We must burn all the Three Stooges reels!

Three Stooges are not offered as role-models. Viewer is invited to laugh at them, not be inspired by them.

And Tom and Jerry? My god!

Actually, my collection of Looney Tunes came with a video-clip by Woopy Goldberg apologizing on behalf of Warner Brothers for the "racism" and "stereotypes", which, according to her, "were wrong then and are wrong now", but, nevertheless, "are part of Americana"...

Funny, how Django had no such disclaimers and apologies over portraying the two good guys as head-hunters sniping from afar at innocent people for money. (Kinda vindicates our Dear Leader's policies, but I digress...)

The problem is that in real life, often the people who think they are right and good actually aren't, they torture the wrong person, and there are unintended consequences.

But not in the case described in TFA — the threatened man really was a drug-dealer, and they did get the necessary info out of him.

Now, do you have statistics to back up your implication, that in real life police are more often wrong than right?

Note, that I am not saying, it justifies the miscreants in TFA. But you seem to...

They get away with lots of things in movies that are not acceptable in real life.

Sorry, I fail to see, how mere racism or sexism can lead to a boycott, while abuse of a suspect gets a pass. And not just once either!

Likewise, if Captain Steven Hiller — Will Smith's character in Independence Day — can be a hero despite beating and otherwise abusing a prisoner, the morons of Abu Ghraib have their excuse...

The real life vs. fiction may explain the legal responsibility, but the moral condemnation of such actions should not be any different between the real and imaginary worlds.

Drug him and beat him with a $5 wrench until he tells us the password

XKCD did not invent it — the method is known as rubberhose cryptoanalis for ages — unlike wrench, a hose is less likely to leave visible marks.

But beating is for wussies — and drugging is completely gratuitous. The real men of the wonderful entity lovingly referred to as "Russkiy Mir" (Pax Russiana) use the swifter variation known as thermorectal cryptanalysis.

It does not have to involve any beating and requires a $5 soldering iron. I'll leave the details to your imagination...

I remember it being done in a few movies — by the good guys — without anybody in the audience cringing. Nor do I remember any calls to boycott a movie over such things.

So, if popular culture approves of and encourages it, can't blame the cops too much for doing it despite it being merely illegal...

And at least a few of them genuinely believe in the magical thinking, while most are just there from social peer pressure. But it's still a dire problem.

The whole military system is so turned on its head now that it has become a distinction without a difference. But it didn't start out that way. The the Framers were very leary of standing armies, and so restricted military appropriations to two years, assuming that major military appropriations would happen only in times of declared war. In the meantime, states could keep militias that could be called up in times of war. That's not how it has worked out, though. We now have a huge standing army, and while we technically follow the rule that military appropriations have a two-year life, we renew them like clockwork every two years. So in effect, we have become exactly what the Framers hated (and had just overthrown).

I'm in favor of this, mainly because "privateer" is a cool word, and it would be all swagger and swashbuckling to have them. Also, it would probably be an excellent way to stop African piracy. And paying bounties for capturing/killing terrorists would probably be cheaper than our current war effort.

Your copy(the lamp) is yours. The smoke/light is not.

Nonsense. Both are mine.

Your demand for control over it once it is released is immoral, unethical, and just plain wrong.

I explained the ethical theory, which makes the theft of intellectual property indistinguishable from that of tangible kind — in short, such copying is equal to theft, because the victim suffers the same kind of loss.

I await your explanation for why my "demand for control" is "immoral, unethical, and just plain wrong".

the copyrighters are the robbers/pirates who steal from society.

And just what is it, that they steal, may I inquire to ask?

We've established you to be a Communist-sympathizer before.

You have?? When was that?

Right here. But, just in case I made a mistake — would you mind stating your opinion on Communism for the record? And on whether it is Ok to steal from "rent-seekers or speculators"?

Judging if one song sounds sufficiently like another is an endless opportunity for debate.

Except you aren't solving this problem by making copyrights last 5 years instead of 50. Not at all — because if it did, there would've been no new musical genres (Jazz, Blues, Rock-n-Roll, Rap) appearing at all.

Which makes the argument of "strealing vs. being inspired" irrelevant to the conversation of copyrights.

Well, under the law, things are different.

I am talking about morality. A song I wrote is just as mine as a car I purchased or a house I built.

speaking up for rent collectors and speculators

I see, that your morality allows you to rob some people.

But mine does not. We've established you to be a Communist-sympathizer before. Nothing new here, hop along.

Ideas are not physical things.

And "property" is not a physical thing either.

The taking of real, physical property involves real, involuntary displacement or separation.

Distinction without difference. You copying my drawings, notes, or recording without my approval is still theft — even if I still hold on to my copies of same.

And not because FBI says so, but because it is indistinguishable in its effect from the theft of tangible things — the victim (inventor, creator, or whoever bought the invention/creation) still suffers real tangible losses.

Careful that what you are calling plagiarism really is plagiarism.

I have not called it that — I merely asked for evidence, copyright stifles art. What was offered as evidence was a list of cases, where works deemed plagiarization were sued for copyright violations. That, in my opinion, is a good thing — and I asked, whether the "informative" Mr. Slippery disagrees.

The entertainment industry would love, just love to turn the clock back to 1985

Irrelevant. The talk is about copyright, not "entertainment industry".

They would throw 90% of all our wealth away, their own included, if that increased their control

Though they are welcome to treat their money however they wanted, I fail to see, how they could possibly get mine. Or yours... If you disapprove of their practices, the solution is very simple: do not buy from them.

Antonin Scalia basically single-handedly saved the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment. And as MorphOSX noted below, he (along with Roberts) voted with the majority on this one. Thomas, Kennedy, and Alito dissented.

It's not as easy as you think to divide the justices up into "liberal" and "conservative," and those two "groups" certainly do not always vote as a block. You may not agree with Scalia's judicial philosophy of constructionism, but he is usually very disciplined and consistent in applying it.