The 92% guilty rate is not the interesting part. Rather what strikes me is that 97% of the "guilty" have "confessed".

There is no such thing as a legitimate coerced confession ("plea bargain"), the very concept is antithetical to most ideas of justice.

As for your factual questions, I encourage you to poke around the linked US Attorney's Statistical Report. It may be an official gubmint publication, but it doesn't paint a pretty picture.

I am not here asserting what is the "right" conviction rate. Rather I simply assert that our American system of coerced false confession is patently unjust and immoral.

The US kangaroo courts operate on a principal of coerced false confession. The oppressive multitude of petty laws is used to heavily over-charge defendants. They are then offered the choice of "confessing" or spending the rest of their life in the hellish sensory deprivation torture chambers of the American gulag.

Consider that "of the 82,092 defendants terminated during Fiscal Year 2013, 75,718, or 92 percent, either pled guilty or were found guilty" and "during Fiscal Year 2013, a total of 73,397, or 97 percent,of all convicted defendants pled guilty prior to or during trial." Source: United States Attorneys' Statistical Report 2013 Only 3% of federal prisoners were convicted by an actual trial!

That someone plead guilty at an American trial is no more damming than if they had farted.

Even if the persecutor's allegations are to be believed, this young man has done no harm to anyone. He deserves no punishment at all. To threaten an ethically innocent man with decades or life in the hellish sensory deprivation torture chambers of the Gulag is itself a criminal act.

The federal agents involved should be fired and possibly jailed. (Nuremberg defense may apply to lower level goons.) The budget of their agency should be slashed, as they clearly have more agents than valid uses for them.

Fish found to be good at swimming! News at 11!

Damn straight - only people with $$ deserve to have fun!

Bart and Caltrain stations in broad daylight have always worked well for me. Same goes for major public transit facilities in any city. Granted my transactions tend to be limited to computer hardware and automobiles.

Don't think I'd feel comfortable meeting someone at a pig fortress, just to buy/sell a laptop. Adds unnecessary risk to otherwise routine business.

FTFY

No one actually believes these numbers are an accurate representation of public opinion.... right?

Violent Purtians vs insensitive clods - loads of fun, but best watched from a considerable distance.

"Pardon me - does this train go to the airport?"

Sure, the best workers in a given profession usually earn more than the average worker. Duhhh.

More interesting, when comparing different professions, is to look at typical earnings for the average worker. In that regard software development beats the pants off food service and menial labor. But it falls far short of occupations such as finance, real estate, and some guild-restricted professions like law and medicine.

I've been freelance for a long time, so I'm no stranger to uncertainty, erratic cash flows, and the hustle to find new clients. Seems like it might be a tad nicer with bigger paydays for less laborious work.

That's a legit concern for the future. But at the present, in my particular city, there is real competition.

I took Lyft home tonight, but I would have LOVED to take the Muni instead. I'm nothing if not cheap. It's good that SF has the all-night Owl service, but to be honest it sucks balls. A 15 minute walk followed by a 30 minute wait followed by a 15 minute bus ride followed by another 15 minute walk wasn't really worth it when the Lyft ride took under 10 minutes door to door.