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Comment New York: The new police state (Score 4, Informative) 165

Actually, the *old* police state, just catching up with technology. I can't imagine a more awful place to live, where your every move is subject to surveillance and unlawful searches. What's worse is that New Yorkers actually vote these fascists in office.

Guess you get to lie in the bed you make after all. No sympathies here.

Comment Impossible Math & Chemistry (Score 1) 600

Every attempt to refer chemical questions to mathematical doctrines must be considered, now and always, profoundly irrational, as being contrary to the nature of the phenomena. . . . but if the employment of mathematical analysis should ever become so preponderant in chemistry (an aberration which is happily almost impossible) it would occasion vast and rapid retrogradation....
Auguste Comte, The Positive Philosophy, 1853

Comment Not to sound antiegalitarian... (Score 2) 147

...but isn't man's disruption of the natural processes that keep the population in check a direct contributor to the world overpopulation problem? From a strictly scientific point of view, drastically altering the mortality rate of the world's population by decreasing it (and increasing the birth/death ration) can't be a good thing. Many of these people have lived generations in their current environment, so why does a first world country believe they have the right to disrupt nature in such a drastic way?

So a first world country solves the woodstove problem, thereby decreasing mortality rates. Are they prepared to then step in and deal with inadequate water supplies, increases in loss of arable lands, higher rates of infant mortality, and other side effects of overpopulation?

Comment Re:Some FA (Score 1) 356

IANAL, but I believe this is the Supreme Court decision that later case law was established upon that basically permits any LEO to lie (not in court though). So basically case law carves out an exemption specifically for law enforcement.

Also, this article demonstrates how easy it is to get ensnared by the feds on a lying charge. Scary stuff.

Comment Re:Some FA (Score 5, Informative) 356

Lying itself can't be a crime

Actually, 18 USC section 1001 does, in fact, make lying to a federal official a crime. Feds often use this law to convict people in lieu of having any evidence that a crime was committed. If you're questioned about an alleged crime, and it later turns out that you didn't commit the crime but you earlier statements don't sync up with later statements, there's a good chance you'll see jail time.

This is why you never talk to law enforcement officers without competent legal representation present. And especially the Feds.

Comment Re:well (Score 1) 236

Bruce Schneier himself advises avoiding elliptic-curve, as being intellectually tainted by the spooks. [theguardian.com]

I didn't see any such recommendation in the linked article. However, there is a comment in this article in which he does make such a statement. Schneier seems to have reversed himself on advocating the use of elliptic-curve ciphers.

Comment I hit a pedestrian that stepped out... (Score 1) 136

...from behind a car stopped in traffic. I never saw him, and and he never looked my way. I was traveling about 30 mph, and later reconstruction of the incident by the county sheriff's office (used in my defense during the civil court case) showed that there was probably less than 2 seconds between when he stepped out and when I hit him. I seriously doubt this app would have helped him or anyone else in a similar situation.

BTW, he was issued a ticket in the hospital for "failure to yield right of way to motor vehicle." Never knew there was such a law, and it certainly helped in my defense. (Needless to say, the insurance company paid anyway because it was cheaper than going to court.)

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