Do you know how much better you could make the world if you go volunteer instead of post on Slashdot?

That can often run into many thousands of pages, and they can change literally every single day. Regulated industries often have employees whose sole job it is to ensure that they're in compliance with the regulations. [...] This isn't necessarily a bad thing. The Congress aren't experts in the domain.

And when you have thousands of pages of regulations, so many that you need compliance experts, that drives up costs for the business and ultimately the end consumer. It raises the barrier of entry for new companies, and tilts things in the favor of large, established corporations, reducing potential competition. Want to help the entrenched monopolies? Pass regulations.

Don't get me wrong - not all regulations are bad. We need some regulations (don't dump radioactive waste into the water supply, for example), but our government goes crazy with them and we end up with a tangled mess.

I believe that regulations (which are just laws passed by an agency) should be voted on by congress. No, I don't expect congress to be an expert in internet communications, but they don't have to be an expert if we really do need them to do something. They don't need to know the contents of the header of an IP packet and they don't need to know what a subnet is. They just need to have the gasp of general concepts (communications carrier, content provider, etc.) that your average joe already understands (or can understand), and write some basic, simple laws.

I do believe that it can be that simple. No law or regulation should be so complicated and so complex that your average person is unable to understand what it means, and it shouldn't be so long that it spans a thousand pages or more. It sure as hell shouldn't be passed without being read on the floor. It's endemic of a serious problem in general in our legislative process.

What I think I'm arguing for, in essence, is a refactoring of our existing laws (to make them far fewer and more simple) and forcing them to be talked about and passed in the open, where it's easy to see what is happening, where the common person can (and should) be able to understand what is being proposed and offer input.

This does not mean that domain experts shouldn't be involved - of course they should be - but the end result should be short and simple and voted upon.

Okay, I'm going back to my world where politicians actually give a crap about the country. Bye!

I believe you need a slight correction: Conservatives believe in the free market. Many republicans are not conservatives.

Cymbals are even worse when you're listening to orchestras, and then there's gongs and whatnot. Encoding has gotten a LOT better over the years, but even today you need to encode at 192kbps at least for it to have an okay sound. Certain instruments just don't encode very well.

I also don't "get" Reddit. The pages give me a headache, it's a mess. The moderation system also sucks (just up and down) and looking at what gets modded up there... Slashdot is still way, way better.

I remember sending mail to America Online requesting their installation disks. They had that hole removed so that you couldn't write to them, meaning you weren't able to use their disks for whatever you wanted.

Worked great - until I fetched a roll of tape. ~(o:

BlackBerry phones are still the de facto gold standard for international travel. You can go just about anywhere and it will work. Those who travel between North America and Europe know what I'm talking about. If you're somewhat high level in the government I'd imagine there is a fair amount of international travel, so it's nice to have something that will "just work" when you head overseas.

I know, BlackBerry isn't considered trendy or sexy or cool or hipster, but their products work.

One can have a little humor without making it into a political war, which I hadn't, nor was I intending to do so.

Breathe.

Smile.

Relax.

It's okay.

I hope the rest of your day goes well.

...then it is good enough for us. Right?

11? You are way, way off. 18 is the latest.

It's very nice that they released a report. Maybe the next move will be a very strongly worded letter!

I tried this service a few months ago - I took pictures of about 200 books (out of 1,000 or so) and not a single match was found. It's a great idea, but the library is so thin that the service is probably near useless for most people. Still, it's worth a few minutes of your time to check it out just in case.

I do wish that the major publishers would get behind this service. I wouldn't mind paying a dollar or two for an electronic version of the paperback books I already own - but honestly not much more than that.

The worst part about felonies is that apparently, the average American can be convicted of Three Felonies a Day. If someone doesn't like you and has a little influence, it would be very easy to ruin your life. Forever. Felonies are no joke. Not only is there a loss of voting rights, but as the submitter has noted, getting hired is impossible. You're also not allowed to own a firearm - even if your felonies wee completely non-violent or were a long time ago. Renting an apartment or a house can be impossible. You can't hold many professional licenses. You cannot even get a license to cut hair if you're a felon.

A felony is in general (but not always) a serious crime. There should be some kind of punishment. But once that punishment is dealt... how do you move on with your life? Is it any wonder that we have so many repeat offenders that get out of jail, spend a few weeks outside, and bounce right back in again? It's hard to find a way to make an honest living, find a place to live, etc.

These people are doomed by a scarlet letter. It is one of our modern society's greatest crimes.

From Redrawing the Lines (just a site I found with a quick Google search, no special reason to pick it other than it is what I found):

Are states permitted to create new majority- minority districts?

States are permitted and sometimes required to create new majority-minority districts under the Voting Rights Act to avoid diluting minority voting strength during redistricting. States with significant minority population growth over the course of the last decade, for instance, may need to create new majority-minority districts to ensure that redistricting plans comply with the requirements of Section 2 of the Act. Plans that dilute minority voting strength by failing to create feasible majority-minority districts may be quickly challenged following adoption. Since Section 2 litigation can be both costly and time- consuming, officials in many states set out to draw plans that fairly reflect minority voting strength at the beginning of the redistricting process. The need to comply with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act to avoid minority vote dilution can serve as a compelling justification for both preserving and creating new majority-minority districts, which helps protect these districts from constitutional attack.

From Cornell University, we have:

Vote Dilution

Section 2 of the VRA, codified at 42 U.S.C. 1973, prohibits drawing election districts in ways that improperly dilute minorities’ voting power. This prohibition applies to states, counties, cities, school districts, and any other governmental unit that holds elections. Two typical forms of vote dilution involve “cracking” a minority community between several election districts, and “submerging” minority communities in multi-member districts. Cracking occurs when election officials split a single minority community into enough different election districts that even if the community voted as a bloc, it could not influence any single districts’ elections. Alternately, election officials might dilute a minority community’s voting power by submerging it in a multi-member district with enough non-minority voters to routinely defeat the minority community’s chosen candidates. See Gerrymandering.

Personally, I find it all to be a bunch of bullcrap. Have you seen those voting districts that are along, squiggly lines that wander all over the place? Give me big squares, randomly generated with approval from a set of judges or something like that, and get the god damned legislators out of the district drawing business. I don't care who it "hurts" or "helps", it is ridiculous to have some of the districts that we do.