I'm not sure how much of the "conspiracy" angle I buy, but this does illustrate how badly election reform is needed in the US.

I would love to know if the general elections are run as poorly.

The role is to interpret whether or not actions are in compliance with the written law - not to interpret new meanings/definitions of the law.

Changing definitions within a law alters the law, rewrites it, which makes it legislative activity. That's outside of judicial scope.

You can summarize the thought pattern as : "We know the law says this one thing, but we think this other thing should apply, so instead of waiting for a change to the law [so that it will apply], we will just say it applies already, even though it's not written."

It's sheer laziness, complacency, and acceptance that allows that sort of activity to be. It also creates a minefield of possible offenses that are not created by elected representatives, and are not documented in any way that would allow a person to avoid violation.




You are forgetting the current laws that restrict gun ownership. Not anyone can own a gun - even though the 2nd makes no exceptions. Laws that violate constitutional law are left to stand all the time, simply because people are ok with it.



The constitution also denies the government the authority to limit assembly - but that freedom has been interpreted to be secondary. It is in practice restricted by a permit process that makes any non-approved assembly subject to government disbandment.
It's supposed to allow people (i.e. the state) to communicate, organize, and form a disruptive group that is able to cause enough disruption to the government that the state can force a disobedient government to behave - without having to resort to violence.
But, because people are universally inconvenienced by folks that are protesting about things they don't care about, they would rather the government keep those folks out of their way. So freedom of assembly goes to the wayside.


Basically, the 'system' takes the law only as seriously as is convenient. When it's useful to be literal, it's treated literal. When it's useful to be twisted, it's twisted. It's just whatever is useful/convenient/populist/etc to the people executing the process.




Eminent is not a word you would use on today's parlance to say that something is obvious.

Ask most people what eminent domain is, and they will recite a legal concept. Ask them what the words themselves mean, and most will draw a blank. Few will say 'it is a domain that sticks-out'.

The point was just to illustrate how things change regarding how people express themselves. It's not strange to hear someone describe something as 'well adjusted'. But if they said 'well regulated' instead, you would think they mean something else. You wouldn't think that they are just speaking in 1700's English.

Imagine writing a law that states that only 'well adjusted' people are allowed to drive cars. Then imagine 200 years from now, 'adjustment' is a reference to genetic engineering. You'll end up with people arguing that only well genetically engineered people can drive.

-scheherazade

Then, in 1 minute without doing google research, you should be able to give at least 3 prime examples where the translations differed. I have a REALLY hard time believing you read multiple translations of a religious text for a religion you clearly despise.
3-2-1-GO 1 Minute

EDIT: You couldn't do it. Time's up, by now you could have researched it online and offered not only 3 examples, but 3 that also illustrate YOUR points, so don't bother. I've made up my mind about your veracity.

@transmorpher

It's a little difficult to 'debate' your comment, because the points that you address to me are numbered but don't reference to specific parts of my post. That's probably my fault as i was releasing frustration haphazardly and sarcastically, and that sarcasm wasn't aimed at you. All i can do is try and sum up whether i think we agree or disagree overall.

Essentially everything is a question of 'taste', even for you. There's no escaping our nature, most of us don't drink our own piss, many of us won't swallow our own blood, almost all of us have a flavour that we can't abide because we were fed it as a child. So yes, our decisions are defined by taste. But taste is decided by the food that is available to people, within reasonable distance of their house, at a price they find affordable according to the society around them, from a range of food that is decided by society around them. Your average person does not have the luxury to walk around a high street supermarket selecting the most humane and delicious foods. People get what they can afford, what they understand, what they can prepare and what is available. Our ancestors ate chicken because of necessity of their own kind, their children are exposed to chicken through no fault of their own, fast forward a few generations, and thus chicken becomes an affordable, accessible staple. Can we reach a compromise here? It may not be necessary for chickens to die to feed the human race, but it may be necessary for some people to eat chicken today because of their particular life.

I don't like the use of the phrase 'if i can do it, i know anyone can'. I think it's a mistake to deal in certainties, especially pertaining to lifestyles that you can't possibly know about without having lived them. Are you one of the many homeless people accepting chicken soup from a stranger because it's nourishing, cheap and easy for a stranger to buy, and keeps you warm on the streets? Are you a single mother with coeliac disease, a grumpy teenager and picky toddler who has 20 minutes to get to the supermarket and get something cooking? Or one of the millions using foodbanks in the UK (to our shame) now? I don't think you're willfully turning a blind eye to those people, i'm not tugging heart strings to do you a disservice. Maybe you're just fortunate you not only have the choice, but you have such choice that you can't imagine a life without it. I won't budge an inch on this one, you can't know what people have to do, and we have to accept life is not ideal.

And within that idealism and choice problem we can include illnesses that once again in IDEAL situations could survive without dead animals, nevertheless find it necessary to eat what they can identify and feel safe with.

Yes, those damn gluten hipsters drive me round the bend but only because they make people think that a LITTLE gluten is ok, it makes people take the problem less seriously (see Tumblr feminism... JOKE).

I agree that we must look at what action we can take now - and that is why i keep reminding you that we are not in an ideal world. If the veganism argument is to succeed then you must suggest a reasonable pathway to go from how we are now to whatever situation you would prefer. My "ideal farm" description was just me demonstrating the problem - that you need to show us your blueprint for how we start again without killing animals and feeding everyone we have.

And on that subject, your suggestions need to be backed by real research, otherwise you don't have any real plan. "It's fair to say there is very little risk" is a nice bit of illustrative language but it is not backed by any fact or figure and so i'm compelled to do my Penn and Teller impression and call bullshit. As of right now, the life expectancy of humans is better than it has ever been. It is up to you to prove that changing the diet of 7 billion people will result in neutrality or improvement of health and longevity. That proof must come in the form of large statistical analyses and thorough science. I don't want to sound like i'm being a dick, but any time you state something like that as a fact or with certainty, it needs to be backed up by something. I'm not nit picking and asking for common knowledge to have a citation, but things like this do:

-- 70% of farmland claim
-- 'fair to say very little risk' claim
-- meat gives you cancer claim - i accept it may have a carcinogenic effect but i'll remind you so does breathing, joss-sticks, broccoli, apples and water
-- 'the impact to the planet would be immense' claim - in what way, and what would be the downsides in terms of economy, productivity, health, animal welfare (where are all the animals going to be sent to retire as of day 1?)
-- etc. etc.

Oh, and a cow might get its protein from plants, but it walks around a field all day eating grass, chewing the cud and having sloppy shits with 4 stomachs and enzymes that i don't have................. I'm a bit puzzled by this one... I probably can't survive on what an alligator or a goldfish eats, but i can survive on parts of an alligator or fish. I can't eat enough krill in a day to keep me going, but i can let a whale do it for me...?

And when times are good you continue to add more debt, just not as much, right? This video perfectly illustrates the situation. The only difference is this guy could one day not get a loan. The US might not be able to sell debt to other countries(or at too high an interest rate) but it can always print dollars. I think the responsible method should be to simply print the deficit yearly to spend it and if inflation increases, let people complain until the politicians stop printing money. The one thing usually not mentioned is the percentage of the budget spent paying interest on the debt, which keeps creeping up every year.

This graph (edit: replaced with non-paywalled source), or rather its German equivalent, has become absolutely irreplacable to me when discussing macroeconomics. That display of sectoral balances is such an immensely powerful illustration of why federal deficits are not the devil's handiwork.

It's unfortunate that the episode/series was not true to its thesis. In this episode, we were not really given 30 days in the footsteps of a Christian but instead were given a very biased mutual experience/ debate. MS should've just done 30 days in the life of an Atheist because obviously that was the intent of this episode. In the Christian/Muslim episode, the Christian had to walk 30 days in a Muslim's shoes. He even had to pray a prayer that basically made him renounce his faith. Not all Muslims or Atheists are bad, right? Similarly, not all Christians are bad either. This episode did not seek to illustrate this as it had for other groups. Most importantly this episode violated the premise of the show with the most obvious bias I have ever seen. Too bad no one got to see 30 days in the footsteps of a Christian. MS has no right to call himself an objective documentarian.

I don't really care about their taxes. I was simply illustrating that they unlock phones (individually by request with a warrant), that they got burned the last time they left a backdoor in a product, and that they are completely mercenary. The mercenary part is in line with what you said, they have only a responsibility to the shareholders to return a profit.

If they were doing this to safeguard the 4th Amendment only, then that would be patriotic.

@greatgooglymoogly

Thanks for taking the time to watch it.

Like I said in my previous comment, this talk needs to take a lot of shortcuts, otherwise its length would surpass anyone's attention span.

So, point by point.

By "balanced budget", I suppose you refer to the federal budget. A balanced budget is not neccessarily a bad thing, but it is undesirable in most case. The key reason is sectoral balances. The economy can divided into three sectors: public, private, foreign. Since one person's spending is another person's income, the sum of all spending and income of these three sectors is zero by definition.

More precisely: if the public sector runs a surplus and the private sector runs a surplus, the foreign sector needs to run a deficit of a corresponding size.

Two examples:
- the government runs a balanced budget, no surplus, no deficit
- the private sector runs a surplus (savings) of 2% of GDP
- the foreign sector must, by definition, run a deficit of 2% of GDP (your country runs a current account surplus of 2% of GDP)

- the government runs a deficit of 2% of GDP
- the foreign sector runs a surplus of 3% (your current account deficit of 3%)
- your private sector must, by definition, run a deficit of 1% of GDP, aka burn through savings or run up debt

If you intend to allow the private sector to net save, you need to run either a current account surplus or a public sector deficit, or both. Since we don't export goods to Mars just yet, not all countries can run current account surpluses, so you need to run a public sector deficit if you want your private sector to net save. No two ways about it.

Germany runs a balanced public budget, sort of, and its private sector net saves. But that comes at the cost of a current account surplus to the tune of €250B. That's 250 billion Euros worth of debt other countries have to accumulate so that both the private and public sector in Germany can avoid deficits. Parasitic is what I'd call this behaviour, and I'm German.

If you feel ambitious, you could try to have both surplus and deficit within the private sector by allowing households to net save while "forcing" corporations to run the corresponding deficits. But to any politician trying that, I'd advise to avoid air travel.

As for the "devaluation of the currency", see my previous comment.

Also, she didn't use real numbers, because a) the talk is short and numbers kill people's attention rather quickly, and b) it's a policy decision to use debt to finance a deficit. One might just as well monetise it, like I explained in my previous comment.

Helicopter money would be quite helpful these days, actually. Even monetarists like AEP say so. If fiscal policy is off the table (deficit hawkery), what else are you left with...

As for your question related to the Fed, let me quote Eric Tymoigne on why MMT views both central bank and Treasury as part of the consolidated government:

"MMT authors tend to like to work with a consolidated government because they see it as an effective strategy for policy purpose (see next section), but also because the unconsolidated case just hides under layers of institutional complexity the main point: one way or another the Fed finances the Treasury, always. This monetary financing is not an option and is not by itself inflationary."

MMT principle: the central bank needs to be under democratic control, aka be part of government. The Fed in particular can pride itself on its independance all it wants, it still cannot fulfill any of its goals without the Treasury's help. It cannot diverge from government policies too long. Unlike the ECB, which is a nightmare in its construction.

Anyway, what does he mean by "one way or another the Fed finances the Treasury, always"? Well, the simple case is debt monetisation, direct financing. However, the Fed also participates by ensuring that Primary Dealers have enough reserves to make a reasonable bid on treasuries. The Fed makes sure that auctions of treasuries will always succeed. Always. Either by providing reserves to ensure buyers can afford the treasuries, by replacing maturing treasuries or buying them outright. No chance whatsoever for bond vigilantes. Betting against treasuries is pointless, you will always lose.

But what about taxation as a means to finance the Treasury? Well, the video's Monopoly example illustrated quite nicely, you cannot collect taxes until you have spent currency into circulation. Spending comes before taxation, it does not depend on it. Until reserves are injected into the banking system, either by the Fed through asset purchases or the Treasury through spending, taxes cannot be paid. Again, monetary financing is not optional. If the Treasury borrows money from the public, it borrows back money it previously spent.

Yes, I ignored the distribution of wealth, taxation, the fixation on growth and a million other things. That's a different discussion.

I could see this being used in a new campaign for seat belts. Seriously, does anyone need a better illustration as to why we wear them?

I never said you can't oppose institutional rape. That was a counter-example to your "history wasn't universally sexist" point. I thought that was pretty clear.

I'll concede that sexism wasn't universal, but nothing is, so that's a completely meaningless point. I was illustrating that history in general has been pretty fucking awful to women.

As for that definition, it's not mine. I actually looked it up before I used it to make sure I wasn't using it incorrectly.

"the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities"
- Merriam Webster
"The advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes."
- Oxford
"Feminism is a range of movements and ideologies that share a common goal: to define, establish, and achieve equal political, economic, cultural, personal, and social rights for women"
- Wikipedia
Do I need to go on?

And yes, the concept has been around for ages. Support for the concept is relatively recent and has brought great change.

His description of Santa made me picture a ZZ-top-looking mafioso in a bloodred, pin-stripe suite who chainsmokes cigars in public.

Gods I wish I had more time in the day. I absolutely want to take the audio portion of this and make literal illustrations per his description.

I meant not to be particularly argumentative, only contradictory. However, I feel that I have been forced into the position to return fire with fire, as it seems you lack the capability and or willingness to discuss something without attacking me, spewing meaningless information, circumventing reason, and drawing up arse about face codswallap for your conclusions.(Look mommy, I can curse to!!!!!!!)

Firstly, I should like to address your attacks against me...

Fox bubble? My god, were I to force myself to absorb and process information from such a low level of news broadcasting, I would reel in shock from the incursion into my sanity. Luckily, however, I live in the UK, and had to research Fox on Google to even understand the reference.

Now, to business.

The investigation.... a Red Herring?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3299310/Benghazi-probe-Hillary-Clinton-facing-months-FBI-investigation-emails.html

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2015/10/27/How-FBI-Could-Derail-Hillary-Clinton-s-Presidential-Run

http://dailycaller.com/2015/10/22/fbi-director-im-following-very-closely-the-investigation-into-hillary-clintons-emails-video/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3275919/Investigation-Hillary-s-email-server-focuses-Espionage-Act-10-years-jail-FBI-agent-says-prosecuted-jus
t-failing-tell-Obama.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/fbi-probe-of-clinton-e-mail-expands-to-second-data-company/2015/10/06/3d94ba46-6c48-11e5-b31c-d80d62b53e28_sto
ry.html

Research, see? Useful. For finding stuff like....INFORMATION.

Socialism:

http://fee.org/freeman/why-socialism-failed/

https://mises.org/library/greece-illustrates-150-years-socialist-failure-europe

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/07/01/greek-disaster-is-all-about-socialism.html

http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2014/02/25/5-ways-socialism-destroys-societies-n1800086/page/full

http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/why-socialism-collapsed-eastern-europe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism

Bit of light reading, don't worry, I am getting to a point...


"Mischaracterization of Obama's record" ??????

http://healthaffairs.org/blog/2015/06/25/six-problems-with-the-aca-that-arent-going-away/

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/06/07/problems-with-obamacare-that-could-prove-difficult.aspx

http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/09/so-long-as-you-ignore-the-problems-obamacare-is-perfect/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/obamacare-problems/

http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/obama-poll-disapprove-isis/2015/08/21/id/671190/

http://theweek.com/articles/589272/obamas-isis-failure

http://www.martinoauthor.com/list-obama-failures/

https://www.gop.com/obamas-biggest-failures/

Next, get a First Class Honours Masters Degree in Psychology from the University of Cambridge, and then spent five years of your life convincing rich people to give your bank their money(My job, by the way), carefully analyze anything Obama says about anything important, then come tell me my observations are "ridiculous" and "beyond contradicting".

As for Trump? Sure, all political candidates are devils in disguise. However, why don't you try to turn a mere million into a multi billion dollar empire and say you cant do anything for the economy?

You know how you get rid of 11 million people?

1. Dont let anymore in...

2. Ship the rest out with the Federal resources you already have...

3. Smile, because you just saved your bloody country:

http://dailycaller.com/2015/09/14/americas-heroin-epidemic-fueled-by-flood-of-illegal-immigrants/

http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2015/04/isis-camp-a-few-miles-from-texas-mexican-authorities-confirm/

http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/crime/item/20678-report-with-cartel-help-isis-crossing-border-from-mexico

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/09/25/mexican-cartel-sicarios-crossed-texas-kidnapped-u-s-citizen/

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/414969/mexican-drug-cartels-caused-border-crisis

http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=379605&CategoryId=10718

How do you make Mexico build a wall?

1. Stop official trade with Mexico until they give up and build it.

Wow... That was easy...

As for making China ignore our debt... Basically impossible, but that's who's fault?

Obama got you blinkered people into $18 Trillion dollars of debt with his hysterically shoddy plans, I can't believe no-one is smart enough to realize that simple and plain a truth.

No way on Earth his plans would even be tried? He is the Republican frontrunner... By popular poll.

You tried Obama's plans, and his bloody approval rating is (http://www.gallup.com/poll/116479/barack-obama-presidential-job-approval.aspx). Its about time you Americans experienced some success in the world, don't you think?

Sod it all, I am tired, I could say more, but I await your response. May I request that you refrain from using vulgar language in response to an amicable post? As you can see by the content of my article here, I can be a ripe-mouthed cur, but is it truly necessary?

The extreme case I thought of here wasn't about the balloon, it was about the air. Imagine the air was a lot denser... like water, or jelly.

I wasn't familiar with the term 'extreme cases' but use this all the time when making logical arguments, and think of it as exaggeration to help illustrate a point.

Unfortunately, while I think it makes it easier for me to visualize the point, people are often blinded by the comical nature of the exaggeration

"What do you mean if there were 10 zillion Chinese people on the island of Malta and 3 Brits had the Americas to themselves? The world should still learn English!"

(Someone trying to argue that even if Chinese was predominant, English would still be used in a larger geographical area, and me attempting to use exaggeration to illustrate that it's besides the point).

No, I'm not missing the point. The point of the video is in the title "how climate change deniers sound to normal people". The video itself clearly illustrates this. The previous sentence is the first time I've directly addressed the topic of the video. It's disturbing that you think you can dictate to someone based on conjecture (since I hadn't directly addressed the video topic before this) whether they have understood something or not. I indirectly addressed the topic when I wrote of the video ridiculing people who do not understand climate change (which is what the video does).

But that doesn't change what I've said. I.e. that if you are going to present a fact, then be accurate.

It also doesn't change my opinion that ridiculing them is counter-productive.

Unless all the knowledge in your own head is in 100% correct order, then perhaps you shouldn't write others off as lost causes because they've gotten something wrong.