Yeah, and the news has picked up on a facebook joke that quotes Cruz as saying Obama couldn't run for president because his father wasn't American and he wasn't born in the US. Sometimes the news has it wrong.

And his corporate welfare and war policies were not significantly different from the previous president, marking him as center. He's far too right wing for me. He promises change, but doesn't deliver.

What, that in the rest of the world "center" is well to the left of the US "center"? How does that say anything about the messenger?

What year was he born? What year did HI become a state?

Because Obama's mother was a minor at the time, had he been born outside Hawaii, he would not have been a natural-born citizen without additional paperwork that wasn't done (as it wasn't needed, as he was born in Hawaii). The only problem with Obama's birth was that his mother, being under 18, was unable to confer citizenship at birth, because the laws were sexist. Though those laws, if challenged today, could be considered unconstitutional, making him retroactively a citizen at birth.

The law was not settled. It never really came up at the time, and was changed between his birth and now anyway.

What law is it against? I've seen one regulation quoted (after she was using personal email) that indicated that emails should use the official system, but no idea if there was any grandfather clause, and the department policy isn't "law".

Why is the standard of proof so much higher for Hillary than Palin?

So you are asserting that Hillary Clinton, while serving as Secretary of State, is not a government employee?

How about flamenwerfer

... of napalm in the morning.

You can't enter into all kinds of contracts. The constitution bans you from selling yourself into slavery, for instance, and various other laws prevent various other terms. Doesn't matter who knows or signs.

Having fun isn't necessarily stupid. Having fun with flamboyantly dangerous things isn't necessarily stupid. It's endangering unwilling bystanders that's stupid.

Some people like to build and shoot powerful crossbows, or even replicas of medieval siege weapons. These are extremely dangerous and useless things. The dangerous power of a trebuchet to throw an upright piano 150 yards is part of the charm.

But a trebuchet is something that takes certain amount of thought and sacrifice to obtain and use. This flamethrower thing is more like a powerful handgun. There's been a recent fad for ridiculously overpowered handguns, which pack superfluously fatal power into a convenient, affordable form factor. The recent brouhaha over "armor piercing" ammunition was a side effect of a manufacturer selling a cut-down semi-automatic carbine as a "handgun", even though if you look at videos of people using them they're obviously terrible as handguns. This raised the question of whether 5.56 NATO ammunition should be regulated as "handgun ammunition", and in the end I think the decision not to was reasonablee. These aren't cop-killing or military handguns. They're extremely dangerous toys designed to get your rocks off.

There are some who'd say that because these guns are dangerous and impractical they should be banned. But I don't agree. "Impractical" isn't the same as "useless" because getting your rocks off is a legitimate use for a thing. I think people should be able to enjoy their ridiculous firearms as long as they do it at some kind of appropriate range. I also think there's a real danger though from stupid people who will go plinking in the woods with the things like they were BB guns.

That's really the only problem I have with this flamethrower, whether it's gold, chrome, or gunmetal gray. Any idiot can buy one, but it'd take someone reasonably intelligent and determined to find a place where it can be used safely. I'm not against people buying them, but I am for coming down hard on people who use them where they're a danger or public nuisance.

They aren't a threat, because the "or else" must be stated or implied. I've had a non-compete in a contract. But they were too cheap to run it past a lawyer. The only remedy the contract allowed if I breached it was for them to terminate it. That made sense in that if I came to work drunk, they could fire me on the spot and not give me notice, a hearing, or other recourse. But if I quit, then take a job somewhere else that competes, there is no remedy allowed in the contract, so it's a threat like "go away or I shall taunt you a second time" is a threat. It is a statement of purpose, but since the consequence carries no harm, it doesn't meet my definition of threaten. "state one's intention to take hostile action against (someone) in retribution for something done or not done." Taunting someone isn't "hostile".

Even in states where non competes are allowed, the contract as explained here would likely be invalid. Think about the practical application. Someone that worked for Amazon leaves. Unless they work in a service-only industry (as a janitor or a lawyer), there's little they could do. They couldn't work for a book store (if there are any left), Wal-Mart, a movie theater, or millions of other places.

The allowable reasons for a non-compete are to protect the previous employer. A non-compete that offers no such protections, but is purely punitive is illegal in all 50 states. Though some may require more appearances in court to prove that point.

But why should I expect my private business to incurr costs to make some future militarization easier?

Well, in the end you have to ask "did he get away with it?". Or, given that he turned himself in later, "did he have some purpose in escaping that he fulfilled?"

Intelligence is a multi-dimensional phenomenon. It includes things like thinking through unintended consequences before acting that quite clever people are sometimes bad at.