Ah, I see - you chose to take their post literally.

I chose to assume the caveat "Except the obvious shit" to apply.

I was being facetious. But when you add the "Except the obvious shit" caveat you then introduce "who gets to decide what is obvious".

Perhaps we can all agree "I support sunset clauses on bad laws!" and be done with it?

I don't make that assumption at all (and I don't agree with it either). As I wrote elsewhere:

What I can't agree with is applying sunset clauses to laws that are intended to last. The solution to "Some laws are bad" is not "Let's make laws last for less time and then renew them!" it's "Let's make better laws". If a law is so bad you can't bear to enact it unless it is automatically repealed in 5 years - it's probably not a very good law. All this accomplishes is feeding short-termism, allowing politicians off the hook for their crap. "Hey I passed a law! (But don't worry it won't do any real harm because it'll be off the books before we see the consequences)."

Sunset clauses increase legislative overhead. There are two outcomes from this that I can see:

1. the politicians are overworked so they are able to produce fewer laws, and so fewer laws (bad and good) are passed
2. the politicians are overworked so they are less able to usefully debate/deconstruct laws, and more bad laws are passed

From your post it sounds as though you are advocating for position #1 - that is by making politicians revisit their laws, fewer laws are passed and so the bad laws will be reduced. However, if we apply sunsetting to everything then we also lose good laws. If you think this is on balance an optimum solution then sunsetting is a strange way to approach it - you can have the same effect by simply reducing the numbers of politicians*. That also has the benefit of saving money.

(* the Constitution may have a problem with this - but that's something that can be dealt with when you sunset that and revisit it).

I fall more on the side of position #2 in that I want elected representatives to spend their time doing maximally useful work. I do think there are probably too many laws, but that the most efficient way to deal with that is through progressively revisiting and repealing those that are deemed counterproductive (by the same debate process as sunsetting). I would argue quite strongly that such review should be carried out.

Like the Constitution?

Just to clarify - I'm not against sunset clauses in all cases. But I am against the idea (expressed in the original post) that "There really should be sunset provisions on all laws." Some things don't need regular repeal - some laws are just that good. Like laws against murder. Similarly, short term laws to cover things (like getting back on topic corn subsidies) make sense as a short term financial instrument. There sunsetting makes sense - and gives a defined end point for companies that depend on the subsidy.

What I can't agree with is applying sunset clauses to laws that are intended to last. The solution to "Some laws are bad" is not "Let's make laws last for less time and then renew them!" it's "Let's make better laws". If a law is so bad you can't bear to enact it unless it is automatically repealed in 5 years - it's probably not a very good law. All this accomplishes is feeding short-termism, allowing politicians off the hook for their crap. "Hey I passed a law! (But don't worry it won't do any real harm because it'll be off the books before we see the consequences)."

Bundling these things into cumulative bills would mean they'll get so little oversight that they may as well be permanent. They're hardly read the first time, what makes you think anyone will pay attention to what the law says when it's on page 543?

Huh? That makes no sense. So, basically, you're saying that it takes more time to buy (or not buy) a car someone built than it would take for you to engineer and build a car yourself. That's nuts, yo.

Quite obviously, no. In bigpat's OP they stated that: "There really should be sunset provisions on all laws." This is clearly nonsensical. Or would you argue that there should be sunset provisions on the laws against murder? The Constitution? If not then you accept there is a class of laws for which sunset clauses don't apply (i.e. laws that will be a good law for a long period of time). "There really should be sunset provisions on all laws." is demonstrably false.

If you want to argue that laws against murder get sunset clauses attached and renewed on a decade-by-decade basis assuming "Senator Bob" remembers please do, but I want it as a car analogy.

As opposed to months of 'closed doors' meetings, secret deals with lobbyists, writes and re-writes and re-re-writes, etc.

Because that is of course the only alternative. I'm starting to wonder whether you're ticking off a list of logical fallacies here, you've already managed a Straw man, Either or and False analogy.

That had nothing to do with sunsetting laws, and everything to do with the fact that our Congress is made up of, essentially, narcissistic 5th graders.

Ad hominem.

I'll take your final point though I was thinking of the budget not the fiscal cliff. In other countries the previous budget continues to run until a new one is in place. As a result the running government can't be held hostage to the whim of Senator Bob on an off day. It's not always a simple case of "yea or nay?"

Er, no. Sunset clauses are a terrible waste of government time. Just think about it - if every law you pass gets a sunset clause, that means cumulatively over time you're spending a bigger and bigger portion of your time renewing previous laws to make them still active. You end up with situations like the US "fiscal cliff" - which miraculously every other mature democracy on Earth manages to avoid.

Any good law will be a good law for a long period of time. If it becomes not a good law, repeal it. If you're not sure it's a good enough law to last, don't pass it.

Is it just me, or does it seem like everyone now-a-days is trying very hard to come up with new methodologies and paradigms and web 6.5isms, so they can get their 5 minutes in the lime light?

That's nothing. My new product turns the light plaid.

Competition is good but if the government is doing it this must be socialism.

Does it also detect Slashdot dupes?

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/11/20/161244/google-patents-fooling-friends-with-snooping-chatbots

I said. Does it also detect Slashdot dupes?

Sounds great!

So, to summarize...

• You value people with wealth over those that work
• You think a person's contribution to society is directly proportional to disposable income (Miley Cyrus > Van Gogh)
• You would rather keep someone alive who inherited vast quantities of wealth (and does nothing) vs. someone who started with nothing and now has a job cleaning floors
• You don't like people who clean floors
• You want your pizzas served by people with diseases
• ...preferably from a pizza shop that doesn't clean it's floors

Your utopian dream (I'm calling it Cyrocracy) might just be fair if a) everyone started their life with the same opportunities and wealth; b) all money was redistributed on death (no inheritance). But that smells an awful lot like government intervention so I guess your weird little fantasy can stay just that.

The majority disagreeing with you |= a conspiracy.

The scientists are free to study what they like (in so far as permitted by their funding). This is a deliberately scuppered study on the effects of climate change on Nebraska. By ignoring the elephant in the room the results become next to useless, even dangerous. Since scientific careers are built on usefulness of research taking this on = ~ 3yr of career down the pan for nothing. "They should study it anyway! Scientific curiosity! Every angle!" Yes, and they should also study whether there are fairies on the moon and whether the solution to this whole climate change thing is copper bracelets or setting fire to icebergs. Nobody has checked that right?! Right!

There are an infinite amount of things to study. Scientists have to use their judgement, based on evidence and experience to determine the validity of a line of investigation.

Your boss comes in tomorrow and says "Hey 'phairy, we've got a problem with the network think we're getting hacked." All the evidence points to Chinese hackers, there are even posts all over Netcraft confirming it. "But," your boss continues, "my new business partner is Chinese so don't bring them into it". "I want the report on my desk pronto - and if it doesn't help fix the problem you're fired!*"

I guess you'll just buckle down and write that report?

*fudged to fit the analogy. Feel free to replace with "you can spend the next 3 years upgrading our network to block everything (except Chinese hackers). If it doesn't solve the problem you're fired!"

Grant money is grant money, and publications are publications.

That couldn't be less true if it tried. A PhD/post-doc spent outputting useless intentionally-crippled research is not the basis of a successful career.

I am sure there are many grad students / post docs willing to take on this research.

Find one. I hear Nebraska has some money to spend.

Thanks for the link - that cleared things up nicely.

The Tor site is a tad jargon heavy methinks.

The video on the EFF site gives instructions for downloading a Vidalia Bundle for Mac - but this doesn't exist on the Tor website. The only downloads that I can see available are the 'Tor Browser Bundle' which is an auto-launching Tor node and browser combination.

So you can't run a node without a Tor browser window open all the time?