In a purely practical and objective standpoint, you are correct. It would make more sense to have employees of the city to do it.

But this is not a practical or objective world. There are politics to be played; Backs to be scratched and palms to be greased. For those in that sort of position of authority, there is a game to be played. Who can they trade this favor of a contract (with the possibility of over-payment) for some future consideration or contribution?

This is not the world of high-school civics that we were taught. These people are not there out of a sense of service to their fellow citizen or because they have good ideas that might make the world a better place.

This is the world where people have ambitions, who want to get ahead and further up the ladder of power. This is the world where people can and do get addicted to the feeling of power that their authority gives them and want only to increase it.

This is also the world where other people, further up the chain of authority tell the lower levels to who and how a contract should be presented. And because it is their boss or their boss's boss or their boss's boss's boss doing this, they fear for their jobs and livelihood and do what they're told instead of going out and shouting to the world of the corruption they've seen.

This isn't the first time this has happened.

It also happened way back when with the start of the airline industry. Back in 1903, the Wright Brothers started one over the way one controlled a plane. Long story short, WWI started and seeing as how planes were a cool new war toy, the US government stepped in and made them make peace or else no one would get the patent money.

I have to wonder what's it going to take to get that to happen this time around.

No it wasn't. It was 9-0 decision. There were two opinions handed down which was the split --- Alito wrote the second and was joined by Ginsberg, Beyer, and Kagan. Alito wanted to go further and say that the length of time required a second, separate warrant to cover it.

See Wired's coverage for more details.

Nothing. You seem to fear the police's ability to investigate. If they find it was a child then they can hand the evidence of such to the parents and DA and let them sort it out. If it was an adult then they can had the same evidence to the DA and let see where the speech may fall. Either way, an investigation as to what happened is called for. The police are the most obvious way to see that done. It doesn't have to be a priority, it doesn't have to take away from any other duties. What exactly are you opposed to in that sense?

At the very least it is a display of ignorance which needs to be dealt with in a way that does not let it grow into something worse. If this was a teen or a child playing (to what in their mind was) a prank, then it definitely needs some sort of correction. If this was an adult then surely they are aware of the consequences of their words and how a society will and often can punish them for such ignorance.

Re #2: The sad fact of the matter is that (as someone living in the county) that it's well known that the BPU is very corrupt. As in former board members have resigned over rigging the pay of friends and family. There's a good reason that the county government ignored them and are trying to ram this through. See this for further reading.

Re #3: The incumbents did this to themselves. Before it was popular everywhere else, Kansas fucked its own ass by giving the cable and telcos state wide franchises and removing all of the local oversight boards. There might have been a chance to stop Google, but their greed got the best of them years ago.

Are we certain about that? I thought that part of the problem was the circular logic used in this case. ie, The government will not let you know if you were spied upon because they might be building a terrorism case against you. As far as I can recall, that was the whole of the initial justification and why congress had to act to pass the law.

So how do we know?

The obvious and easy remedy would be to declare the law null and let the public see for themselves what was done on their behalf. That is the only way to be certain that there was no cause for concern and that there is no other remedy needed in this and every other case brought up by such actions or laws passed by Congress.

Poor science and a century and a half of water rights wars with California.

See this fine article.

It's not that I want to hide the ads. What I want is to hide the annoyance of the ads. Keep the ads subtle and out of the flow of what I'm on a site for, and I won't want to block them.

What the marketers don't understand is that the more annoying they get, the less eyeballs they receive because of more and more people use ad-ons like Adblock to avoid the annoyance. All they seem to understand is the lazy approach. Be loud! Be garish! Be anything but smart and honest!

A new expac announcement inside a year of the last being brought out.

A race and class that's been begged for since the beginning. And was once a April-fools joke.

An additional game, gratis, for long term subscribers.

Is it just me or does this have the reek of desperation? They reported a drop in numbers earlier this year, and it makes me wonder if that drop has been steady all year long. Why else bait the hook with so much junk? It doesn't feel like Blizz has the same confidence in the game they had before.