The DEA is only a subset of 'the government', not in charge of it.
Think about how much real power 'the government' has over its branches. They might manage the bosses, but what goes on inside is not monitored by 'the government'.

And how often do you hear of branches doing stuff they should not? Do you honestly think it is always 'an order from them man himself'? Don't kid yourself.

Problem is, they are all in the same boat so they will be very cautious to beat themselves for any wrong doing.
If a branch gets caught doing something they should not, a few token fall-men will take the blame and get moved over.

Thing is, this also happens in the private sector.

Think about it from a different perspective: How many employees rip off their employers? Now think about a company the size of the government.
Do you think every time a stapler is stolen, it is by decree? Do you think every time a bent cop plants evidence, it is done by order of the government?

People are people. And the government, just like the private sectors, are made out of people. If they think they can get away with things, they will try to do so. They are just as corruptible and as honest as other people.

Only difference between private and public is that the big heads in charge are voted in by the people. So if someone in the government is corrupt, well you put the person there.

Think about that next time you vote. Do you think the person will do a good job because he is 'likeable'? The boss of Amazon, Steve Jobs and others could be ar$3holes, but they did do good jobs.

One thing people always forget is that such systems cost money to install and operate.

Today the DEA wants to use it against drug trafficking. But let's be realistic, they won't catch many (criminals are not idiots), but the system will continue to cost money. So they extend the goal to include other crimes as well. Perhaps even mistermeaners. All just to justify the costs. And to fight crime o/c.

This is basically the chicken-egg problem that will wind up costing a lot of money but only bring little actual value.
Except to the people selling and/or running such systems.

You can look to the UK to see how great it works. Instead of catching the bombers, they use it to catch people littering or urinating/humping in corners.

I think we all have to come to the realization that OUR governments are puppets for corporates. Whenever politicians talk about fixing things, they only want to 'increase the economy' i.e. help the corporations, never fixing social needs.

I look at Germany's booming economy, yet we have totally slashed and gutted our social systems. We can spend trillions on banks and Greece, yet cut our funding for schools and other projects.

And when they want to 'invest in the country' they fix/build roads. Now who the fark gains anything from that, besides the road building companies and the politicians themselves, because it gives the smokescreen of them actually doing something for once?

Our politicians live on the whim of corporations. If the politicians think about doing something the corporations do not like, the corporations threaten to fire people &| close plants and move them to Cheapistan or simply start a media campaign to denounce them. Every tax cut, every 'reduction of bureaucracy' comes at the advantage of corporations.

How else do you think the banks got the trillion dollar bailout in a few days, yet our governments cannot even find 1/100 of that for teachers or meals in schools or whatever?

Don't vote established parties. They have lost their ways and are simply corporate drones.

For the record, yeah I am pissed and what pisses me off more is that we all would rather complain then actually do something about it.

Perhaps because we try to find the golden hammer that will replace all our energy problems with one decisive sweep.
That won't work. Just solar or wind or whatever power cannot compare.

IMHO, we should not find one, but rather take them all (as far as possible). f.i. If you only chose solar, what do you do on a rainy day?

So I would go all out. Even personally for my own house.
Solar, wind and a geo-thermal heat pump.
Keep the isolation of you house up to date and conserve energy (not energy abstinence, just try not to use as much)
And I think that is something we all have to do.

One other semi-pseudo argument I often hear is how we need to create this huge infrastructure for power transportation (i.e. backbones to transport large amounts).
Yet at the same time we want to decentralize the power creation with a large number of small plants.

Now I might be confused, but if I really do decentralize the creation with massive amounts of small plants, why do I need a huge infrastructure? Wasn't the large infrastructure needed due to the centralized nature of the old system? And if I have multiple smaller power plans all close by, why do I need to get my energy from farther away?
Also, would a distributed net (similar to the www) not also be able to transport smaller amounts, but over multiple paths from A to Z?

Probably one of the few that would be problematic are the industries that consume a lot of energy. But there I would consider creating a special grid for their massive needs.
Kinda like backbones.

Reminds me of a telecom joke where two techs are talking about the new mobile antenna they installed and that people were complaining about headaces and whatnot.
Upon which the other replies: Wait until we turn it on!

Back to the topic. I have read a lot about people in Germany complaining about the noise (range about 50m) and the shadow casts if the sun crosses the turbines path.

But I do find them questionable at best. Most of these turbines do not stand next to houses and the shadow is only for a short period of time.

How about other 'dramatic' problems:
Solar panels: sun/light reflections
Bio-Gas: smell
ground pumps: the drilling

Yes, they all have their downsides, but I would ALWAYS prefer them to a coal burning plant or a nuclear facility whos waist will still be around far after all of us have fallen to dust.

Thing is, people do not care about what you do as long as it is not in their back yard.

The lizard chick with the katana!
It would be quite interesting because it adds the extra problem of non-humans milling about in human history/future.

+1

@Sub-Topic:
If we do consider ourselves democracies or republics then WE are the ones responsible for the governments we elect.

Not like other totalitarian states where we love to punish the populace for actions committed by government they had no part in creating.

Strange that we elect them, yet when they pull some dumb shit, we quickly claim innocence and that we have no involvement!

Sorry, in a democracy they represent US (as in the people) and what they do in our name reflects upon us.

Yeah, on Maher or The Daily Show someone said that China will do what works and call it 'Socialism'.
Though kinda like we call 'Democracy' ;)

I think the initial statement of '$60 to expensive' is to simple.
To expensive for what?
For a standalone game that offers ~40 hours of entertainment? I think not.
Even a multiplayer game that sounds quite reasonable, as long as there are no monthly costs.
If I have to pay monthly, then I do not want to have to buy a box in advance.

What also might be indicated is that the days of trying to leech your clients for all they have are coming to a rapid end, even more so with Free2Play titles.

While WoW was massively popular and did earn the people a lot of money, it was like earning money off of Online Poker. Get the people hooked (emotionally) and then try to bleed them for all they have.
I see the same problem with Free2Play titles.

Contrary to that I go back to games like GuildWars (made by old Blizzard people) who did not try to leech their customers. You had to pay the full price for the boxed game (a nice box btw!) and then could play for free with ALL benefits. You did not even need the box because you only needed a small start-client you could download from the GW-page. i.e. no scratched DVDs.
While the addons and some other additions (more char slots) did cost extra, you were not missing out on the game just because you did not shell out money.

The devs (remember they were from Blizzard and created Diablo) knew that you did not need the subscription model to finance the game. So they did that and were quite profitable in a market dominated by WoW.

So I'd happily shell out $60 bucks for GuildWars2 because I know that that will be the last purchase I need to make to enjoy the game (at least from the game's point of view, HW purchases not included).

Good point. Could it be that the government is trying to raise the lower level of 'acceptable harm'?
Basically that would be the level at which the government can induce harm to get it's way without it becoming a civil rights issue.

I mean if you look at how your government already operates with pepper spray and tazers, they have already become the 'normal procedure' and not an exception.
Hence being sprayed and tazed is no longer considered 'to much'.

The excuses were quickly found why the police, you know the ones with the guns and the nightsticks and cuffs and whatnot had to use it against pacifist demonstrators doing a sit-in to 'protect themselves and the populace' and the people accept it.
Hey it is the police and what they do must be right. Heck they even threw those people in jail so the protesters must be criminals and deserve whatever they get.

So the powers will try to 1up the current level. 'How much more can we get away with?' If you look at what our governments can already get away with, I think we can all scratch the 'democratics' and 'republics' from our nations.

Now since all that has become the norm, what do you think the threshold is to torture someone? Not to mention a 'non-american dark skinned non-christian'?

It is not a lack of training or whatever when this happens. It is either sanctioned or the proverbial tip of an iceberg from a sick culture.

We claim to hold ourselves to the highest standards, yet drop them at the first chance we get. Kinda shows we never had those high standards in the first place, or at least only expected them from others.