,
trying to find a system that only recruits the right people is a
fool's errand. Eventually, the commission would end up captured by
agents of specific incumbents or the parties themselves co-operating
to protect incumbents against any challenges. While it is not
possible to insure the right people, it is possible to create
conditions that compel the wrong people to do the right thing.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The best way to create conditions to
compel the right decisions is simple. It requires two simple rules;
the first and most important is that districts must respect
pre-existing political and natural boundaries as much as possible. No
jumping back and forth across streets, rivers, counties or even the
Chesapeake Bay to cheat as many people as possible of a voice.<br /><br />The
second rule is compactness – that districts be as compact as
possible. That would prevent any remaining tricks that don't involve
crossing boundaries like running along a river to include friendlier
communities to flip a district. It's a simple reinforcement of the
first rule.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
These rules would have the effect of
keeping communities together, which itself makes it easier for
challenges to gain standing within a few communities to build a
support base of voters and volunteers, which in turn would compel
incumbents to listen and focus on the communities they represent,
instead of grandstanding on television and relying on party loyalists
to make up the difference. Currently, with pieces of the districts
here, there and all over, it makes it extremely difficult to reach
out to and develop support bases without already being an incumbent.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The rules would allow meaningful
judicial review as well. Currently, judges have very few rules to
determine what is a good or fair district, so judges have few
justifications to throw out rigged maps. These simple rules will
create the opportunity for judges to assess whether the maps are
fair. The posssibility of judicial review will incentivize the
map-makers to create fair districts, as they would not wish to cede
the power to a court or another body to create a map themselves.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Obviously, the current system is
rigged. Mike Miller, State Senate Leader, has effectively admitted
that both MD-6 and MD-3 are rigged to insure both John Delaney and
John Sarbanes win re-election. Without the rigged lines, they would
lose for certain. That's outrageous and reprehensible, not
defensible.</div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-2766066486848517772015-09-14T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-14T12:45:40.661-04:00Advertising Networks Abuse Their UsersStop shielding them.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Many websites today have autoplay video/audio ads, even when they aren't supposed too. <a href="http://www.erfworld.com/blog/view/47176/bad-ads-killed-new-ads-tried-and-augusts-armored-dwagon" target="_blank">This post</a> at the webcomic <a href="http://erfworld.com/" target="_blank">Erfworld </a>lays out the basics as to why. In short, advertising networks are paid for ads from producers and host them on their networks. The networks appear on many sites, and those sites receive a portion of the revenue from the networks.<br />
<br />
It turns out that the best-paying networks "accidentally" let a larger portion of "malicious" (that is, with unauthorized function) ads through. These ads play audio when the websites running them have demanded no-autoplay, crash websites with long scripts, lock the page so the ad is on-screen, making it impossible to scroll and even redirect mobile devices to the purchase page of whatever they are advertising. Somehow, the networks that pay less don't have the problem of "malicious" ads "sneaking through" and "accidentally" breaking webpages or blasting noise and music.<br />
<br />
At the moment, these ad companies are protected. The obnoxiousness of the ads is often related to the uselessness of the product, so annoying or even destructive ads enhance revenue - the terrible reputation of the company is not a factor for someone selling a cell-phone game no one has heard of. Most people won't quit a website for playing an audio ad sometimes, so the ads still get plenty of viewers. Even if a website goes down, the ad networks are massive - killing a smaller website won't noticeably impact a network's revenue stream. Finally, the ad network is not the company selling the particular product, so even if the product is some people would normally buy and runs the risk of a boycott, the network itself is safe, because no one knows who it is.<br />
<br />
So what options exist for people to avoid destructive, harmful, annoying or otherwise destructive ads.<br />
<br />
1) Get an ad-blocker.<br />
<br />
While the ad-blockers are simple and elegant solutions, even top-tier websites, sites like <a href="http://legalinsurrection.com/" target="_blank">Legal Insurrection</a> and webcomics like <a href="http://egscomics.com/" target="_blank">El Goonish Shive</a> need the ad revenue to maintain their level of quality production. (You may have noticed that I have trouble writing three articles a week. Dan Shive regularly produces 6 <i>comics </i>a week. That's a full-time job.)<br />
<br />
2) Complain to the websites.<br />
<br />
Erfworld, EGS and LI have all responded quickly to my complaints about autoplay ads and deserve credit for being on top of it. Erfworld's staff, in fact, spent roughly 120 man-hours to sort which ad networks could be trusted. Here's the problem, though: <i>they shouldn't have to.</i> The whole reason ad networks exist is to provide third-party support for managing ads. If a website says "No autoplay ads or redirects", that <i>should</i> mean <b>no autoplay ads or redirects</b>. The individual websites allow these ad networks to take a part of the revenue for themselves, this is part of what they are being paid for.<br />
<br />
3) Expose the ad networks who have or continue to "accidentally" let abusive ads "slip through".<br />
<br />
I don't believe that these ad networks are consistently missing ads with exploits or that ignore permissions. It happens too often and too frequently to be an accident. Every now and then, I could understand if an advertiser cheats a network and tricks them into displaying an abusive ad, but when the same ads consistently "break" the rules on multiple websites in the same way, I am forced to conclude that there is an understanding between the advertiser and the network.<br />
<br />
Right now, according the Erfworld's results, the ad networks that pay the best routinely have ads that the sites have previously objected to. There needs to be an economic cost to these companies. Their reputations need to suffer.<br />
<br />
If you run a website or can otherwise identify abusive networks, make them public. Announce them on Twitter, Facebook, your website, wherever. You can even comment below and I will construct a list. When people look for ad networks to provide some extra revenue, they'll find which networks cheat and which don't. That will make the latter more valuable, more people will host them, and more people will try to put ads on them, driving up the price of putting those ads up and therefore the revenue paid to the sites you want to support.<br />
<div style="text-align: start;">
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-30812927676636090622015-09-11T07:02:00.001-04:002015-09-15T10:56:38.355-04:00Mark Plaster is running for MD-3Video!<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>(Video is offline for the moment)<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/6VJwZgt4fAA/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6VJwZgt4fAA?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2015/08/governor-hogans-gerrymander-solution.html" target="_blank">MD-3 is the most gerrymandered district in the US</a>, but according to Dr. Plaster, the gerrymander reflects the fragility of Democratic strength in it.</div>
<br />
For more, see <a href="http://plasterforcongress.com/">plasterforcongress.com</a><br />
<div style="text-align: start;">
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You can now <a href="https://www.facebook.com/DarkTechObserver" target="_blank">like me on Facebook</a>, <a href="https://www.patreon.com/darkTechObserver" target="_blank">contribute support to my work</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/DarkTechMonitor" target="_blank">follow me on Twitter</a> and if you run a Maryland political group, <a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2015/08/free-stuff-inside-for-baltimore-area.html" target="_blank">I am offering free video work</a> this year.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-60799776197448049132015-09-09T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-09T07:00:00.746-04:00Education Has Become A GameAnd people are focused on manipulating the rules, not succeeding<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Today, parents are focused on making sure their child gets the maximum possible test scores possible, as if their child were a video game character they can Min/Max.<br />
<br />
To explain: in many games, video and tabletop, characters get assigned points to various attributes; strength, intelligence, agility, stamina, and those points define how many hits a character can take, how hard they hit, etc.<br />
<br />
Min/Maxing is the principle that, in most games, selecting a specific attribute and pumping most of the available points into that attribute yields greater results than spreading them out realistically. So a wizard character would put most of their points into their intelligence, which lets them cast stronger spells more often. Warriors would put most of their points in strength so they can hit harder and wear heavier armor.<br />
<br />
But no matter how low a character's strength is, he won't fall over or be unable to walk. No matter how low a character's intelligence is, the player will still be able to play strategically and thoughtfully.<br />
<br />
Why?<br />
<br />
Because the game has to function and the player is not affected by character's attributes.<br />
<br />
Those things are <i>not</i> true in real life, and if time was attribute points, parents would be dumping every single point available to their children into the "test-taking" attribute.<br />
<br />
It's gotten so bad that we've discovered, as a result of parental and governmental demands to eliminate recess and physical education, that children's balance and physical <i>development</i> are built around play and physical activity. We found this out because schools and parents have <i>created </i>mild physical disabilities, most notably balance problems, by forcing children to sit still constantly.<br />
<br />
We've also created emotional problems, by disallowing children to work through their own problems and playing outside with others. Instead, out of irrational fear of bees, peanuts, strangers, accidents and lightning strikes, they're kept isolated in front of the television or on a schedule of formal playdates, sports, and structured activities. As a result, they don't know how to contain or control their emotions and they just end up throwing a tantrum. They've never had the practice of working out their emotions on their own.<br />
<br />
Not only emotional problems, but mental illness too. By eliminating the ability of children to play and figure things out on their own and having to constantly go to adults for permission, kids end up with depression (I can't do anything), anxiety disorders (I can't make any mistakes) and, of course, ADHD. This is the result of killing unstructured physical activity and corralling everyone into "academics".<br /><br />We're also killing non test-centric fields of study. Music, art and theater are being dumped in favor of more "academics". If it can't be on a multiple-choice test, it must be skipped so that the child can be <a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2014/08/national-standards-and-common-core.html" target="_blank">College And Career Ready</a>, get into a Good School, and Have A Future.<br /><br />Which is crap.<br /><br />The major complaint from employers is not that kids can't fill out bubble sheets. It's that college graduates are incapable of demonstrating judgment or making decisions and need to be told exactly what to do and how to do it. That they walk in expecting a corner office and a $50,000 salary just for showing up. That they can't handle setbacks. That they don't have basic social skills or etiquette. <i>It's that they missed out on life while growing up and don't have the slightest clue on how to be independent.</i><br /><br />But they slam those multiple-choice tests like Mario slams Goombas.<br /><br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-4134595055170390392015-09-07T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-07T09:33:43.876-04:00Why Do Corporations Have Speech Rights? They Don't.Their members do.<br />
<a name='more'></a>Loads of people have been freaking about about recent Supreme Court cases regarding free speech, which is culminating into a move to repeal the speech protections of the First Amendment. A major pillar of the campaign is that "Corporations aren't people." Except that ignores a basic fact of corporations: they are organizing structures so that <i>people</i> can co-operate. Corporations are <i>nothing but</i> people.<br />
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So, let's take a group of people:<br />
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All of these people have independent rights to speak, to protest, to create media and distribute it, and to have rallies and meetings. Nobody challenges that (yet).</div>
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But a group of people all have different skills and abilities, so a group may decide to do a specific thing, like a video, and work <i>together</i> to accomplish it, using their complementary skills and abilities.<br />
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But then, assume they want to start a BIG project and to raise money. If they all just raised money on their own individually, or as an ad-hoc group, there'd be no way to make sure the money actually went to the project, or that it would go to actual work. To alleviate these concerns and get the group organized, they form a corporation.</div>
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So now we have a corporation, which is made up of people who have the right to speak, which includes producing videos. The "right" of the corporation to speak is simply the right of the people involved in the corporation to speak <i>together</i>.<br />
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So what about large corporations that have other agendas too, especially business corporations?<br />
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Well, being a member of the corporation is voluntary, especially for stockholders. If they object, they can simply sell the stock at their discretion. It's harder for an employee to quit than it is to sell stock, but it's still voluntary. If someone disagrees with the direction of any organization, it is their obligation to quit the organization if necessary.<br />
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But even that does not justify curtailing the freedom of speech of everyone <i>else</i> involved in the organization. Because when you curtail the speech of an organization, you curtail the speech of <i>everyone in that organization</i>, because that's where the "right" of the corporation comes from: the right of the people in the organization.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-19190072074014749292015-09-04T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-06T21:05:33.366-04:00Kim Davis Spits On The First AmendmentNo, establishing your religion in your government office is not protected. It's prohibited.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Kim Davis is now in defiance of a court order compelling her to do her job and issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Christian right-wingers are falling behind her proclaiming her heroism and her stand for religious liberty.<br />
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Except she's standing <i>against</i> religious liberty.<br />
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She's not acting in a private capacity being asked to participate in a ceremony or practice she finds objectionable. Rather, she's acting on behalf of the <i>government</i> and refusing to grant a <i>government license</i> on the basis of her religious belief.<br />
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This is what's called "establishing religion", in that the government reflects a specific religious viewpoint and acts within the religion. It becomes the official religion of that <i>government</i> office.</div>
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What Conservatives are defending now is the <i>opposite</i> of religious freedom - theocracy.<br />
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Don't believe me? Try these other examples:<br />
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Note that the last one is actually being done by officials in DC. Not on religious grounds, but of the grounds that DC officials don't like guns.</div>
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Once you accept a position in the government, you accept that you have to apply the law fairly and without bias. If your religion or conscience places you in a position where your governmental duties offend your belief, your only option is to resign. You do not have a right to a government office.<br />
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But Davis feels that not only should she not resign, but people who fall outside her <i>faith's</i> conception of marriage should be denied government service.<br />
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Can Catholics' refuse to issue to issue marriage licenses to non-Catholics on the grounds that you can only be married within the Church? Or refuse to issue divorces on the grounds that the Church doesn't recognize them?<br />
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Can Muslims refuse to grant any license if their particular faith holds that dhimmis cannot possess them?<br />
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Can a pagan require an animal sacrifice to Gaia before issuing a permit?<br />
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Can a Mormon refuse to grant a food service license to a shop that primarily sells green and black tea?<br />
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Can a member of the Church Of The Broken God only issue permits to people who have some kind of technological device (pacemakers, artificial limbs) augmenting their life?<br />
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And if low-level elected officials can impose their religious views on the people they serve, can a governor declare the state government his own religion for the duration of his administration?<br />
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No. Prohibiting elected officials from imposing their faith is not only a basic principle of America, but it's also how we avoided the religious wars that plagued Europe for centuries. A government agent imposing their religious views on others should be run out of office, not celebrated as a hero.<br />
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That's a frightening precedent to be defending.<br />
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JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-38667669039906499042015-09-03T14:08:00.000-04:002015-09-08T00:49:37.738-04:00MUSLIM CLERK REFUSES TO ISSUE MARRIAGE LICENSE TO NON-MUSLIMSYou won't believe what he says his reason is.<br />
<a name='more'></a>Satire: Actual article <a href="http://jasonboisvert.blogspot.com/2015/09/kim-davis-spits-on-first-amendment.html" target="_blank">here</a><br /><br />A devout Muslim court clerk in a small town in Tennessee is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Xg1Dh2xhXg" target="_blank">now refusing to issue marriage licenses</a> to any couple who are not both Muslim. The clerk, Ahmed Mahmoud, explained his views:<br />
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It is against my religious faith to allow any infidels to marry outside the will of Allah, in fact it is an insult to God. I am entitled to my views under the First Amendment to the Constitution and am simply seeking to have my views respected.</blockquote>
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As the law requires marriage applicants to seek a license from "their local or nearest Clerk of the Court" (Ten. Law. 67-1a[Q]), this leaves nearly all new couples unable to get a marriage license to complete a marriage ceremony. Several women left the courthouse in tears yesterday. One women lamented, "I can't believe it. How can he deny me a marriage license? Don't I have rights?" Another women said:<br />
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I don't care who you are. In this country, our government respects all people and all faiths equally. We are not trying to restrict his First Amendment views, but if he can't do the job, he should not have taken it, and he should resign. Then he can follow his conscience all he wants, without imposing his religious law in anyone who doesn't want it.</blockquote>
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A group of people who were denied licenses have filed a civil suit and expect to be in court for preliminary hearings next month. Experts predict that such a case make take several months to be decided, leaving many couples waiting a full year for an ideal wedding date.<br />
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Btw, this story is satire and more people fell for it in the first 12 hours than read almost any of my other pieces to date.JasonBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17168996959722509869noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6501056741342847732.post-47832297894855937582015-09-02T07:00:00.000-04:002015-09-02T07:00:01.716-04:00Police Unions are a Primary Source of Police CorruptionPolice unions cause, promote, and protect corruption, and should be abolished.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Why are police unions a major, perhaps even primary, source of corruption?<br />
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The unions negotiate extremely generate contracts that allow for incredible protections for police, creating extremely perverse incentives.<br />
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Let's take three cops, Rafael, Fred and Charlie. Rafael has some anger problems, Fred is overweight and out of shape, and Charlie takes his work seriously.<br />
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Rafael is accused of viciously beating suspects during their arrests. His violence is unnecessary and often unhelpful when arresting people. But when he is charged with misconduct, the union contract gives him incredible protections. He gets a hearing, a chance to review the evidence and, most importantly, are investigated by fellow members of the union. So when he is investigated, his actions are always found justified based primarily on his say-so. So he continues in his position.<br />
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Fred is fat. Fred has no physical ability, can't chase suspects and can't fight. He can kinda shoot, but that's it. He's still on patrol because union rules prohibit police leadership from sidelining him or firing him for not being able to perform his job. When there's a fight, Fred draws his pistol. He's too out of shape to actually fight, so he relies on his gun instead. Naturally, he's involved in a lot of lethal-force encounters, but he's investigated by fellow union members, so he's always cleared.<br />
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The incentives for the union favor protecting exactly these kinds of people: people who, for various reasons, are terrible at their jobs. For police unions, that means the violent, the lazy, the overweight, and the stupid. These kinds of people are dependent on the union for their jobs, because in a fair employment environment, they would be fired. This insures their loyalty to the union.<br />
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Charlie is a good cop, the kind that people actually <i>want</i> to be a police officer. Professional, courteous, serious and the kind of person who doesn't use excessive violence or acts aggressively just to assert himself. He is <i>not</i> the kind of person the union wants to remain on the force, specifically because he <i>doesn't</i> need the union to protect his job. When he finds corruption or criminal activity and reports it, other officers, loyal union members, will turn on him and drum him out.<br />
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Unions protect their members, not the public. This attitude not only impacts negotiations, where they negotiate for unpayable pensions and benefits, but general police attitudes. Older police attitudes were about putting themselves at risk to the protect the public. Today, police put the public at risk in order to protect themselves. You've heard police talk about their top priority being getting home every night. That's not what they signed up for, if they wanted a safe job they could've been accountants.<br />
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The only real solution is to outlaw police unions, stop negotiating with them, and return to policing with a focus on protecting the public, not force-protection.<br />
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