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Comment There is a problem with "viewership" (Score 1) 45

Just because someone has a channel on doesn't mean they are watching it. Doesnt mean its not on mute. Someone could be taking a whiz, making dinner or any number of things. Does DVR recording count as "watching"? because if thats the case you can FF through all the commercials anyway. I dont know how television networks get so much money from advertisers when actual viewership is just, at best, a liberal estimate of how many people are actually watching anything at all.

Comment Re:TAX or PENALTY???? (Score 1) 688

How can SCOTUS make it a tax out of thin air when thats not what the bill spelled it out to be? I dont see how they redefine it to be a tax instead of a penalty just to save unconstitutional merits. Your line about deferring to Congress is really exactly what i was confused about. Shouldn't congress have had to go back and write it as a tax and vote on it again since originally it was going to be a penalty?

Comment Re:TAX or PENALTY???? (Score 1) 688

the general idea was is that if it had been written as a Tax instead of a penalty it wouldnt have made it to the presidents desk to sign because people didnt want to be taxed more to basically fund other peoples healthcare - so they were going through with it as a penalty.... this is what i remember so please correct me.

Comment TAX or PENALTY???? (Score 1) 688

What I don't get is that the bill that was written had it as a PENALTY. Thats what was voted on in congress. SCOTUS ruled that it is constitutional as a TAX yet I find it odd that congress didn't have to go back and vote on the bill with the clarity of it being a tax.

Perhaps a dumb question but: How is it that the Affordable Care Act is being implemented when the congress voted on it based on penalties but that was found to be unconstitutional....and congress didn't have to re-vote on the bill to be passed after the SCOTUS ruling that said it had to be a tax?? I've been wondering that now for some time.

Comment Re:Limited Vs Perpetual (Score 1) 154

"No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."

I dont see anywhere where it says , No bill... shale be passed... except when talking about Copyright. Did they just make that part up on a whim? I know that they have made up things in the past, like declaring that somehow there is a "separation of church and state" in the constitution where that phrase never is mentioned in any founding document. Not only did they have to go outside of the any of the founding documents to declare this clause part of the constitution but the intent behind the Danbury letter had a totally different context/meaning/circumstance that is well documented in history and they, (SCOTUS) chose to ignore/were ignorant of the facts.

Again, in the Ashcroft case, it looks like they just made up laws on the whim which is not their job anyway.

Comment Limited Vs Perpetual (Score 1) 154

I cannot believe that the law didn't say something to the effect, limited in nature and not to exceed "X" amount of years. The non-dissenters argued that as long as the copyrights werent perpetual then that wasnt a problem. What the heck does perpetual even mean? As long as it's not "forever"? That is, as one dissenter stated, virtual perpetual extensions.

Comment Video Games Quote (Score 1) 203

"The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games"

Why would you want to take the fun out of making video games? Did he not get the memo that happy employees means better products, better team spirit, better morale in the office etc etc etc ?

Comment Re:Pretty awesome precedent, actually (Score 1) 1073

The (democratically elected, BTW) AG, in her professional opinion as, you know, an attorney, determined that the law was unconstitutional and refused to enforce it.

He, under oath, swore to enforce laws passed by her constituents. It isn't her job to determine where something in unconstitutional or not. People always complain around here about a theocracy and this sounds like a pure theocratical power grab by the AG. And yes, you can vote the AG out, eventually, but the AG in the case should be downright impeached for not upholding what he vowed to uphold.

Well, yes, there is always the potential for the abuse of elected (or appointed, however your AG works) power.

That was the meat of the decision: The Supremes carefully considered whether anyone was screwed, and decided that the people complaining had, in fact, not been screwed.*

The people complaining just wasnt about them bring *screwed but all the of the people of the state of california being *screwed as well. Why have an amendment that the people of california vote on that can so easily be refuted? That doesn;t seem like something the founding fathers would have wanted or approved of. On top of that the very same people (and a small group of people in question here that was sent to represent everyone else who voted for Prop 8.) can't even defend what was voted on because the AG refuses to enforce it? This just wasnt about harm to the 6 or 7 individuals before the court but to rest of the people of california and harm to amendment system as well.

As bjdevil said earlier, this is WRONG. He should be at least impeached. At least. And this is a BAD precedent. Next thing you know some other law will get passed and the AG will say, "hey i don't llke that law, *screw it!, I am not going to enforce it.

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