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Comment Re:Annoying but actually reasonable (Score 1) 45

I would hope most every folk understand why such a tax is necessary and good but I guess I've never seen the logistical and privacy costs of tracking the miles driven worth the benefits over just flat rating the EV at registration, or making it based on vehicle weight or some other fact of the vehicle and driver. The best taxes tend to be the ones that are the simplest to comply with.

Comment Re:2 out of 10 - Could do better. (Score 1) 45

Don't know where you are from but here in America(TM) we let the states decide how and whether at all vehicles get inspected, despite the fact there are zero restrictions for driving between state borders.

I live in a no inspection state and while when I did it was annoying to have to take it in every year or two the number of tires in the parking lot I see with the belt wires poking out tells me they're probably a good thing.

Comment Re: Make EV owners buy fire insurance also (Score 1) 45

The fires can be worse but gas cars catch on fire like 2-20x as often.

This is also a problem that is only going to get better over time, most companies are moving away from lithium-ion and they are making more and more stable. In 20 years all the batteries will be solid state and those vehicles will effectively be inert, the only flammable device will be the airbags.

This was more interesting counterpoint back in the 2010's where every Tesla that caught fire made the national news but the stats just don't back it up.

Comment So I looked into it (Score 1) 38

The examples I can find where someone actually got in trouble were explicit calls to violence. The famous one is a guy who wrote for a British sitcom called Father Ted. He explicitly said that if you see a trans girl in a woman's bathroom you should punch them in the balls. The two that got actual jail time were inciting an attack on a hotel full of immigrants during riots. Even in America that's not legal we just very seldom enforce those laws.

The example in the article you linked to the police admitted they were wrong and paid the people in question 20,000 British pounds as compensation. In America the 20K would not have been worth it because every time you interact with police there's a high probability they are going to kill you. When police get something wrong in America the payout should probably be at least half a million to account for that. But as far as I know the cops in the UK don't just randomly murder people for shits and giggles like they do in United States.

I'm not saying that there isn't some abuse going on though. 12,000 arrests is insane.

But at the same time they're probably needs to be a middle ground between arresting 12,000 people and the rampant stochastic terrorism we've got going on here in the United States where we've got idiots running around killing people trying to start a race war.

Comment Re:Will be prohibited into the United States (Score 0) 41

LOL, you're so funny.

The US

Died a little less than year ago. Now there's no "US", there is the trumpistan, a country, which basic ideology doesn't differ all that much from the basic ideology of China or Russia or North Korea. The slight difference is that trumpistan is a few years behind those three, although it is catching up quite quickly.

Still, it is as much an enemy of the free world, as exemplified by its support for rashism, by its rampant and shameless corruption, by the baseless accusations towards its former allies, which it uses to excuse its bullying and by its absurd territorial claims, that lack even putin's appearance of "historical" justification.

People didn't like US, but they really don't want to be under the trumpist/Chinese/Russian/North Korean boot.

And you, unlike anyone else in history, chose this yourselves freely.

So, please, go eat a bowl of dicks with that self-righteous attitude.

Comment Re:UK arrests 30 people a day for speech (Score 1) 38

Only when little are against right wing policies.

When people are attacking from the right, e.g. immigrant haters and farmers opposed to tax, the government is very very light touch.

Farage is busy inciting race riots where convicted domestic abusers attack the police and they're are hardly any arrests. But against hold up the wrong cardboard sign...

Comment Re:Legal precedent (Score 3, Interesting) 26

I mean a country is by definition sovereign, so the idea of 'legal precedent' is meaningless. You probably mean that it's not in keeping with the 'rules based global trading order' which is true, but that was/is simply a post-war construct that is getting pretty shaky these days. You're not supposed to be able to slap tariffs on whoever you feel like to strong arm them into doing your bidding either, but here we are.

Ultimately the government of India can fine Apple, or whoever they want, whatever they feel like if their voters don't kick up a fuss. I imagine that Apple has tried to appeal to the government and hasn't made any progress, so they're going for a constitutional ruling since this has authority over the legislature.

But I think Apple still has a lot of leverage here. They probably can't pull out of the country, though I imagine they could threaten it and see if the government calls their bluff. But they have large factory investments there (through Foxconn), people like their products, and I imagine lots of Indians work on products tied to the Apple ecosystem. Closing all of that out would not be good for the Indian economy. There is also wider leverage from the US government. I'm sure Tim Apple can find an even bigger piece of gold to gift to the administration.

Comment Re:About time (Score 1) 41

You mean unlike the US pharma price-gouging, where people pay 20x as much as they do for basically the same product with the same safety in other places? Let's hope so. Americans may find out that most things can actually be treated without sending you into medical bankruptcy.

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