You realize that radiated energy decreases with the square of distance, right?

No. But in my defense, that is because that's not true. That is only the case when the radiation goes equally in all directions. A radar gun focuses the energy in a much more concentrated beam. Therefore, the falloff is far less.

It's a huge stretch to compare a doctor who spent years in medical school training to diagnose and treat medical problems with airport security guards.

It's the education that separates what happens in a doctor's office from random things on the street? I thought it was informed consent and context.

You go try screening young women for breast cancer on the street. Let me know how that works out for you if you can get onto slashdot from jail.

I assume you're implying without their consent. It would be just as bad as me as for a doctor without their consent. Of course, the doctor could offer to perform a legitimate service that I could not (real medical care), but as long as I made it clear it was role-play and not a legit offer of services I cannot imagine any legal issue. Of course, there may be public indecency rules, but those apply regardless of medical degree.

So when this stuff started become standard operating procedure I decided to never again travel to the USA, and that has worked out pretty well. No conferences, no family holidays, no business trips, no standing in line while a jackbooted rentacop yells "PAPERS!" in my face.

"Papers" is about controlling who can go where. This is obviously very bad.

Frisking is about discovering contraband. Frisking everyone does not bother me. I don't really care if I get frisked entering a mall or a bar... just have a qualified professional do it.

So sue away... until another Apple ends up owning you because you flatly refused to give customers what we're begging for and willing to pay for, an easy way to watch every TV ever created on every media device we own.

One, that's a pretty tall demand.

Two, like half these companies are part owners of Hulu. The rest license content to Hulu. I'm sure this is more about protecting Hulu's profit margin, and standing to sue, than anything.

They're designing it from the ground up to be PATRIOT-Act proof because it will literally be impossible for them to give the feds the data they want. It is fewer fights, but may amount to one HUGE fight with the biggest gorilla on earth, the U.S. Justice Department.

Who he already fought. This guy is the same guy who fought (successfully), the national security letter he recieved in 2007.

Humans are as tribal as they want to be. In Ireland there has been a HUGE influx of immigrants ... Backlash? None. Rise of right wing groups? None.

Its a very open and inclusive society

Ireland as a paradigm of understanding and tolerance? Of non-tribal behavior?

Need I point to the sectarian Irish Civil War?

Obviously, there's some danger/value tradeoff societies have to make. I'm not claiming everything has to be perfect or not exist.

However, your claim that the recall must somehow involve junking all the cars is similarly extremist. Look at the Prius recall. A lot of other recalls are done in a rolling fashion, fixed in the dealership (so the recall may take a few weeks... that's another way of handling cost/danger tradeoffs) while the person reads a book for half an hour, and the defective part is replaced (or commonly failing part is tested to see if it needs to be replaced.

If the settlement/loss cost put too low of a weight on human life in the equation, then the argument is that the results of lawsuits are too cheap, not that the car companies shouldn't use the equation at all.

Well, it's an interesting collection of conflicting goals. If car companies use this equation, and the equation is accurate, then it correctly captures the costs. However, a lawsuit also has a punitive aspect... testing to see if the 5 cent savings in plastic will make the car dangerous before saving that money is something we want to incentivize. But that leads to too many recalls.

Of course they're going to use that equation. Why wouldn't they?

It fails to take into account people who don't settle immediately: court costs, damages if found guilty and public relations costs. It also fails to take into account the value of certainty vs. uncertainty in costs. And that's without all the more involved questions about whether a public recall costing X hurts the stock price more than secret payments of Y given current conditions, etc.

Why shouldn't they?

Well, reading "should" as a moral question, I doubt that the aggregate out-of-court settlements really capture the full cost of leaving the vehicles on the road.

Why can't they say that already? "Oh, maybe in the eyes of THE_STATE you're married, but not in the eyes of MY_DEITY".

Because most people recognise that they can be both religious and a citizen of a state? Seriously, what a Mormon believes religious truth is doesn't matter. What the state believes the legal truth is, does.

If the state says a speed limit is X, we understand that it is X.

Marriage as a concept hasn't traditionally been owned by organized religion,

I can only really speak to European history, but it was pretty owned by religion (not necessarily organised.) Judaism defines religion. Catholicism defines religion. Anglicanism started over marriage. Whether Eastern marriages were religious or not, a good chunk of the planet believes it is religious.

My point is that the whole "the state shouldn't be involved in marriage, but domestic unions are okay!" thing seems dishonest. State marriage is a non-religious domestic union. If they really mean "gays shouldn't be domestic unioned", they ought to just say it. If they're really concerned that the State will start interceding on their religion, why not pass a law to prevent that rather than one to stop same-sex marriage in general?

They do. Or at least a large movement does. If you're talking only about those who say "legal marriage for me, legal civil union for you", that's a fair critique. But there is a large group that just wants the government to stop having any say in "marriage" and only deal with "legal household creation". That group exists and you do them a disservice by lumping them in with the others.

Who cares if it happens to share the same word as religious institutions use for their own domestic unions?

A lot of people.

I mean, I know it's a rhetorical question, but it seems particularly incorrect. A lot of people object to the term "married" being applied to gay people. For religious reasons. And since it's a legal term, the state defines who is married and who is not. If the state used any other word, those offended would say something like "Oh, maybe in the eyes of STUPID_OTHER_DIETY you're married, but not in the eyes of MY_DIETY."

That argument strikes me as a cheap way of shifting responsibility. Rather than truthfully supporting their positions, the religious folks can just say "well, the state shouldn't be involved in marriage anyways"

Huh? They don't think that gay people should be allowed to get married. Instead of letting 800 definitions of "married" exist, the state creates one. That seems to be pretty explicit.

What secret position do you think they support?