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Earth

VA Supreme Court: Michael Mann Needn't Turn Over All His Email 348

RoccamOccam sends news that the Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that Michael Mann, a climate scientist notable for his work on the "hockey stick" graph, does not have to turn over the entirety of his papers and emails under Freedom of Information laws. Roughly 1,000 documents were turned over in response to the request, but another 12,000 remain, which lawyers for the University of Virginia say are "of a proprietary nature," and thus entitled to an exemption. The VA Supreme Court ruled (PDF), "the higher education research exemption's desired effect is to avoid competitive harm not limited to financial matters," and said the application of "proprietary" was correct in this case. Mann said he hopes the ruling "can serve as a precedent in other states confronting this same assault on public universities and their faculty."
Technology

Ask Slashdot: What Tech Products Were Built To Last? 702

itwbennett writes: "When you think about tech products these days, you probably think 'refresh cycle' more than 'built to last.' But there are plenty of tech products that put up with hard, daily use year after year. Here's a few to get you started: Logitech MX510 mouse, Brother black & white laser printer, Casio G-Shock watch, Alvin Draf-Tec Retrac mechanical pencil, Sony Dream Machine alarm clock. What's your longest-lasting, hardest-working device?"

Comment Re:It's crap (Score 1) 1633

As I posted elsethread:

Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution reads in part:

The Congress shall have power...
To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
[...]
To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

In other words, it was intended that we have no standing army[1] and that instead we have a militia of armed citizens that could be quickly mustered to "execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions", and for this militia to be governed and regulated by rules promulgated by Congress (but ultimately under the command of the President as commander-in-chief).

The bit about "suppressing insurrections" is particularly damning of the idiots who think the intent for the Second Amendment was to give us the ability to overthrow the government. Even in George Washington's presidency the militia was used to suppress an insurrection (the Whiskey Rebellion), so it's quite obvious that the intent was to have the "well regulated militia" be our primary fighting force at least until a proper army could be mustered and fielded, and so the right for people to keep and bear arms was meant to make sure we had a militia capable of fighting.

Since we now have a permanent standing army, there's no longer any reason under the original intent for citizens to have an unrestricted right to keep and bear arms.

I am not making any arguments as to whether relying on a militia rather than a standing army is a good one, I'm just going for the "original intent" argument that gun-rights people have such a huge boner for.

[1] which is why we have the biannual vestigial fig-leaf of the National Defense Authorization bill.

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